Re: Surprise Valley No.1

The Surprise Valley Railway was a project projected by Eureka & Palisade Superintendent John E. Sexton. It was projected to be a 3' gauge line from a point east of Reno, NV to Lakeview, OR. It does not have seemed to matter to Sexton that the Nevada-California-Oregon Ry already connected these two points. Sexton had some of the old E&P equipment (now renamed Eureka Nevada Ry) relettered for his Surprise Valley line and revived his planned line in 1915. The locomotives that were relettered were former Sumpter Valley Ry. Baldwin 1880 4-4-0 #15 and a newly acquired Porter 0-6-0 with tender that came from a Chicago Equipment dealer in 1913. The 4-4-0 (ex-Utah Western, Utah & Nevada, Oregon Short Line & Utah Northern and Sumpter Valley) became Surprise Valley #2, while the used Porter 0-6-0 became "SV" #2. A number of cars, including a short combine were also relettered. However, little else seems to have come from the Surprise Valley project.
Matters are made even more confusing by a 1912 exchange of locomotives between the EN Ry and the Sumpter Valley Ry. I covered all this in my multi-part NG&SL GAZETTE series in 2016 and 2017.