Some of you may be wondering what happened to Yesteryear's model of
the National Orange Company packing house once located in Riverside,
Calif. The model has been advertised a few times in the hobby press
but never seems to appear on Yesteryear's website. This model (and
an image) is listed in this group's files section on the "Models and
Supplies" list.

First of all, models actually have been produced and sold in recent
months. Mike Aldridge of the Orange County Module Railroaders
built one for his module. I hope to have a photo of the module on
this site very soon.

I talked with a representative of Yesteryear at the World's Greatest
Hobby Show this weekend. She told me they are somewhat at the mercy
of Intermountain, who actually makes the HO and N-scale kits of this
model. Intermountain is going strong with a lot of kits so these
particular kits compete for production time.

Yesteryear hopes to have more kits of this model in the coming
months and when they do, they will be put on the website and offered
for sale.

Bob Chaparro
Mission Viejo, CA

Bob Chaparro wrote:

Your photos and the models are fantastic. Would you care to share with us the techniques you >used to construct some of the items in the grove and the precooler details?

Thanks for the compliment! :-) My model was almost entirely kitbashed from Walthers parts--R. J. Frost Cold Storage, icing platforms, and foundry canopy. The pre-cooler apparatus are four sections of flexible straws, telescoped together and painted. I used Walthers ice decks for the top surface of both decks and the underpinnings of the ice-only deck. The pre-cooler deck has solid concrete walls, so is done with styrene. The shed needs roofing material, and everything still needs weathering. Even at about a fourth of the size of the prototype, it is still a very large building in HO.

The shed is 24" x 12", the main building is 20" x 7" and the machinery section is 7" x
4". I didn't have much room for a "B Yard" itself, so I use it only for reefers--my "A Yard" is my main freight facility on the San Bernardino end of the layout. My "B Yard" will hold about 24 reefers.

All of my 130 or so orange trees were done by my wife Carol, who grew up in an orange grove in Fontana and said she knew what they should look like. Basically they are sponge pieces cut to shape and put on a stick, and then Woodland Scenics foam pieces were hot-glued over the sponge base. Several shapes, densities and colors were used, for variety. They were then sprayed with Scenic Cement adhesive and Woodland Scenics oranges sprinkled on, followed, when dry, by more spray adhesive. She found that you have to go easy on the spray or the oranges turn white.

I routed grooves for irrigation ditches and painted them earth color, then "flooded" with clear varnish. Standpipes are styrene tube with a couple of rows of tape wrapped around them, followed by several coats of thick paint to blend in the tape. Various Preiser and other figures were adapted to orange picking--Preiser makes some nice painters on ladders, which take only a little judicious snipping and painting to become pickers.

I have added a few more photos to the modeling folder I created yesterday.
Tom Cockle
Fieldbrook CA

On Sun, 20 Feb 2005 20:31:11 -0800, Tom Cockle wrote:

Originally icing was also done at the
pre-cooling deck, but in later years the shed was expanded to include
a standard icing deck of similar length, thus apparently accounting
for the two additional tracks.

Thanks for an excellent description.


Jerry
--
Porcupines are peaceful creatures but God still saw fit to give them
quills. -Unknown

Tom Cockle wrote:

For my HO San Bernardino B Yard I "guestimated" what the precooler
building would look like, not having available the great photos that
Jim Lancaster has just posted to the List. I have posted some photos
of my MUCH reduced model--my precooling and icing decks hold 8 cars
each, 4 to a side. Even at one-fourth the size of the prototype, my
model is huge. I modeled the buildings as basically windowless, but
now I see in Jim's photos that the "machinery end" has a lot of
windows--I guess I'll have to make some modifications there. :-)

Just for the record those were John Thompson's photos. He sent them to me to
post on my web site. About all I did was run them through Photoshop.

Jim

There was a nice four page article, excerpted from a May 11, 1912 Railway and Engineering Review, which included a track plan plus interior and ice deck photos, in the 4th Quarter 1988 Santa Fe Modeler. Unfortunately this issue is long-OOP. Basically the large building was a huge refrigeration plant, utilizing brine tanks, which delivered cold air to the ice deck, where flexible ducts were fitted to each end of a car's hatches. Cold air was blown in one end and sucked out the other, thus quickly cooling the already-loaded car by a number of degrees. The idea was to remove the field heat and thus reduce ice melt, and consequently reduce the need for frequent re-icings on the journey east. The pre-cooling deck had a capacity of 32 cars--16 to a side. Originally icing was also done at the pre-cooling deck, but in later years the shed was expanded to include a standard icing deck of similar length, thus apparently accounting for the two additional tracks.

Another, probably later, track plan--this time with four tracks under the shed roof rather than the original two--was (is?) available from the SFRH&MS. Neither of these track charts are to scale.

