Oregon and California Railroad Co. collection
Finding aid created by California State Railroad Museum Library and Archives staff using RecordEXPRESS
California State Railroad Museum Library and Archives
2020
111 I Street
Sacramento, California 95814
(916) 323-8073
Library.CSRM@parks.ca.gov
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Title: Oregon and California Railroad Co. collection
Dates: 1876-1926
Collection Number: MS 134
Creator/Collector:
Oregon and California Railroad
Extent: 8 boxes + 1 volume
Repository:
California State Railroad Museum Library and Archives
Sacramento, California 95814
Abstract: Includes an equipment record and financial records.
Language of Material: English
This collection is open for research at our off-site storage facility with one week's notice. Contact Library & Archives
staff to arrange for access.
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 Capital District Collections Manager. 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.
Oregon and California Railroad Co. collection. California State Railroad Museum Library and Archives
The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley; Southern Pacific Railroad, New York Collection.
Biography/Administrative History
The Oregon & California Railroad was incorporated March 17, 1870 and eventually totaled approximately seven hundred miles
of standard gauge, steam operated railroad, a little over half of which was constructed under its own name, the balance being
obtained by acquisition of the following organizations:
1. Oregon Central Rail Road (east side)
2. Oregon Central Railroad (west side)
3. Western Oregon Railroad
4. Portland & Yamhill Railroad
5. Albany & Lebanon Railroad
6. Oregonian Railroad
The Oregon & California itself, as originally constructed, was a railroad without branches, extending approximately 365 miles
from Portland, Oregon southerly via Salem, Albany, Eugene, Roseburg and Ashland to the Oregon-California state boundary.
Several small branches described later were constructed under the corporate name of the O&C after the road was taken over
by the Southern Pacific Company.
O&C rails reached New Era, on the east side of the Willamette River, 20.08 miles south of Portland, on December 24, 1869,
under the name of the Oregon Central Rail Road. Southward progress was as follows: To Salem September 27, 1870, Albany December
25, 1870, Eugene October 15, 1871, Roseburg December 3, 1872, where construction was halted for almost nine years. The section
to Myrtle Creek was completed August 14, 1882, to Grants Pass December 2, 1883, and to Ashland May 4, 1884. The line of the
Central Pacific building north from Red Bluff, California, reached the Oregon border on June 1, 1887, and the O&C, under lease
to the SP Company since July 1, completed construction north from the border to Ashland on December 17, 1887, thus completing
the Siskiyou route and forming a continuous rail line from Portland, Oregon to New Orleans, Louisiana, about thirty-two hundred
miles, all under one management. [Guy Dunscomb, A CENTURY OF SOUTHERN PACIFIC STEAM LOCOMOTIVES, 1862-1962 (Modesto, California:
1967), p. 395]
Scope and Content of Collection
This collection is arranged in two series:
•1. RECORD OF EQUIPMENT
•2. FINANCIAL RECORDS
1. Record of equipment
One volume, July 1, 1887 with entries that provide numbers (old and new) of boats, locomotives and rolling stock on the Oregon
and California, including those pieces of equipment transferred to the line from other railroads, class of equipment, dimensions,
weight, date in service and remarks, including disposition of the equipment.
2. FINANCIAL RECORDS
Includes accounting records of the Oregon & California Railroad. They include journal entries for land transactions, land
accounts, land sales and leases, correspondence, letterpress books, cash books, balance sheets and cash payments.
•Contact Library Staff for additional financial records.