John H. Heering

John H. Heering is listed as the photographer who captured the original railroad effort in Alameda Cañon in 1866. 

He was active in San Jose in 1859-1873. See Heering's building here.

This Heering photo shows up in many references, including the NPS form for the Niles Canyon Railway. Apparently an original is at Ardenwood. "Date October 2, 1866 Photographer, J.H Heering, San Jose CA, from the collection of Clyde Arbuckle, by permission from Patterson House at Ardenwood Historic Farm, City of Fremont, CA." How do they know that this is the photo taken of the Commissioner's train? Is this in a report? 

Reported in the Daily Alta California is "Cars run daily over the first section of twenty miles of the Pacific Railroad, starting from San Jose and stopping at the Alameda canon." Were they picnic excursions?

Found in History San Jose catalog number 1993-106-8

This one isn't at NYPL? 

The Stockton Independent reported on the work in 1866

The New York Public Library has several Heering photos. A selection of his pictures can be found by searching the New York Public Library collections. These are stereographs of portraits, railroad scenes (some not titled, but probably in Alameda Cañon), San Jose, and rural scenes. Are they taken at the same time as the one above? The reference to San Jose could be to John Herring's studio location, not the location of the photo. OR since the mouth of Alameda Cañon is sometimes called San José Valley and Niles doesn't exist yet, it could all be lumped into San José.

View the Heering photos as in a book. Use the control on the top right to jump to the different cards.

His building can be found on Calisphere

NYPL - see a wiggle gif version of this here.

If you look at this with your stereo viewer, you can see that the train is paused just before a bridge.  You can see that there are some ladies in skirts. Maybe some workers? Is that the same bridge that is in the next view? 

This is about the same view as "1527. Looking down Alameda Canon, above the third Bridge" (The third bridge became the second bridge became the Farwell bridge)

So this is Farwell looking down the canyon. Verified on Google Earth.

Also History San José has a single image that matches this catalog 1993-106-7.

NYPL 

From the NPS document, "The dual Howe truss as initially constructed at Farwell. The bridge was covered after 1869. Photographer, J.H Heering, From stereo card, collection of the New York Public Library (NYPL ID:G89F349_011F) Date October 2, 1866"

This is identified as the Farwell bridge in the NPS report. 

Looking down the canyon.

This looks like the same photo as this from History San José catalog number 1993-106-9.

What's a Howe truss bridge? What's a dual Howe truss?

NYPL

"View of bridge, river, rocks." 

This is the Farwell bridge. Looking up the canyon. Verified on Google Earth.

This is the same photo as this from History San José catalog number 1993-106-10.


Several History San José photos look like single images from some of the stereo pairs.

Others may have been taken at the same time?

Image 1993-106-6 is looking through a bridge. It was confirmed to probably be Farwell bridge using Google Earth 3D and superimposing  bridge image on 3D image.

Anyone recognize this train station? If this is 1866, there is no Niles station yet. San Jose maybe?

Further Reference: