Chasing the narrow gauge 55 years ago, June 1964

I early June 1964 I finished my Junior years at New Mexico State University, and had accepted an offer by Mobil Oil for a summer job at their gasoline (actually natural gas condensate) plant in Kermit, West Texas, starting on June 15. This left a week between the end of the Semester and reporting in Texas. I was dying to head to the narrow gauge, while my room mate Leo Sopheantha, a Fulbright student from Cambodia, was eager to explore the the Rocky Mountain West. I had use of the not necessarily very reliable 1949 Mercury that my dad had bought in 1957 for 250 dollars when we had not yet made a decision about staying in the USA or returning to Germany. So Leo and I decided to join forces, combining sightseeing with a limited amount of train chasing (always a challenge when traveling with non-railfans)

The 1949 Mercury was pretty much a beater car but there was hoping it would serve well that summer



On Friday morning, June 5, we left Alamogordo about 2 o'clock in the morning to catch up with the freights operating out of Chama that day. Unfortunately this middle of the night departure aroused the suspicion of the local police, and less than a mile from my parents house as I was driving and Leo was trying to sleep in the back seat, the dreaded flashing lights came on behind us. It was my first time getting pulled over and I could see our trip coming to an end already. We were interrogated and accused of speeding, although I was driving at least 5 mph below the speed limit. Eventually we were relieved to be let go without a ticket. Finally,pulling into Chama, we encountered 487 switching out lumber loads at the Skyline saw mill.



Before this trip we had made a run to Fed Mart in El Paso where Leo had bought an SLR camera, while I was still stuck with an ancient 120 film Agfa box camera cast off by my folks. So most of the following photos were taken with Leo's new slide camera, while a few B&W shots from my Agfa box are sprinkled in.

After gathering up the lumber loads and GRAMPS oil tank cars, 492 and 487headed out of Chama with the morning's Cumbres turn. Here are 492 and 487 at the dirt road crossing outside Chama.





Further along the dirt road 492 was working hard leading the full tonnage train