Greetings family, friends and train buddies!  Today's rambling is about Sierra Railway Combine #5 and memories that span six decades....Bill

Railroad Ramblings

SIERRA RAILWAY COMBINE #5

Mike and I searched through the Sierra Railway yards in Jamestown

attempting to locate the iconic “shorty” combine rail car #5 that I had

captured in a watercolor painting nearly six decades ago. It was a hot

afternoon in the gold country foothills as we scrambled between

several rows of vintage rolling stock, historic displays and scattered

iron remnants of more than a century of steam railroading.

Back in 1965 I received an inquiry from Stanford University student

Bruce MacGregor expressing an interest in purchasing a watercolor

of Rail Car #5 that operated on the historic Sierra Railroad. Like me,

Bruce was captivated by the unique rail car that was the subject of

dozens of his photographs. He had seen my painting exhibited at the

Alameda County Fair and after some friendly bartering agreed to pay

$30 for my “Sierra Combine” watercolor along with the choice of a

half dozen highly desirable and personally printed glossy’s from his

growing collection of railroad photographs.

In 1902 the operators of the Sierra Railway called upon the Holman

Company of San Francisco to build two custom “shorty” cars for their

newly completed Angels Branch Line. Passenger and Mail Combine

#5 and Passenger Coach #6 were specially designed to handle the

twisting tight curves, steep climbs and multiple switchbacks of the

Stanislaus River Canyon on the nineteen mile standard gauge right of

way connecting the Sierra RR yards in Jamestown with the mining

town of Angels Camp. The olive green cars pulled by one of the

Sierra’s Shays, Heislers or rod locomotives typically made up the

lines daily consists for more than twenty years. When the mines gave

out and the Angels Branch abandoned, Sierra Combine #5 and

Coach #6 found new roles appearing in dozens of western movies

behind the Sierra’s storied steam locomotives. The iconic duo

appeared in the opening credits of more than two hundred episodes

of TV’s Petticoat Junction as well as in prominent roles in many of the

show’s stories. The cars were routinely used in Little House on the

Prairie and in scores of episodes of Death Valley Days, Bonanza,

Gunsmoke, and more recently in the Back to the Future.

After thoroughly searching the yards, rickety covered storage barns,

and making inquires to State Park personnel, we finally located the

illusive rail car safely out of Jamestown’s scorching heat carefully

preserved and partially hidden between two of Sierra Railway’s

classic steam locomotives in the railroads historic century old

roundhouse.

I was reunited with Combine #5 after six decades and have long

since traded my watercolor brushes for a laptop keyboard. Bruce

went on to become a highly regarded railroad historian, photographer

and author, and Combine #5 and Passenger Coach #6 patiently await

being called on by Hollywood for their next gig.

Postcard: Combine #5 and Coach #6 pulled by Sierra Railway Locomotive #3 at

Jamestown circa 1960’s -Bill