For my HO San Bernardino B Yard I "guestimated" what the precooler building would look like, not having available the great photos that Jim Lancaster has just posted to the List. I have posted some photos of my MUCH reduced model--my precooling and icing decks hold 8 cars each, 4 to a side. Even at one-fourth the size of the prototype, my model is huge. I modeled the buildings as basically windowless, but now I see in Jim's photos that the "machinery end" has a lot of windows--I guess I'll have to make some modifications there. :-)

Tom Cockle
Fieldbrook CA

On Sun, 20 Feb 2005 14:22:57 -0800, ljames1@... wrote:

The link to the in-work San Bernardino page where you can
see the precooler photos is:

I've seen the photos, but can someone please explain (or provide
a link to an explanation) of how these critters worked? Are
they just industrial air conditioners?


Jerry
--
Porcupines are peaceful creatures but God still saw fit to give them
quills. -Unknown

Bob Chaparro wrote:

We have created a new photo album titled "Icing-Cooling". This
album contains 9 photographs taken by Jack Delano in March 1943.
All are from the Library of Congress collection.

The photos were taken inside the facility that once stood in the "B"
Yard at San Bernardino. We have no exterior photographs of this
facility so if anyone has exterior shots and/or a track plan these
would greatly be appreciated.

I have some photos of the precooler that John Thompson sent me some time ago.
I have a big backlog of material for the packing house web site and these were
in that backlog. The link to the in-work San Bernardino page where you can
see the precooler photos is:
(note: you cannot yet get to this page from the home page).

I have additional San Bernardino photos to add when I get the time.

Jim Lancaster

We have created a new photo album titled "Icing-Cooling". This
album contains 9 photographs taken by Jack Delano in March 1943.
All are from the Library of Congress collection.

The photos were taken inside the facility that once stood in the "B"
Yard at San Bernardino. We have no exterior photographs of this
facility so if anyone has exterior shots and/or a track plan these
would greatly be appreciated.

Bob Chaparro
Mission Viejo, CA
Owner-Moderator
Citrus Industry Modeling Group

few more photos up tonite

开云体育

Hi All:

?

John was kind enough to provide the URL off list to me, so now I have it and have taken a look ...

?

Thanks,

?

Pepper

--- In citrusmodeling@..., "John R. signor"

Since this is the Citrus Modeling Group I went ahead and uploaded a
new album of "citrus modeling" to get the ball rolling
--
John R. Signor
Phone: 530-235-0261 Fax 530-235-0915

Hi John:

I can't locate the file you loaded ... do you have the URL for
it ?? ...

Thanks,

Pepper Kay
Garland, TX

Nice photo's! I'm jealous. But they give me some ideas that I hadn't
thought of.


--- In citrusmodeling@..., "John R. signor" <sstudio@s...>
wrote:

Since this is the Citrus Modeling Group I went ahead and uploaded a
new album of "citrus modeling" to get the ball rolling
--
John R. Signor
Phone: 530-235-0261 Fax 530-235-0915

I noticed that the Microscale 87-771 and 48-299 sets do say "1955+" on them. I knew that the stylized orange logos would not be appropriate for my 1955 layout, but figured the shadowed block lettering--which figured so prominently on packing houses, usually on a dark blue background--was not so recent. I seem to recall seeing it in older photos, but may have a hazy memory there! Jim Lancaster can certainly confirm if it shows up in pre-1955 photos.

I certainly hope Microscale would take up your earlier version, as I have several packing houses that could use them.
Tom Cockle
Fieldbrook CA

Bill Messecar wrote:

-- 

In 1910 the first railway through Placentia, CA was opened. There
were six large packing ouses built soon after, right along the track.
They were Placentia-Olinda, So. Cal. Fruit Exchange, Randolph, Strain,
California Vegetable Union and Cobb Vegetable Company. C.C. Chapman
had a siding on his Santa Ysabel Ranch and a large packing house.

Placentia shipped more carloads of freight than any other place in the
southland except Los Angelos. They shipped 800 carloads the first
season. The biggest year for Placentia was 1953. That year 4,200
carloads were shipped.

In 1952, the Pacific Electric Rwy served the following packing
houses at Corona:

Orange Heights Orange Assn. Houses 1 and 2. These were on the
eastside of town.

Jameison Co. It was on the westside of town and required the PE run
through town on 3rd St. The line was still in service when the
Riverside Freeway was built.

Other companies with sidings/spur were Richfield Oil, Union Oil,
Pacific Warehouse and Storage (dried beans and Fertilizer)and S.P.
Rosenbaum (Grain and Feed).

From a PE issued list of Idustries and warehouses

Cliff Prather

Thanks Bob for inviting me to your group. I am currently involved
with the Pacific Railroad Society, Pacific Railroad Musuem in San
Dimas, CA. Our museum is in the former Santa Fe Depot that served 5
surrounding packing houses.

In the good old days, the stations of the Pasadena Sub were located
half a mule day apart. Farmers could bring a load from the field to
the packing house and return in one day. Notice the locations
between Monrovia and San Bernardino. The Pasadena Sub produced 10%
of the Santa Fe feight in good years.

I recall a gentleman who had a drayage business on Etiwanda Ave. He
kept the mules at the North end of the street so that the trips to
the lemon packing sheds were downhill and they came home empty on the
up slope. There are still a few eucalylptus tree rows that protected
the groves from the winds.

