Miniature Railroads: Billy Jones Wildcat Railroad

William “Billy” Jones was a San Lorenzo Valley native who began his career working for the Southern Pacific Railroad at the age of 13 in 1897. For the next 54 years, he became a mainstay of the local railroad industry, running engines all along the California coast. It was late in his career, in 1939, when he found a one-third scale, 18- inch-gauged steam locomotive in a shipping warehouse.1 It had been originally built for the Venice Miniature Railway by the Johnson Machine Works of Los Angeles in 1905, but had been abandoned with the closure of the miniature railroad in February 1925. Its history for the next fourteen years is mostly unknown, with it eventually falling into the hands of a local machinist who purchased and relocated the locomotive from Los Angeles to San Francisco.2 Jones bought the small locomotive and brought it to his Los Gatos prune ranch on Daves Avenue where he spent the next four years restoring the engine.3 His intention was to rebuild the locomotive with the help of his two sons as a family project, but both sons tragically died while fighting in World War II. Jones decided to continue the restoration as a memorial for his sons. Over the years, he partnered with Louis MacDermot to build miniature passenger cars to support the burgeoning railroad.

BJW #2 on the track at the Jones Ranch, 2 May 1951 [Charles Givens]

In 1943, Jones opened up the Wildcat Railroad on his property, free of charge to the public. The trains could hold up to 90 passengers at a time.4 Jones retired from the Southern Pacific in 1949, after which he devoted himself full-time to his miniature railroad. Walt Disney, another miniature railroad fan, became an acquaintance of Jones around 1948 and Jones visited Disneyland frequently, even running the Santa Fe & Disneyland Railroad during its first week of operations in 1955. Jones's railroad was immensely popular with the Los Gatos community, and Jones himself was a well-known philanthropist, donating money to children’s hospitals and local non-profits.5 Jones eventually died of leukemia on January 10, 1968.6

Opening day of the Billy Jones Wildcat Railroad at Oak Meadow Park, 1970. [Robert Turner]

Fortunately, Jones’s family and a lot of locals wished to preserve the miniature railroad for future generations of Los Gatans. They founded Billy Jones Wildcat Railroad, Inc., a non-profit charity focused on family entertainment and education. The train and facilities were moved from Jones’s ranch to Oak Meadow Park beside Vasona Park where an engine house and passenger depot were built for the train. Over a mile of track would be built in the following years to support the train, including two bridges over Los Gatos Creek, one of which was constructed from a disused Southern Pacific flatcar.7 Most of the trackage is within the adjacent Vasona Park, though the depot and maintenance facilities are in Oak Meadow Park. The railroad began operations at its new location on July 26, 1970.8 The attraction is now one of the most popular tourist features in Los Gatos, bringing in over 100,000 riders each year.

BJW #2 at the depot fuelling up for a day around the track at Oak Meadow Park. [Ed Kelley]

The original railroad was expanded in 1993 by the addition of a miniature diesel locomotive numbered 2502. It was built by Custom Locomotive Works of Chicago and donated to the railroad by Al Smith, founder of Orchard Supply Hardware and operator of the miniature Swanton Pacific Railroad north of Davenport.9 It now acts as the pinch hitter for the original steam locomotive, numbered 2. Another diesel, #3502, joined the Billy Jones fleet in 2005, while a custom-built electric engine went into service at around the same time to assist with track maintenance. Finally, a fifth engine and second steam engine joined in April 2013.10

BJW Diesel #2502 running along the track in Vasona Park. [Marcel Marchon]

Bill Mason Carousel at Oak Meadow Park. 

For additional entertainment, the Town of Los Gatos added a carousel to Oak Meadow Park in 1991 following a decade of restoration work. The carousel dated to 1915 and was built for the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco. The restoration work became a community affair with dozens of local artists assisting in painting the wooden horses and the decorations on and around the carousel. A Wurlitzer band organ was installed, as well, to provide music for the ride.11 The carousel was dedicated to the memory of William E. Mason, a civic-minded man who ran the non-profit Wildcat Railroad for many years after Jones’s death.12

The Railroad Today:

BJW Diesel #3502 in Vasona Park.

The Billy Jones Wildcat Railroad runs year-round with weekly service in the summer and on weekends during the remainder of the year. The surrounding Oak Meadow Park was established by the Town of Los Gatos in 1958 to replace Memorial Park which was
demolished to create State Route 17.13 When it first opened, the park sat on the eastern edge of the Southern Pacific Railroad right-of-way which became soon after University Avenue. The Southern Pacific Railroad tracks were removed in 1959, but the railroad’s legacy lives on today through Billy Jones and the miniature railroad that he built.

