Background
Salvador Ramirez was born 22 January 1936 in Los Angeles, California and died 24 August 2014 in Carlsbad, California. He
was a United States Navy/NSA Veteran and public school educator. He received his BA and MA from CSU Long Beach and his counseling
credential from UCLA. He taught in the Los Angeles School District for nine years and was a principal in San Fernando Valley
for four years. He spent the remainder of his education career as the principal of San Dieguito High School in Encinitas,
California.
Salvador was very passionate about California history and this passion lead him to research and write six books on the history
of railroading in California. His writings primarily focused on the Southern Pacific Railroad. He was the author of “Fort
Gaston, CA: A Brief Sketch”, “From New York to San Francisco via Cape Horn in 1849”, “Octopus Speaks: The Colton Letters”,
“Inside Man: Life and Times of Mark Hopkins”, “Clash of Titans: Ambrose Bierce and Collis Huntington”, “Colton Letters Revisited”.
The 1982 book, “The Octopus Speaks: The Colton Letters”, is published correspondence between C.P. Huntington and David Colton.
These letters were previously believed to have been lost.
Restrictions
Copyright has not been assigned to the California State Railroad Museum. All requests for permission to publish or quote from
manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the CSRM Librarian. Permission for publication is given on behalf of the CSRM
as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must
also be obtained by the reader.