george pearce Wrote:
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> Here are some more numbers you can crunch! Going
> by the response to my query about active Mudhens
> in 1936, apparently 450, 451 and 457 were not in
> use. Maybe 455 and 459 were stored too. If that
> was the case, this day there would be 10 Mudhens
> available for use. Guess what!! Ten Mudhens showed
> up in Jimmy's posting!!
>
> Of the 10 K28's, 6 saw use this day. Of the 10
> K36's, 8 were out and about, and all of the K37's
> were in use somewhere.
>
> Amazing!! Of a total of 40 locomotives possible,
> 34 were used this day. That sounds like a busy
> railroad. And yet they were supposedly losing
> money on the narrow gauge.
The Rio Grande had to work hard to purposely loose money--one way was letting the Mail Contract go which led to the demise of San Juan and RR in general. They made very good money off that Mail Contract. It wasn't a secret they would even tell customers that wanted rail service how bad it would be to scare them off and have them use Rio Grande Motor Freight. Crazy I must say.
William
aka drgwk37