Citations & Credits:

1. “Billy Jones Wildcat Railroad and W.E. ‘Bill’ Mason Carousel,” Billy Jones Wildcat Railroad.
2. Panacy, Peter, “Venice Miniature Railway: A Brief History and Its Influence on the Billy JonesWildcat Railroad,” 10.
3. “Billy Jones."
4. Bruntz, George G., The History of Los Gatos: Gem of the Foothills (Fresno, CA: Valley Publishers, 1971), 149.
5. “Billy Jones."
6. Kelley, Edward and Peggy Conaway, Images of Rail: Railroads of Los Gatos (Mount Pleasant, SC: Arcadia, 2006), 68. 
7. “Billy Jones."
8. Kelley & Conaway, 110.
9. “Billy Jones”; Kelley & Conaway, 123.
10. "Billy Jones."
11. “Billy Jones."
12. Bergtold, Peggy Conaway, and Stephanie Ross Mathews, Legendary Locals of Los Gatos (Mount Pleasant, SC: Arcadia, 2014), 74.
13. “Oak Meadow Park," Town of Los Gatos, California.

Source:

• Whaley, Whaley. Santa Cruz Trains: Railroads of the Santa Cruz Mountains. Santa Cruz, CA: 2015: 191-193.

Miniature Railroads: Ramohs Pacific Railroad

One could say that the hills were alive with the sounds of miniature railroads, and it would be true. In the hills above Los Gatos between the town and Almaden Valley, Ralph Morrell Heintz built a quite small 7.5-inch gauge railroad on his private hillside estate that he named the Ramohs Pacific Railroad.

Ralph Heintz's W6RH ham radio registration card, showing him driving his miniature train while holding his parrot, Shorty. His wife, Sophie, and dog, Gilmore, are in the trailing cars, ca 1960. [Engineering and Technology History Wiki]

The property on which the Heintz family built their ranch was originally owned in the early 1900s by James Augustus Bacigalupi, first president of the Bank of Italy and a founder of the Bank of America. Somewhere on the property, a large mansion was built, and for decades the property was simply known to locals as "The Mansion". It burned down in 1965 and the property was mostly abandoned by the time Ralph and Sophie Heintz purchased a portion of it, mostly likely in the 1950s.

Ralph Heintz holding a radiotron tube, August 1927. [History San José]

Ralph was a chemical and physical engineer and inventor, cited as having over 200 patents to his name including four inventions that are currently at the Smithsonian. His wife was a U.S. Marine Corps ham radio operator who ran the radios for the Wilkins Expedition to the North Pole in 1928 and the Byrd Expedition to the South Pole, while also serving in World War II. After moving to Blossom Hill Road, they operated an apricot orchard and Ralph continued to invent in his small workshop. Most of the rest of the property remained undeveloped, a playground for the wealthy but little else. The Heintz family owned the property as a recreational site but spent most of their time in Los Altos.

Peter O’Malley and his siblings and parents riding on the Ramohs Pacific Railroad with the tunnel in the background, ca 1971. Photo by Ralph Heintz. [Peter O’Malley]

At some point, probably in 1962 (the date the tunnel was completed), Ralph got the idea to build a small miniature railroad on the hilltop above his property. He probably operated it as a family project as his son was a member of the Golden Gate Live Steam Club for many years. The site of the railroad was remote, which was a good and bad thing in the end. Ralph was friends with Billy Jones, and this relationship may explain his desire to build his own railroad.

Children riding the Heintz locomotive at a Golden Gate Live Steamers event, 2002. [Golden Gate Live Steamers]

The route itself was approximately 0.35 miles long, which included a loop on the east end and a turntable at the west end. An engine and stock barn was kept beside the turntable. More impressively was the short tunnel that Heintz had installed mid-way down the track, the remains of which are still visible today, although one portal has entirely been buried. The surviving tunnel portal is eight feet wide and was probably 6 feet tall, and it extended through the hillside for 150 feet. Heintz personally constructed the locomotive and rolling stock himself, probably using castings and plans from Little Engines Atlantic.

