Letcher railroad collection, 1860-1889

Summary

Title:

Letcher railroad collection

Dates:

1860-1889

Creators:

Letcher, Howard T.

Extent:

2.2 Linear Feet (4 manuscript boxes and 1 half box)

Language:

English .

Preferred citation:

[identification of item], Letcher railroad collection (M0268). Dept. of Special Collections and University Archives, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, California.

Background

Scope and content:

Correspondence and documents concerning the Southern Pacific Company and the Northern California operations of the Central Pacific Railroad. Topics include: accidents, brakes, employee problems, engines, engineers, rates pay, and train delays.

Biographical / historical:

Dr. Howard T. Letcher worked for the Shasta Division of the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1940 and 1941; he was a noted railroad historian and in 1971 was asked by then California Governor Ronald Reagan to serve on the board of directors of the Transportation museum in Sacramento, California.

Custodial history:

Purchased from Howard T. Letcher Estate, 1976. Accession 1981-013 was a gift from Donald Duke in 1981.

Physical location:

Special Collections and University Archives materials are stored offsite and must be paged three business days in advance. For more information on paging collections, see the department's website: https://library.stanford.edu/libraries/special-collections.

Rules or conventions:

Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Indexed terms

Subjects:

Railroads

Names:

Southern Pacific Company

About this collection guide

Collection Guide Author:

Processed by Special Collections staff; machine-readable finding aid created by C. Del Anderson;

Date Encoded:

This finding aid was produced using ArchivesSpace on 2025-10-09 13:45:48 -0700 .

Restrictions:

Open for research. Note that material must be requested at least 36 hours in advance of intended use. Audiovisual materials are not available in original format, and must be reformatted to a digital use copy.

Terms of access:

While Special Collections is the owner of the physical and digital items, permission to examine collection materials is not an authorization to publish. These materials are made available for use in research, teaching, and private study. Any transmission or reproduction beyond that allowed by fair use requires permission from the owners of rights, heir(s) or assigns. See: http://library.stanford.edu/spc/using-collections/permission-publish.

Preferred citation:

[identification of item], Letcher railroad collection (M0268). Dept. of Special Collections and University Archives, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, California.

Location of this collection:

Stanford University, Manuscripts Division

Department of Special Collections, Green Library

557 Escondido Mall

Stanford, CA 94305-6004, US

Contact:

(650) 725-1022

specialcollections@stanford.edu

Website