Southern Pacific No. 2472

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Schellville

Schellville is not really a town, just an intersection of a two lane highway and a country road in incorporated Sonoma County. But this is a very important railroad junction.

This is the last bastion of the once great Northwestern Pacific Railroad (NWP).

Schellville was an important rail junction on the NWP and there is a two mile rail yard south of the former train station.

The Schellville Depot has seen better days, just like the rest of the former Northwestern Pacific system. Now it is used for storage.

This was NWP’s only outlet to the greater Southern Pacific rail network. All passenger and freight traffic from Eureka in Humboldt County south to Willits, Santa Rosa, Petaluma and San Rafael in Marin County, had to pass through Schellville.

At one point, post World War II, 11,000 cars a month passed through the junction at Schellville. Many cars went on, under Southern Pacific steam, to the division point at Roseville.

Over the years, declining passenger and freight service, landslides, and the severe winter floods of 1964, sent NWP on a downward decline. The railroad was operated by Southern Pacific and once SP merged with Union Pacific in the mid-1990s, NWP changed hands many times, holding on to it’s diminished existence.

It seemed that the entire fleet of four locomotives where fenced in near the station. This motley collection were painted in the livery of other railroads.

NWP No. 1501 painted in the Southern Pacific “bloody nose” livery.

From the Y track at the station I headed north along the line, vineyards flanking either side of the rusted rails. I crossed a short trestle and before me stood a railroad graveyard, a mothballed fleet of NWP and SP diesels and rolling stock.

The mothball fleet is mainly Southern Pacific locomotives and a mix other other rolling stock. The locomotive on point is Northwestern Pacific EMD GP 9 No. 1922, faded and being returned to nature.
At the end of the diesels is Southern Pacific caboose 1971. The locomotive coupled to the caboose is the former Bessemer and Lake Erie F7 numbers 718 A and 716 B.

While these locomotives had seen better days I was surprised to see a Southern Pacific Steam Locomotive on a siding across 8th Street.

At first I couldn’t believe my eyes. Could this be one of a handful of operable SP steam locomotives? I could barely make out the road number.

It was P-8 Class No. 2572 a 4-6-2 “Pacific” type built by the Baldwin Locomotive Works in 1921.

2472 was retired in 1957 and donated to the city of San Mateo and put on public display at the San Mateo County Fairgrounds.

In 1976 a group decided to restore the SP workhorse to working order. The group, the Golden Gate Railroad Museum, had 2472 ready for Railfair 91 in Sacramento which feature another Southern Pacific legend, 4449.

For many years 2472 operated steam excursions in Niles Canyon but was moved to Schellville on March 1, 2020.