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Relatively-large
42-foot log cars are dwarfed by the giant crane used to unload their cargo of
Douglas Fir saw logs at Potlatch's cold deck log storage yard at Lewiston,
Idaho. Potlatch's sawmill operations here were modernized in 1987, and produces
an average of 120 million board feet of timber a year, mostly Douglas Fir and
Western Cedar.
The
Milltown: Lewiston, Idaho
Since Northern Pacific
rails first town in 1897, Lewiston, Idaho has been the center of railroad operations in
the Clearwater River country. At the confluence of the Clearwater and Snake Rivers,
Lewiston is the area's commercial hub as well, dominated by the huge Potlatch lumber and
paper products mill a couple of miles east of downtown. Northern Pacific built a
subsidiary railroad, the Clearwater Short Line, 76 miles east up the Clearwater River in
1907, and a year later had completed a second branch atop the Camas Prairie to
Grangeville, 66 miles from a junction with the NP at Spalding. With such commercial growth
in the area, Union Pacific's Oregon, Washington Railroad & Navigation Company later
that year reached Lewiston on its own line from the west. UP plans for a railroad of its
own onto the Camas Prairie were shelved when an agreement was reached with the NP for
joint operation of both railroads between Riparia, west of Lewiston, and Grangeville under
an independent operating company, the Camas Prairie Railroad. Profits and expenses would
be split 50-50, and each road would supply cars and locomotives. The original agreement
was amended in 1928 to include the line to Stites as well as a newly-completed 40 mile
branch from Orofino into the woods to Headquarters, gateway to Potlatch predecessor
Clearwater Timber Company lands. Northern Pacific built a connection of its own from Pasco
to Riparia to gain a western outlet.
Lewiston remained
headquarters for Camas Prairie operations, the location of the railroad's major
classification yard, eight-stall roundhouse and car shop, and two-story depot that hosted
trains to Portland as late as 1958 and to Spokane into 1966. Local passenger traffic east
of Arrow Junction (to Grangeville and Stites) ended in 1955.
In later years, a daily
train would handle UP interchange traffic downriver to Riparia (the "downriver"
train, naturally); after the original NP line was closed between Moscow and Arrow in 1983,
this train would handle all the BN's traffic as well. At the time of these photographs,
East Lewiston yard would originate a train to Orofino, Jaype and Kamiah on Monday and
Wednesday; each Friday morning, a Grangeville turn would operate.
East of town, the railroad
was dominated by the massive Potlatch complex, necessitating a dedicated switch job to
spot and pull loads and empties and keep the log deck at Forebay supplied with sawlogs.
Potlatch uses the logs for its seven-species board and construction shapes lumber mill;
timber waste, as well as woodchips brought in from outside the plant, are used for a
variety of paper products and pulp.
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The Grangeville
turn arrives at Forebay on an October 1992 afternoon behind UP2043/BN3503/UP 2033/BN 3043.
The two Forebay siding tracks can be seen to the left of the train, with the large
Potlatch "cold deck" log sort yard in the background. At one time, this area was
a large mill pond, logs either floated down the Clearwater River to the pond or dumped
from Camas Prairie cars. |
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Forty-foot log
cars are dwarfed by the stacked logs awaiting sorting and processing at the Forebay Cold
Deck in October 1992. Most prominent among the cars is a loaded Union Pacific log car,
converted from a GS-series gondola by having most of its sides torched off and log bunks
installed. This fleet was built in 1972. Adjacent BN cars apparently were converted from
boxcars, with side sills and log bunks added, about the same time. |
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All's quiet in
Lewiston at 7pm on October 15, 1992, where over at the roundhouse, BN caboose 10122,
UP GP38-2 2041, and BN GP40 3043 await their next assignment. This view is looking east;
the vapor plumes in the background are from the Potlatch mill. |
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The drawbridge
operator pauses from his many, many duties to watch the Downriver Turn rumble eastbound
across the Snake River drawbridge and into Lewiston at 220pm on July 28, 1993. The
drawbridge was raised considerably and a lift-bridge section installed, replacing the
older swing-type span, when the Snake River was raised in the early 1970s. |
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The Downriver
turn comes off the Snake River bridge at Lewiston at 802am on July 26, 1993, bound for a
quick water-lever trip west to Riparia to drop off the BN traffic, then on to Ayer
Junction to handle the UP interchange. The 1973 lift span is clearly visible in this view;
it's in a natural Cor-Ten steel finish; the original bridge over the snake remains in
UP-standard silver paint. BN GP40's 3503 and 3062 have ahold of 18 cars an a caboose; by
this date, UP power largely operated the CSP east of Lewiston, two BN units the Downriver
Train. All cabooses were BN.. |
Blair's World Camas Prairie Home Milltown
Second Subdivision Woods
Railroad Vintage Links, etc.
All photographs Copyright 2002
by Blair E. Kooistra, except as noted. Duplication, reproduction and use of images
without permission of photographer is prohibited
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