Willamette Valley Railways tells the story of the electric interurban railways that ran through Oregon's Willamette Valley and of the streetcars that operated in the towns they served. Long before modern light rail vehicles, electric trains were providing Portland and the Willamette Valley with reliable, elegant transportation that was second to none. Between 1908 and 1915, two large systems, the Oregon Electric Railway and the Southern Pacific Red Electrics, joined smaller competitors constructing railways throughout the region. Portland became the hub of an impressive interurban network in a frenzy of electric railway building. Yet all too soon, this brief but glorious interurban era was over. Highway improvement and the growth of automobile ownership made electric passenger trains unprofitable in the sparsely populated valley. By the early 1930s, the company that had launched the nation's first true interurban was the only one still offering passenger service here.
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Rail historian Richard Thompson, author of Arcadia PublishingÂ’s PortlandÂ’s Streetcars, has enjoyed an interest in streetcars since his grandmother took him on OregonÂ’s last interurban. In this volume, he uses more than 200 historic images to give the reader a sense of what it was like to travel through the beautiful Willamette Valley during the interurban age.
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Rail historian Richard Thompson has been writing about Oregon's street railways since 1979. This interest in industrial history may come naturally, since he is a decendent of Willamette Valley millwrights and holds a Masters' Degree in history from the University of Oregon. His passion for the subject of trolleys has resulted in a collection of memorabilia that served as a resource for the three books he has written in Arcadia Publishing's "Images of Rail" series. He has also authored 15 entries for the online Oregon Encyclopedia. Thompson has worked as an archivist, historical museum director, librarian and streetcar coordinator.
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Trolley poles and pantagraphs south of Portland,
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This review is from: Willamette Valley Railways (Images of Rail: Oregon) (Paperback)
Willamette Valley Railways is one of the more than 4,000 local history titles published by Arcadia Publishing, and part of Arcadia's "Images of Rail" series. However, this 2008 publication has one key word missing from its title: "Electric." The subject of the book is Willamette Valley Electric Railways, and provides history and illustration of the area's interurban and street railways, but does not deal with steam railroads.
The Willamette Valley is Oregon most populous region, extending 120 miles south from Portland through Salem, Albany, Corvallis and Eugene. The book is divided into eight chapters: Portland Area Interurbans (1891-1958), Oregon Electric Railway (1908-1933), United Railways (1911-1923), SP Red Electrics (1914-1929), Willamette Valley Southern (1915-1933), Salem Street Railways (1889-1927), Albany Street Railways (1889-1918) and Eugene Street Railways (1891-1927). Portland Street Railways, the Oregon Electric Railway and the SP Red Electrics have been covered in other books, but this volume collects the basic company histories, photos, maps, timetables and vintage advertising in one handy reference. Some of the photos have been often published, but many obtained from museum and local library collections will be new to most readers. The book consists mostly of photos and captions, with just one page of historical text per chapter. The dates included with each chapter title refer solely to the years of passenger operation. In most cases this conforms to the company's history, but in the case of the Oregon Electric Railway, electric freight operation continued another dozen years into 1945 and the corporate identity lasted past the Burlington Northern merger, Oregon Electric being a subsidiary of the Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway.
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The Portland area is generally credited with having the country's first true interurban railway. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
combination baggage, passenger motors Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Oregon City, Courtesy Mark Moore, Forest Grove, Oregon Electric, United Railways, Southern Pacific, Courtesy Lane County Historical Museum, Courtesy Oregon Historical Society, Red Electrics, Willamette Street, Courtesy Warren, Mount Angel, Courtesy Donald Duke, Willamette Valley Southern, Lyon Street, Golden West Books, Pacific Railway Journal Archive, Pacific Electric, Courtesy Gholston Collection, University of Oregon, Bell Rose, State Street, Oak Grove, Main Street, Union Station Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
The Portland area is generally credited with having the country's first true interurban railway. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
combination baggage, passenger motors Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Oregon City, Courtesy Mark Moore, Forest Grove, Oregon Electric, United Railways, Southern Pacific, Courtesy Lane County Historical Museum, Courtesy Oregon Historical Society, Red Electrics, Willamette Street, Courtesy Warren, Mount Angel, Courtesy Donald Duke, Willamette Valley Southern, Lyon Street, Golden West Books, Pacific Railway Journal Archive, Pacific Electric, Courtesy Gholston Collection, University of Oregon, Bell Rose, State Street, Oak Grove, Main Street, Union Station Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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