McCloud River Railroad
Equipment Roster
Miscellaneous Work Cars


A leased Southern Pacific ditcher and side dump car at work near Car A. From the T.E. Glover Collection.


Miscellaneous work cars that don't fit into any other category will be featured on this page.

504- 41-foot long, 50-ton capacity drop bottom gondola, purchased 5/1958 from Western Pacific (ex-WP #5685). Book value of $665.93. One of 700 such cars built 1921 for the WP by Pressed Steel Car. Used in scrap service. Retired 3/1973.


Gondola #504, probably in Roseville, California. Jeff Moore collection.


1733:2- Tool car. Converted 8/1941 from box car #3031. Retired sometime after 1/1970.


Tool car #1733 in the McCloud yards in the early 1960s. Pacific Northwest Virtual Logging Data Center/


1769- Horse car, converted from water car #1813:1. Work order issued 4/6/1914, car completed 5/1914. Cost $778.27 ($277.75 labor, $500.52 materials). Used to transport horses between the woods and some ranches the lumber company owned in the valleys south of McCloud. Retired 4/2/1932.

1771- Outfit (Tool). Converted 6/1914 from water car #1815:1. Cost $450. Retired 4/2/1932.

1983- Material/Supply/Tool car. Rebuilt from log flat #1983. Retired sometime after 1963.


Tool car #1983 coupled to outfit car #01 in McCloud about 1953. Travis Berryman collection.


2979, ????- "Cat Doctor" Tool cars, converted from log flats and equipped with a small shop area housing tools and parts to service and effect field repairs to logging tractors. Mated to fuel cars #2003/#2004. Conversions of these two cars is not explicitly recorded in surviving company records. #2979 is definitely known from photographs; identity of other car is undetermined but leading contenders include #1983 above; #2977, identified as being converted to an outfit/boarding car in one equipment book; 2981; 2987; 2245; or 2261. Both retired sometime after 1964.


Tool car #2979 in Kinyon about 1964. Pacific Northwest Virtual Logging Data Center.



Scale Test Cars- All railroad track scales require periodic testing. None of the McCloud railroads are ever known to have owned a scale test cars, but instead appear to have leased them from Southern Pacific and then Union Pacific as needed.


SP Scale Test car next to the original scale circa 1969. Lee F. Hower photograph.



SPMX #2025 in McCloud. Roger Titus.



UP #903145 in the Mt. Shasta City interchange tracks. Roger Titus.



The McCloud River Railroad agreed to maintain the 34 miles of Great Northern and then Burlington Northern owned track between Hambone and Lookout as the owning road dorected. On occassion GN/BN would send some specialized maintenance or inspection equipment over the branch. Perhaps one of the more unique events happened when BN distaptched a Jordan spreader to the line in an attempt to widen clearances, only to have the lava rock outcroppings close to the tracks damage the spreader enough it had to be reportedly scrapped shortly after the move.


A Sperry car inspecting the Hambone branch in the 1970s. Ray Piltz image, Travis Berryman collection.



A weed spraying train is being placed on the interchange tracks at Lookout Junction in 1974. A mechanical failure of the McCloud locomotive intended to pull the train cuased McCloud to lease the BN #1976 for the trip to Hambone and back, the only known or recorded time a GN or BN engine ever made a full trip over the line. George Landrock.



McCloud engineer Ray Piltz at the controls of the BN 1976 as the weed spraying train does its work. George Landrock.



In roughly the middle 1920s one of the McCloud companies purchased a number of small four wheel cars from Pacific Car & Foundry, likely to help with track construction and removal. Following are several pictures of the cars, all builders photos and then one of a cart in Pondosa. All pictures Pacific Northwest Virtual Logging Data Center.