The Heintz locomotive on a raised track at a GGLS event, 2002. [Golden Gate Live Steamers]

The railroad probably only operated for two decades or less. Ralph fell terminally ill in the early 1970s but only passed in 1980. In 1975, his son Ralph Heintz Jr. donated 4,000 feet of track to the Tilden Open Space in Berkeley, which eventually became the Golden Gate Live Steamers. There is still a section of track there known as the Heintz Loop. This track was undoubtedly the entirety of the trackage owned by the Heintz family and it seems likely that the entire route was scrapped at this time. It is speculated that the rolling stock was also given to Tilden, although evidence of this transfer is currently lacking. The locomotive for Heintz's railroad was sold in the mid-2000s to a member of GGLS and is currently undergoing a rebuild and will be repainted blue when it is completed.

The surviving tunnel portal on the Heintz Railroad beside the current shoofly trail. [Bill Dawkins]

Locals who grew up near the property remember that the tunnel remained open for a short time but was eventually filled and buried, as it remains today. Indeed, the entire property was largely abandoned in the 1970s and locals regularly trespassed to use the old mansion swimming pool, walk the trails, ride four-wheelers, and use the tunnel in various ways. Angel Ayala, the property caretaker and gardener, continued to live on the estate for many years in the so-called Summerhill House which was mid-way up the hillside.

Golden Spike ceremony of the Heintz Loop, 1975. [John Haines]

In 1998, Ralph Jr. deeded the property to the University of California's Cecilia Vaughn Memorial Fund for ophthalmic research. It was resold and subdivided to Summerhill Homes which built the Heritage Grove Neighborhood community on the site. The majority of the 91 acres (about 80 of it), however, was given to the Town of Los Gatos where it now operates as the Heintz Open Space Preserve. The former railroad right-of-way is a walking trail within this area called the Valley View Trail, although only the portion at the top of the grade is the actual right-of-way. At the base of the hill, the Heintz farmhouse has been restored and is now a home, while his workshop—the so-called Ramohs Laboratory—remains a place of historical interest with appropriate signage.

Geo-Coordinates & Access Rights:

37.228˚N, 121.925˚W

The Heintz Open Space is publicly accessible via Regent Drive off of Blossom Hill Road. The Valley View Trail (at left from the trailhead) is relatively steep but short and at the top of the grade, it is flat for some distance. This flat area is the right-of-way and along it, you will notice the top of the former railroad tunnel which is now collapsed and mostly buried. The Heintz farmhouse is located on Regent Drive at the end of Ramohs Way.

Citations & Credits:

• Dawkins, Bill. Personal correspondence.
• Golden Gate Live Steamers. 
• Handy, Jim. Personal correspondence.
• Haskey, John. Personal correspondence.
• "Heintz and Kaufman," Engineering and Technology History Wiki.
• Maiten, Michael S. Personal correspondence.
• Phelps, Dale B. Personal correspondence.
• Pope-Handy, Mary. "The Heritage Grove Neighborhood in Los Gatos and the Heintz Open Space Preserve". The Valley of Hearts Delight. 2011.
• "The 1981 Heintz Lecture". The Proctor Bulletin, 3:4 (1981).
• Wiley, Neil. "Heintz Open Space". Mountain Network News.

Santa's Express Train

Original souvenir map of Santa's Village in Scotts Valley.
(ImageArchaology.com)

When one thinks of railroads, even miniature ones, in Santa Cruz County, the long-departed Santa's Village amusement park in Scotts Valley does not usually come to mind. And for many good reasons, it should not, yet for the entire length of its operation, a small diesel-powered railroad ran around a loop entertaining children and adults of all ages.

Santa's Village—sometimes called Skyforest—was the brainchild of H. Glenn Holland, a property developer from Southern California who had already built a similarly-named park at Lake Arrowhead in May 1955, six weeks before Disneyland opened in Anaheim. In 1957, his Santa's Village franchise became the first to become a chain of amusement parks, with a park opening in Scotts Valley that year, and another park opening in East Dundee near Chicago in 1959. Plans to built two more parks in Virginia and New Jersey were never realised. The Scotts Valley venue was opened on May 30, 1957, on 25 acres of the Lawridge dairy farm which Holland had leased the previous year. Richard Bellack, the resident manager, operated the park as a franchise for the first two summers before selling his role to Bruce Prather.