The Proctor Family created Arrowhead Lake to water lemons in the San
Bernardino area. I believe the Proctor Family still harvests lemons
in Ventura Co.

Before Henry Ford, the fruit was moved in lug boxes from the field.
A man would swing a box up on the wagon and his partner would stack
them 5 high. It was tricky to load the last stacks; you had to stand
on a picking laddre and swing the boxes into the load. At the
processing plant, a man would push a hand truck under a stack, pull
it back, turn and push it into the shed. The cars were loaded by
gangs. Boxes were stacked about 5 high and bags were put on top.
The load had to be carefully loaded so that the air would circulate.

Summer loads were cooled. Depending on the crop and season, ice was
needed. In the Jul Aug and Sept, cars had to be precooled before
spotting them at the packing house. Otherwise the first load of ice
was melted before the car returned to San Bernardino. In the winter,
citrus was protected from freezing by car heaters that were installed
in the ice chests. These cars displayed a skull and cross bones on
the door because they may have become dangerously toxic.

More later
Lindsay

Hey that really worked. Now I can study to my hearts content. Thanks
a lot. GaryIII

Hi,

A couple of years ago the San Jose library had the username and password to
the Sanborn maps listed on their website. Luckily I copied it then.
You can go directly to the site of Sanborn


Click on "Browse maps" and then use the login-code from the San Jose Public
Library:

username: SJPLREMOTE
password: WELCOME

Now you have access to the Sanborn maps of California.

The University of Buffalo had a similar agreement and with their account you
could access all maps but alas, they cancelled their subscription I've
heard.

But the above gives you at least the California maps :)

Kind regards,

Wilbert Vossen



-----Oorspronkelijk bericht-----
Van: Gary [mailto:garyiii@...]
Verzonden: woensdag 16 februari 2005 21:48
Aan: citrusmodeling@...
Onderwerp: [citrusmodeling] Re: Neat Maps Where to find?



I went to the web site referenced below and it requires a San Jose Library
card to get access. I called them and asked how to get a San Jose Library
card (Middle Calif)since I live in Placentia, CA (Southern Calif 400 miles
away) and I talked to three or four people and nobody new how to I could get
one short of going to San Jose and establishing residence.

Any ideas?? Garyiii


--- In citrusmodeling@..., "William Messecar"
<santafe-mail@c...> wrote:

Gary--you can pull up all the Sanborne maps of Placentia you want as
they are available to the public on the San Jose library web site. If
you need more information on how to access them contact me off list.

Bill Messecar

Santafe-Mail@C...

-----Original Message-----
From: Gary [mailto:garyiii@h...]
Sent: Tuesday, February 15, 2005 9:12 PM
To: citrusmodeling@...
Subject: [citrusmodeling] Neat Maps Where to find?



Ed posted some good maps of ancient Corona.
Those maps were very nice. However, I am particulalry interested in
Placentia, CA citrus (including Atwood, Richfield, and a couple of
other places I don't remember right now).



In general, the area from Fullerton, going east to the Santa Ana river
"pinch" just west of Prado and Corona.

Where can I find access to similar maps of this area (ca 1900 thru
1940)?

GaryIII@h...





When replying to a message, be sure to eliminate unnecessary or
redundant text. If your reply does not directly address the original
topic, add further text to the subject line.

Please show respect and consideration for other points of view in your
replies.

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When replying to a message, be sure to eliminate unnecessary or redundant
text. If your reply does not directly address the original topic, add
further text to the subject line.

Please show respect and consideration for other points of view in your
replies.

Yahoo! Groups Links

I went to the web site referenced below and it requires a San Jose
Library card to get access. I called them and asked how to get a San
Jose Library card (Middle Calif)since I live in Placentia, CA
(Southern Calif 400 miles away) and I talked to three or four people
and nobody new how to I could get one short of going to San Jose and
establishing residence.

Any ideas?? Garyiii


--- In citrusmodeling@..., "William Messecar"
<santafe-mail@c...> wrote:

Gary--you can pull up all the Sanborne maps of Placentia you want as
they are available to the public on the San Jose library web site. If
you need more information on how to access them contact me off list.

Bill Messecar

Santafe-Mail@C...

-----Original Message-----
From: Gary [mailto:garyiii@h...]
Sent: Tuesday, February 15, 2005 9:12 PM
To: citrusmodeling@...
Subject: [citrusmodeling] Neat Maps Where to find?



Ed posted some good maps of ancient Corona.
Those maps were very nice. However, I am particulalry interested in
Placentia, CA citrus (including Atwood, Richfield, and a couple of
other places I don't remember right now).



In general, the area from Fullerton, going east to the Santa Ana river
"pinch" just west of Prado and Corona.

Where can I find access to similar maps of this area (ca 1900 thru
1940)?

GaryIII@h...





When replying to a message, be sure to eliminate unnecessary or
redundant text. If your reply does not directly address the original
topic, add further text to the subject line.

Please show respect and consideration for other points of view in your
replies.

Yahoo! Groups Links