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Oil Lamps & Iron Ponies Chronicle of Narrow Gauges SIGNED Limited Edition
Oil Lamps And Iron Ponies by SHAW - FISHER - HARLAN
A Chronicle of the narrow gauges.
Copyright 1949.
187 pages.
Hard Cover with dust jacket has damage and it has plastic protective covering) Name written on first blank page. Personal library label on dedication page
THIS book is one of a limited edition signed by the authors.
Regular Edition
HERE IS something entirely new and novel in the presentation of railroad history in the Roaring West, served by the narrow gauge railroad lines which helped to open and develop an empire. The intimate stories of these little lines and the lives of their builders are skillfully told in OIL LAMPS AND IRON PONIES, the outstanding features of which include:
HISTORIES of eight railroads by the three authors, each one written by the man most suited for the task.
MAPS of all eight roads, specially delineated for the book by Frederic Shaw from contemporary records of the time.
LOCOMOTIVE DRAWINGS to scale, compiled by authors George Harlan and Frederic Shaw, many of them measured from the actual locomotives depicted.
PHOTOGRAPHS numbering more than fifty, finely preserved pictures, many of them dating from the 'Seventies, collected by the authors and prepared for book presentation by George Harlan.
A "must" for the library of the railroad enthusiast and Western historians alike, this book records the histories of the eight leading Pacific Coast narrow-gauge railroads together with stories of the men who built them. Included are histories of the Ilwaco Railroad in Washington; the Sumpter Valley Railroad in Oregon; the North Pacific Coast, South Pacific Coast, Nevada County Narrow Gauge, Lake Tahoe, Pajaro Valley Consolidated, and the Pacific Coast Railways in California.
Front the Pacific Northwest to Southern California, each of these slim-gauge railroads was important in developing a large segment of the Pacific Coast. You'll enjoy reliving those narrow-gauge days in OIL LAMPS AND IRON PONIES.
N0 THREE legitimate railroad enthusiasts and historians could be found who are better qualified to write an accurate and readable book on narrow gauge railroads of the West than Frederic Shaw, Clement Fisher and George Harlan.
For Shaw, born in Sturgis, Michigan, grew up on the line of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern, and his railroad appetite was stimulated further when visits to his grandmother in Bedford, Indiana, acquainted him with the Bedford & Bloomfield narrow gauge. Architect, artist and craftsman, Mr. Shaw moved to the West in the mid-nineties to follow railroading, design some of the important buildings in Tacoma, 'Washington, and emerge from World War I as an artillery captain. His hobby of letand reviving old type styles has placed him as a consultant on many railroad historical projects. And now, at last, "Cap" tells the story of some of the little-publicized lines he knew so well.
Clem Fisher, born high atop San Francisco's Haight Street, spent his hectic school days exercising his ability to escape more homework than anyone else, thanks to a photographic memory. He concluded his scholastic bouts by hurling himself at the University of California, emerging as a member of the class of ex-'38. His natural gift of writing aided him materially in his free and easy drift through the halls of learning and this ability, coupled with his keen constructive criticism of literary works, brought him into the ranks of the triumvirate of OIL LAMPS AND IRON PONIES. The only member of the group to "cheat" and work for a railroad as well as write about several, Clem is a Santa Fe passenger agent with an enviable record with the largest of American railroads.
George Harlan, born in Sausalito, California, within sight of Bill Thomas' machine shop of North Pacific Coast days, was such an avid railroad booster in his youth that he was more likely to be found eating his lunch with the track gang than with his schoolmates. He attended the University of Nevada in the Virginia & Truckee's back yard, and later followed a career in Naval Architecture and Mechanical Engineering. A skilled photographer, George's greatest contribution to OIL LAMPS AND IRON PONIES is his preservation and reproduction of the photographic material which decorates the pages of the volume.
These are the compilers of this work. As a team they have functioned without a hitch, each a specialist who has combined his particular skill with that of the other two to bring about a book that has been carefully prepared over a long period of years, and now, at last, is here.
CONTENTS
OLD MAN KIDDER'S NARROW GAUGE (Nevada County Narrow Gauge R.R.)
PINE TIES TO PARADISE (Lake Tahoe Railway & Navigation Co.)
ROUTE TO THE REDWOODS (North Pacific Coast R.R.)
STUMP DODGER (Sumpter Valley R.R.)
BY TUNNELS, TRESTLES AND TREES (South Pacific Coast R.R.)
CLAMSHELL RAILROAD (Ilwaco Railway & Navigation Co.)
NARROW GAUGE MOVIE STAR (Pacific Coast Railway)
DEAD BEET RAILROAD (Pajaro Valley Consolidated R.R.)
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