Santa's Express Train* rounding a corner during Halloween time. (ImageArchaology.com)

Among the opening day attractions was the Santa's Express Train which operated under the name "Magic Train Ride". This 14-inch gauge miniature railroad mimicked the appearance of a generic steam engine from the 19th century, although in actuality a diesel motor drove the train. It was built by the Hurlbut Amusement Company in Buena Park, California. Bud Hurlbut's operation was famous regionally for building the trains at Knott's Berry Farm, where he operated a concession for decades.  It was a relatively simple design with around five painted wooden passenger cars that could see four adults (uncomfortably) or eight mid-sized children in front/back facing seats. The single operator sat perpendicular to the locomotive in the tender car. The train ran around a relatively short circular track which was decorated with an assortment of vegetation. What Christmas theme existed along the route has not been documented or commented upon.

Santa's Express Train with Santa Claus at the wheel! (ImageArchaology.com)

Santa's Express Train ticket booth, with locomotive in the distance. (ImageArchaology.com)

Santa's Village was never a very successful venture, especially once the East Dundee park opened, which was more expensive to run and unable to operate in cold weather conditions. The board of trustees revolted in 1965, forcing Holland to sell all his parks. The Scotts Valley park passed to Noorudin Billawalla in 1966, who operated it under the name Santa's Village Corporation. Billawalla eventually declared bankruptcy in 1977, hoping to recover his expenses and reopen the park as a second Knott's Berry Farm in the north, but the City of Scotts Valley rejected this idea. Suddenly desperate, Billawalla rebranded the park The Village, promoting it as an arts and crafts event space, but it attracted little interest. Scotts Valley demanded the park be brought up to code and also rezoned some of the space as residential, removing many acres from the site. Damage from a winter storm in 1978-9 crippled the park further. In 1979, operations in Scotts Valley came to an end and the entire park, including Santa's Express Train, were dismantled and sold. The property sat abandoned for over a decade until Borland International purchased the site. Besides a small collection of abandoned structures hidden in the woods, nothing really remains of the park except the State Route 17 highway exit "Santa's Village Road". Sadly, even that road is falling apart. The ultimate fate of Santa's Express Train is unknown.

* All images of the train may be of the sister train that operated at the Lake Arrowhead park, which was also of the same design. Both parks were popularly known as Skyforest, causing endless confusion regarding attribution of photos.

Geo-Coordinates & Access Rights:
37.0655˚N, 121.9953˚W

The Santa's Village property is off limits to all unauthorised visitors and trespassing is highly discouraged. Nothing of the rides or the train survive, only the original club house which sits in a very dilapidated and dangerous state remain on site. Relics of the park can be seen at various places throughout the Scotts Valley area, especially iconic multicolored toadstools that once littered the park.

Citations & Credits:

• Gomez, Phil. "Santa's Village in Scotts Valley featured in documentary". KSBW Action News 8. 2013. [Video]
• Grennier, Bobbie. "Santa's Village Scotts Valley". 2011.
• Kelley, Edward J. Personal correspondence.
• Nanney, Duncan. Personal correspondence.

Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk Miniature Railroads

Out of the ashes of the great Neptune Casino fire of 1906 arose a new phenomenon at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. Since the 1860s, the Santa Cruz main beach had been a popular tourist resort, sporting public bath houses, spas and restaurants, gift shops and beachfront campsites. Then in 1903, Fred Swanton formed the Santa Cruz Beach & Tent City Corporation to convert what was a random assortment of private attractions into one unifying vision for the beach. He purchased the large Miller-Leibbrandt Plunge and its accompanying Electric Pier and he moved the old Neptune Bath across the street to become the Tent City restaurant and corporate office for the company. In its place, he erected a massive Moorish-style casino inclusive of (non-gambling) games, gift shops, restaurants, dancing pavilion, and so much more. Outside, a beautiful bandstand was erected while beyond the newly-upgraded plunge a large roller rink was built. No other entertainment attractions were built at this time and nothing else would be forthcoming. For two marvellous summers—1904 and 1905—this grand casino thrived attracting visitors from all over the country, and then tragically everything came to a fiery end one June night in 1906.

Color postcard of the Bay Shore Limited, c. 1910, after the demolition of the curio shop. [Santa Cruz Public Libraries]

The new Casino and the Plunge, while opened before the summer of 1907, built in a Spanish Revival style and was upgraded with state-of-the-art fire suppression systems and far superior architecture. These buildings were meant to last and they still stands today at the western end of the Boardwalk, testaments of the resolve to avoid another catastrophe like that of 1906. But with the new Boardwalk completed, Swanton began searching for attractions to improve his upstart amusement park.

