Photographer Unknown; Author’s Collection

S&NY Railroad #115 at Towanda

For the first “real” post on the site, I offer this shot of SNY # 115 at the Towanda engine service facilities. Photo probably circa 1940-42. Color film would have been expensive and rare during the Depression, and scarce during WWII. The railroad was torn up in mid-1942, so the picture has to be prior to that date. Perhaps when word got around about the pending abandonment, the photographer decided to expend a few precious color frames on the  S&NY?

Color photos from the steam era are precious to the railroad modeler, as we can get a better idea of the weathering patterns on steam locomotives and structures; the color of the ground, ties, and rails; and maybe get a better overall “feel” of the atmosphere of the time. We tend to subconsciously think of the past as black-and-white, since most of the old photos are such, but that is not true.

Note the locomotive is not “black”; but  infinite variations of gray and brown.