Other Titles


Symposium on Railroad History,Vol. 4

Edited by Anthony W. Thompson

This book is the record of the Kalmbach Memorial Library Symposium on Railroad History presentations of 1995 and 1996. Published by Signature Press in association with the Library, which is part of the National Model Railroad Association (NMRA), the book is part of a continuing series. It is distributed solely by the NMRA through the Library. Copies may be ordered by telephone at (423) 894-8144.
Contents of the book and authors include: Larry Kline, "Growing Up Together: Railroads and the Steel Industry, 1870-1930," John Wesner, "When Boxcars Became Colorful: Changes in U.S. Railroad Freight Car Lettering in the 1950s," Robert J. Church, "Dunsmuir: A Railroad Town, Then and Now," Al Westerfield, "Billboard Reefers and Other Disasters: How Government Regulation Affected Car Building," C. Keith Jordan, "Pre-War Operations on the Santa Fe's Surf Line," Richard H. Hendrickson, "Operations on the Surf Line in the late 1940s," and John H. Kirchner, "The Theory and Practice of Plantation Railroads."

Pacific Fruit Express,First Edition

Anthony W. Thompson, Robert J. Church and Bruce H. Jones

The first edition of this book (full page description available, together with reviews) was a thorough and complete history of the world's largest refrigerator car operator, the Pacific Fruit Express Company. The 432-page book had 663 photos (some in color), scale car drawings, shop track layouts, system map, paint scheme drawings, and accurate color drift panels. Published in an edition of 3000 copies in June, 1992 (old ISBN: 09633791-2-7), the book was declared "out of print" in August, 1996.

A second edition (see description elsewhere on this site) has now been issued with corrections and updating of nearly a third of the pages, together with 32 new appendix pages. Publication date was August 15, 2000.