The west end of the Bay Shore Limited loop, with the Pleasure Pier in the background. [Harold von Gorder]

The Bay Shore Limited beside the Plunge, 1907. At right is the skating rink
and at left is the curio shop, both in the style of the 1904 Neptune Casino
suggesting they survived the fire of 1906. [SC Sentinel]

The very first one of those attractions was a 1904 Cagney Brothers' Miniature Railroad Company 22-inch gauge train that ran from the base of the Pleasure Pier to the San Lorenzo River and back under the name Bay Shore Limited. The locomotive was a regulation coal-powered steam engine registered with the Interstate Commerce Commission and operated by an engineer and fireman. It opened in the summer of 1907 right alongside the new Casino and Plunge, and operated on the beach side of the quickly-extending wooden walkway that lined the shore, although after the L.A. Thompson Scenic Railway was built in 1908, part of the track ran directly atop a beach dune. The railroad ran with up to six passenger cars, each capable of seating 16 adults comfortably. Despite persistent rumours, there is little evidence that the locomotive operated on the Loma Prieta tracks in the off-season hauling logs due to the difference in gauges. What is certainly true, though, is that Swanton used this train to exchange courtesy passes with other railroad companies, earning him free railroad service across the United States. The track ran down a long wooden boardwalk to the river where a sharp loop inside an enclosed tunnel turned the train around for its return trip to the Pleasure Pier. Another turntable at the base of the pier ended at a loading station for another trip. The railroad remained in use until the end of 1915, at which point the Santa Cruz Seaside Company, which took over from Swanton in December, decided to discontinue it. Santa Cruz businesses were not responding well to World War I and Swanton had overextended himself, going bust. Competition with other attractions also damaged the little railroad's income.

The eastern end of the Bay Shore Limited, showing the long platform out to the turnaround. [Harold von Gorder]

After its near-destruction in a warehouse fire, the railroad was sold for scrap to a San Francisco firm where Joseph Cornelius Hayes found it. He began restoring it in 1924 with plans to operate it at San Francisco's Ocean Beach or Pacific City in San Mateo, but bad luck haunted the train. Herbert Fleishhacker finally purchased the restored train from Hayes in 1925 and installed it at his zoo in west San Francisco, where it operated until 1978. It was put into storage that year where it languished, rusting as it sat in an enclosure with two Asian elephants, a grey seal, and a pigmy hippo. The Golden Gate Railroad Museum petitioned the zoo to restore the train and and finally, in 1998, it was restored by staff of the zoo and museum volunteers. The parks is now known as the San Francisco Zoo and the train is the "Little Puffer", apparently a nicknamed it had even in 1907. It can still be ridden today, one of only four 22-inch gauge railroads still in existence.

The Sun Tan Jr. parked beside its runaround siding on the western end of the
Boardwalk, c. 1930. Loff Carousel building visible at left. [SC Sentinel]

A decade later, in 1928, the Sun Tan Jr. was installed along much of the same route of the original miniature railroad. This train was named after the much larger Sun Tan Special that began hauling passengers to the beach from San José the year earlier. Stanley E. Kohl, a Capitolan miniature railroad builder, opened the train as a beach front concession and operated it for five years until 1933, when the Great Depression likely drove him out of business. This train was a 1/3 scale Northwestern Pacific locomotive, based on his memories as a mail clerk in San Francisco. Unlike the first railroad at the Boardwalk, this one operated off of a simple diesel-powered Dodge motor hidden beneath a fake boiler, with the exhaust exiting out of the steam pipe at top. The capacity of this little train was up to 3,500 people per day, an impressive feat. It ran from the base of the Pleasure Pier to roughly the location of Funland Arcade today atop a long raised trestle that turned back onto the 'Walk on its ends. The Seaside Company took over the concession in 1933 and operated it until 1935, after which the train disappeared from history.

