To conclude my series on bakeries, here is a little information on the structures, rolling stock, vehicles and operations.

Structures

Bakeries come in all shapes and sizes, but most of the older ones were pretty substantial brick or cinder block buildings from what I can gather. Here’s a collection of photos demonstrating the variety.

Rainbo Bakery, reportedly in Tuscan, AZ.

Older Rainbow Bakery in Tucson, AZ.

Rainbo Bakery in Roanoke, VA.  Photo courtesy of Roanoke Public Library.

Back of a bakery, location unknown.

Here’s a more modern bakery.

Schwebels Bakery, Solon OH, 2005, photo courtesy of  Dan Sapochetti

Here is a collection of photos of a former Rainbo bakery in Lexington, KY with some cool interior shots in case you were very ambitious and wanted to model a realistic interior.

Here is a few photos of silos and unloading equipment.

Shick bulk flour system, courtesy of Shick Solutions.

Detail on…

I lived in Roswell, NM, for much of the early 1990s.  One of the pleasures of early 1990 Roswell was driving by the Rainbo bakery and smelling the fresh bread being baked.  Another treat for me was to check out the spur where the Santa Fe Railway brought in covered hoppers of flour.

Site of Bakery in Roswell.  Green dots denote the former unloading area.

Sadly, it is all gone now with the exception of a few relics.  The green dots above show where the cars were spotted for unloading and the base upon which the silos sat that stored the flour.  The flour was pneumatically carried from the train car to the silos and from the silos to the bakery.  I am not sure if the remaining structure was related to the bakery.  I remember to pneumatic tube that carried the flour to the bakery was pretty long and may…

In an earlier post, I shared B. Smith’s excellent coverage SP action in the San Fernando Valley in the early 1970s.  In this post, we will drill down a little further into the nuts and bolts of the line’s operations again in the early 1970s with a few new photos, maps and field notes made by B. Smith as he documented the line in 1972.  This will be very useful for people interested in modelling the line and give the rest of us food for thought as to how many lines operated in the 1970s and somewhat beyond.

Here’s an overview map to start (Each of the boxes will have detailed maps and field notes to follow.  All the photos were taken July 20, 1972 and copyright B. Smith)–

North Hollywood

Let’s head east to west and visit a little around the North Hollywood area to start.

The San Fernando Valley…

Tarzana team track–©photo B. Smith

The San Fernando Valley Branch in 1973 was an interesting operation with a lot of traffic.  There was a wide variety of shippers and a good deal of team track traffic.  B. Smith, the author of the below profile he wrote in 1973, talked to owners/managers of each business/industry located along the tracks as well as the Southern Pacific Railroad’s area manager who allowed him access to the railroad’s records.  Here is some of what he learned.  It gives us all a glimpse into 1970s to probably the late 1980s-early 1990s operations when single car traffic was still common and embraced by larger railroads. The diversity of the team traffic business really caught my eye.  (The verb tense is present since this is what B. Smith documented in 1973.)

Bakery still using rail, though no covered hoppers this day.–©photo B. Smith

Orowheat Bakery, receives wheat from Montana and flour…