color train photos from the late 30s

Model Railroader Prototype information for the modeler
1

Interesting web page here:

DenverPost.com

If you scroll down a bit past half-way, you will find some photos from the CNW Provisio yard, as well as some IC, and maybe more. Fantastic to see some of this stuff in real, live color!

-Jon

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Jon,

Thanks for the great link. The pictures fantastic.

Sean

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Isn’t that color amazing? That was Kodachrome – and now we have lost that technology. We can only hope that the digital images we are taking today will last that long. (Don’t laugh – put any floppy discs in your computer lately? Play a 12" video disc movie lately?)

The Shorpy site has some railroad photos from that depression era series, some taken by the great Jack Delano.

http://www.shorpy.com/

Search under Delano or under railroad

Dave nelson

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What I really like about Shorpy is how huge the photos are. You can find lots of details in them. Also a great resource. Thanks.

-Jon

5
  1. The photos are from the mid-1940s, not the late 1930s. They were taken by Jack Delano when he worked for the FSA. The REAL photos are here:

http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/fsac/

  1. The Shorpy site is OK, but really not all that useful except as a basic research tool. 99% of the inages they post are lifts from the Library of Congress, mostly from the Harris & Ewing and Detroit Publishing Co archives. Want big photos? How about 19 to 150 meg tiffs?

http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/det/

http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/hec/

Why bother with mediocre when you can go to the source and get REALLY good photos? Oh yeah: be sure to check out the panorama photo collection and the gigantic structure plan files at the HABS/HAER collection.

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Especially the Detroit Publishing Co archives contains many awe-inspiring prototype pictures for early 20th century model railroaders - city scapes and railroad scenes. Much of it is not in color (unlike the Jack Delano pics from the late 30s/early 40s mentioned earlier).

Try to e.g. search the Detroit Publishing collection for pictures from Duluth - some of those images are as if custom made as inspiration for model railroaders.

Don’t know if this link is permanent or temporary, but here is a link directly to part of my search result:

http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/det/item/det1994007019/PP/

Here is a search for “Industrial facilities”: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/related/?fi=subject&q=Industrial%20facilities.&co=det

Here is an interior shot from a Merchant’s transportation Company: http://www.loc.gov