Photograph of the Sun Tan Jr. running alongside the Boardwalk with the Laff-Land dark ride at left, c. 1930. [Boardwalk]

Sun Tan Jr. in front of Entrance 3 near the Carousel, c. 1930s. [Sandy Ragsdale]

The City of Santa Cruz Streamliner on its elevated track beside the main
Boardwalk, c. 1940 [SC Sentinel]

In 1938, a new track was built along the outside edge of the Boardwalk atop 5,000 redwood ties and 1,000 pilings. The new railroad was the City of Santa Cruz Streamliner, an electric train based on Zephyr that had locomotives at both ends. The locomotives and four passenger cars were locally built by the Standard Welding Company of Santa Cruz under the leadership of J. Ross Whiting, the later founder of Whitings Games.  The train was highlighted in red and silver/chrome with green leather seats throughout, replicated in the Zephyr in every way possible. At the time, it was the only miniature railroad that ran entirely atop an elevated trestle. It's capacity was estimated to be 200,000 per summer, which comes out to roughly 2,000 people per day. Unfortunately, very little information is known about this short-lived attraction. World War II ostensibly shut down many of the attractions at the park including this railroad. The railroad, which operated directly over the beach, was deemed too visible when blackout curtains were installed along the walk. It was the last attraction to run alongside the majority of the Boardwalk until the construction of the Skygliders in the mid-1960s. Nothing is known about this train's fate.

The Cave Train to the Lost World, April 2014. [Dexter Francis]

The Cave Train at its depot at the eastern end of the Boardwalk, 1964.
[SC Sentinel]

At around that same time, in June 1961 to be specific, a new miniature railroad was installed in a much tighter and enclosed venue than its three predecessors. Operating off two 2-ton batteries which are recharged nightly, the Cave Train to the Lost World is not your usual miniature railroad. Its appearance is a bit exaggerated and it is operated with quite simple controls. Two near-identical fiberglass locomotives drive two 8-car trains in a circular, albeit curvy, 2,200-foot-long track that runs under the far eastern end of the Boardwalk. The interior nature of this train means that, unlike its predecessors, it can actually feature artificial wonders during the ride, thus the theme of the Cave Train is something akin to The Flintstones, less the official branding. Many of the automated electronics along the ride are triggered by switches hidden in the tracks so staff does not have to operate visuals remotely. In 2000, the ride was upgraded and now is in ultraviolet and follows the story of cave people visiting the Santa Cruz Beach during the Palaeolithic Era, although the trains themselves retain their original faux rustic charm. The original welcome depot was demolished as a part of the rebuild and now the queuing area is outside and uncovered. Considering the recent improvements to the ride, it is unlikely this will be replaced any time soon.

Citations & Credits:

• Beal, Chandra Moira and Richard A. Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk: The Early Years—Never a Dull Moment (Pacific Group, 2003).
• "Little Puffer Steam Train". San Francisco Zoo.
• Rice, Walter and Emiliano Echeverria. Images of Rail: Rails of California's Central Coast (Arcadia, 2008).
• Santa Cruz Sentinel, 05/05/1938, 2:1-3.
• Santa Cruz Sentinel, 09/20/1964, 21.

Glenwood, South Park & Pacific Railroad

Deep in the redwoods in the mountains north of Scotts Valley, a small private miniature railroad once thrived under the guardianship of Jim "Homer" Holmes. Holmes was not new to the miniature railroad game—he had helped Billy Jones build his small railroad on Jones's ranch in Los Gatos and Holmes had also assisted Erich Thomsen. In addition, Jim was an employee of the Southern Pacific Railroad, working out of their signal department for decades. Thus, in 1959, Jim and his brother Dick decided to purchase land in Glenwood for the purpose of constructing their very own railroad. Now Glenwood once had a much larger railroad of its own, but the disastrous winter storms of February 1940 put an end to that line and for  nineteen years, Glenwood sat quiet, largely forgotten by the rest of the county. Holmes had no ambition to put the former town back on the map, but he did aspire to turn his 15 acres into a miniature railroad paradise. He dubbed his creation the Glenwood, South Park & Pacific Railroad, and over the next thirty years, it would continue to grow without end.

A ride behind the "One Spot", with crowded gondola and flatcar, 1970s. (Clark Bauman)

#5 outside South Park enginehouse, 1970s. (Clark Bauman)

Construction of the 15-inch-gauge track was the first task completed, with a small fully-functional sawmill erected to cut the ties and other wood materials for the line. By 1962, the first locomotive was completed, which was essentially a custom-built steam donkey on wheels. Soon after its completion, a second locomotive, this one an oil burner that resembled a much larger narrow-gauge engine, was assembled on site. The track was slowly extended outward, covering much of the property over the years, with many friends of the Holmes' volunteering to help build and operate the trains. Two additional steam locomotives were added in the early 1980s, with one using a design based on Erich Thomsen's Redwood Valley Railway (Berkeley, CA) stock and another shop-built by Ken Kukuk. Indeed, it was Ken's Westside Locomotive Works that provided much of the machinery, parts, and technical assistance needed for Holmes and his friends to build their myriad rolling stock. A relatively large locomotive was completed in the early 2000s. To act as rolling stock for these five locomotives, a flat car, gondola, tank car, ballast car, and caboose were created, primarily to assist in further construction of the railroad. Finally, a rarely-used electric motor car, running off of overhead wires, and a heavy-duty maintenance motorcar fill out the railroad's stock.

