Steam, Semaphores and blue Sky. Only the
sky is a common occurrence in this day and
age. But in selected locations steam is still there to be ridden, chased and photographed.

Semaphores are a little harder to find. Think New Mexico and a few other select locations.

Semaphores were widely used by
railroads, the most recent installed nearly a
hundred years ago. They were state of the art
in their day, one feature being that even with
the light bulb burned out, the position of the
semaphore provided protection. They are
woefully out of date in this digital age, and are
falling like flies in a freeze.

As a rail-fan I love to have them astride
the tracks. From any angle, even at speed on an adjacent highway you could tell by the horizontal position that a train was occupying the block. Wait for about a minute or less and either you had a train, or the arm went upward indicating the train is moving away. U-turn, and the race is on.

Former Spokane, Portland and Seattle #700 is splitting the blades near Prosser, Washington on October 19th, 1990. What an impressive cloud of steam against that blue sky. The massive Baldwin built 4-8-4 Northern loco was returning from a steam expo in the Yakima Valley.

The Northern Pacific and Great Northern Railways owned the SP&S jointly, and had a bad habit of giving hand-me-down locos to its step-child. But in 1937 the owners let the SP&S buy new locomotives, including three fast passenger Northerns. The #700 was part of that purchase.

The #700 occupies new digs in Portland, Oregon with the other Pacific Northwest 4-8-4 Northern, Daylight #4449 of Southern Pacific heritage. Both locos shared space in Portland’s Oaks Park for years, and they can both be found pulling rail-fan excursions several times a year.

Photo credit: Alan M. Miller, as seen in Classic Trains “Fantastic 4-8-4 Locomotives”, special 2012