MAY CONTAIN NUTS
HOME
 
JUMP TO PAGE   100  >  200  >  300  >  400  >  500  >  600
VINTAGRAPH • WPA • WWII • YOU MEAN A WOMAN CAN OPEN IT?

Eats, Liquors: 1943

March 1943. "Ash Fork, Arizona. Pulling into the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railyard." With much helpful signage. Photo by Jack Delano. View full size.

March 1943. "Ash Fork, Arizona. Pulling into the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railyard." With much helpful signage. Photo by Jack Delano. View full size.

 

On Shorpy:
Today’s Top 5

Regarding "Why?"

These boxcar ends are all steel stampings designed to hold the roof, walls and floor together. The horizontal corrugations were intended to give the end strength to resist the force of the lading pushing against the end. Without them a shifting load might just deform the end enough to break the rivet joints and tear the end out of the car.

These patterns all have names to the students of railroad freightcars. These ends on Illinois Central 28465(?) are pretty standard dreadnaught ends (as opposed to improved dreadnaught ends), probably built by Standard Railway Supply. They were a two part end, with the upper and lower halves joined by a rivet strip between them. If you look at the gap just below the tack board on the right (used to tack messages regarding car destination or handling en route), you can pick out the riveted joint.

Another great Jack Delano railroad photo

Note the collection of sand next to the standpipe on the adjoining rails. Obviously, steam engines with a train in tow would pull up and stop here for water. In order to get going again, the engineer would have to apply sand to the rails to overcome the inertia of getting his train back in motion. Nothing has changed, diesel locomotives have to carry sand for the same traction purposes too. It's still 'the steel wheel on the steel rail'.

Gulp & Blow

It looks like the 'Eats' shed and the 'Liquors' sign are strictly for the Railroad men - doesn't seem to be any access road around.

Grainy - 35mm ?

This photo is unlike any other Jack Delano photograph I have seen. Could this have been a "grab shot" with a 35mm camera?

[It's from a 2-1/4 square roll film negative, but presented here in greater magnification than many other Delano images shot in that format: 2700 pixels wide vs. 1900 for Women Wipers, for example. -tterrace]

[Or you can think of it as less reduced. The full-resolution image is 4252 pixels wide. - Dave]

+71

Here's the Liquors building, albeit from a different angle. The well-camouflaged windowless brick building beyond the EATS sign still exists, as well. There is an encouraging amount of tree growth in the last seven decades, making it hard to see which humble bungalows survive.


View Larger Map

Escalante Hotel nearby

Off-camera (behind Delano, to the right) is one of the more notable Harvey House hotel/restaurant/depot complexes. Named the Escalante Hotel, it was constructed in 1907, and demolished in 1951. Only the boiler smokestack remains. Also to the right is the path of Route 66 through downtown Ash Fork.

Those hills in the distance

are two miles away to the East, the tracks make a swing to the North and then a very circuitous route Eastward.

Why?

This photo reminded me of a question from my youth (1950s) that nobody ever answered. Why do/did boxcars have those horizontal ridges on the ends? Were they to allow shelving? Were they an artifact of manufacturing? Or were they "just there"? Inquiring minds, etc.....

Long climb to Williams

Looking east toward Bill Williams Mountain, and a little beyond that, the Navajo Army Depot, about a 2,000 foot climb from Ash Fork. The Depot was the prime holding area for munitions heading to the Pacific Theater until it was moved to Nevada later in the War.

Ash Fork is known as a flagstone producing and shipping center and its population of 400 is still holding on. The little town that could.

Syndicate content  Shorpy.com is a vintage photography site featuring thousands of high-definition images. The site is named after Shorpy Higginbotham, a teenage coal miner who lived 100 years ago. Contact us | Privacy policy | Accessibility Statement | Site © 2024 Shorpy Inc.