The railroad itself was named directly after the narrow-gauged Denver, South Park & Pacific Railroad in Colorado which Jim admired. Glenwood, besides being the location of the railroad, was a historic railroad stop until 1940, while the name of the Clems stop on his line is after the real-life Clems station that sat at the south-western end of the Glenwood vale. Stovebolt was named after the Chevrolet engine that ran the mill. The etymology of Luteward Junction is not currently known to this historian.

#5 being worked on outside Glenwood, 1970s.  (Clark Bauman)

The railroad is definitely a bit of a roller-coaster ride in its design, with a simple U-shaped track that has numerous spurs to access car barns, engine houses, and the sawmill. Most of the route sits on about a 4% grade but the climb from the sawmill exceeds 7% and a very short stretch near the top of the line is 9%! The turn at the bottom of the U is especially tight. Four formal stations, Glenwood, South Park, Stovebolt, and Clems, pockmark the route, with each sitting at a strategic site: South Park doubles as an enginehouse at the bottom of the grade, Glenwood is a switch to the sawmill and a car barn, Stovebolt doubles as the mill, and Clems is another enginehouse, accessible via a switch at Lutewards Junction. As of 2000, 3,000 feet of track was laid, while new track was recently still being laid further up on the hillside.

Craig operating the #13 on the Hillcrest & Wahtoke Railroad line in the 2000s. (Mike Massee)

The 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake did a number to the railroad, damaging a locomotive and shifting much of the track downhill. While it has since been repaired, the most damaging aspect of the earthquake was the change of the water table from a relatively soft, easy-to-steam tap water to a much harder water that unfortunately damages the locomotives' inner workings. Because of this, the railroad has only operated on-site sporadically over the past twenty-six years. Much of its rolling stock enjoys a second life now at the Hillcrest & Wahtoke Railroad in Reedley, CA, where it can be experienced by more people than the small group of friends responsible for the GSP&P's existence. In fact, the #13 is one of the railroad's primary locomotives!

#5 on the Hillcrest & Wahtoke Railroad line in the 2000s. (Mike Massee)

Unfortunately, Dick Holmes died in 1977, and Jim Holmes just passed on 5 January 2016, leaving the future of the Glenwood, South Park & Pacific Railroad up in the air. In addition, due to the problems caused by the earthquake, the original railroad site has largely been abandoned, with vandals and thieves destroying much of the infrastructure and machinery. Although the track still remains in place, it seems the railroad will never really operate on-site again. But regardless of the physical location's fate, the locomotives and rolling stock continue on either in Reedley. The precise location of Holmes' railroad remains a closely-guarded secret, but its existence in the Santa Cruz Mountains is further evidence of the love Santa Cruz County has for railroading.

Citations & Credits:

• "Glenwood, South Park & Pacific #13". Hillcrest.
• Mike Massee and Clark Bauman, photographs and personal correspondence.
• "Narrow Gauge at Glenwood". The Grand Scales Quarterly 10 (Jan 2000), 10-14.

See Also:

• "The Big Juice – Electric Operations on the GSP&P". John Haskey, 2008.
• "GSP&P #13, Full Train". HillcrestShops, 2015.
• "Hillcrest & Wahtoke 15" gauge live steam railroad grande scales". Mike Massee, 2008. Engine #13 at 0:25.

Sierra Nevada & Golden West Railroad

Harvey West giving the final swing on the
golden spike, 1968. [Santa Cruz Sentinel]

There are many peculiar railroad-related enterprises that have passed through Santa Cruz County over the years. One such company was the miniature railroad that operated in Harvey West Municipal Park from 1968 until 1992. Harvey West Park itself was dedicated on May 30, 1959, on fifty acres of land on the north side of the City of Santa Cruz beside Pogonip. It was named after Harvey E. West, the son of old Loma Prieta Lumber Company tycoon and former county supervisor Ed West. Harvey himself was an employee in his youth of Frederick A. Hihn's milling operation on Laurel Creek before founding his own lumber hauling company upon returning from service in World War I. He moved out of the area in the 1930s and founded the Placerville Lumber Company in 1936. West lived until 1979, twenty years after his eponymous park was founded. The park was named for him for multiple reasons: he was a well-known and influential local into the 1930s, he donated great amounts of money to private and public organisations, and he arranged for the purchase of the properties that would make up Harvey West Park, presenting the larger part to the city in 1955 and the Wagner Grove in 1958. Wagner was the original American owner of the land whose descendants had sold it to West for the creation of the park.

In April 1968, notice was given to the city council that a man named Dan J. Hurt was being solicited to install his still-under-construction miniature railroad to the park. Hurt, a friend of West as well as a former US Navy admiral and a local model railroader, proposed a 170-foot-long loop track that would initially operate with a single locomotive and two passenger cars, which would be installed with accompanying authentic railroad sounds. The locomotive was modelled after a 1860s wood-burning engine, although it operated off of a diesel engine. The gauge of the track was to be 18 inches. Hurt was required as part of the lease agreement to erect an enclosed station house and ticket office to protect the rolling stock when the train was not operating. It was intended to operate daily in the summer and on weekends for the remainder of the year. Hurt planned to charge 10¢ per passenger per ride and called his enterprise the Sierra Nevada & Golden West Railroad.

One of the first rides of the Sierra Nevada & Golden West Railroad, July 1968. [SC Sentinel]

Retired Admiral Dan J. Hurt in a press
photo from 1973. [SC Sentinel]

The new railroad opened in late July 1968 and was staffed that summer by Hurt and by volunteers. Harvest West became involved in the construction, donating ties to the track and striking the golden spike during the dedication ceremony. Because of the donations and city funds, he was able to expand the track to 0.25 miles, or around 1,300 feet, which was much longer than the proposed length. It ran in a figure-eight pattern around a good portion of the park. The SN&GWRR departed the station every 20 minutes (implying an approximately 15 minute ride) and it could hold 20 passengers, plus the engineer. Because of the increased costs of the longer track and the need for more cars, the cost of each ride was set at 25¢ for children and 50¢ for adults. Hurt operated the train through the 1975 summer season and then the concession went up for sale.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, there was not a lot of demand for a miniature railroad linked to a public space. As part of the concession, the railroad included a snack bar and hamburger stand, both of which operated out of the ticket station. Hurt listed the train and its accoutrements for $11,000, although its final sale price is unknown.

The station booth and snack shack, c. 1970s.
[Doris Emerick Correll]

Alberto E. and Gayle Vincent finally took over operations for the 1976 season, changing the name to the more straightforward Sierra Nevada Railroad. In 1977, Robert O. and Virginia M. Mock took up the lease, operating it through the 1979 summer season before putting it up for sale again. In April 1980, Hamlet Char Broilers, owned by Gary Parsons, purchased the railroad and ran it for two summers, renaming it the Harvey West Railway & Diner, although "diner" was a bit of a stretch. In November 1981, Richard E. and Barbara A. Gempler, in partnership with Helen Waldemar, took over operations, after which the ownership trail grows cold, unfortunately. Around 1986, it was sold to Chris Burden, but no information is known regarding any intervening owners and it seems that the train was not operating during much of this time.

The Sierra Nevada & Golden West Railroad parked on the tracks, c. 1970s [Doris Emerick Correll]

A real estate advertisement for the railroad, 1975. [SC Sentinel]

By March 1992, the railroad was in a serious state of disrepair. Only the locomotive and a single passenger car were in operable condition, running again under the name Sierra Nevada Railroad. Burden was only charging 75¢ per ride, which certainly did not help his financial situation. Maintenance and rising insurance costs made it so Burden couldn't afford to operate the train in the coming summer. Interestingly, a German tourist offered Burden $40,000 for the railroad and its track, but Burden decided instead to shut it down, thereby ending 24 years of service. The track was pulled up and the train disappeared. Where it went is not currently known. Harvey West today still has a train—the large Southern Pacific locomotive #1298 that was installed for children to play around and on—but the footprint of the miniature railroad that once looped around much of the park is gone and its memory quickly fading.

Citations & Credits:

• Donald A. Clark, Santa Cruz County Place Names: A Geographical Dictionary (Scotts Valley, CA: Kestrel Press, 2007).
• Gary Parsons, personal correspondence.
• Santa Cruz Sentinel, 1959 – 1992.