I’m guessing the containers were “experimental” because they were transitioning from wood crates. David Soderblom Baltimore MD USA drs@...

Every time I see an image like this I can’t help noting all the exquisite details: The EXCESS HEIGHT placard, but it’’s too wide for the wood it’s stapled to, so it’s folded: both of them! Was that fr

Just to fill in… When traditional cucumber pickles are made, you dump them into a vat in brine. The brine suppresses bad bacteria and having them in a liquid suppressed aerobes, and then there’s a mal

About Heinz in California: I pointed out cukes and Michigan just because it was so notable on the map. Equally notable is the lack of receiving stations of any kind in the Bay Area and region. Heinz c

I note with interest the three factories in northern California, Salinas, ~Oakland, and Tracy/Los Banos. Yet Calif. is not a producer of the materials (take a look at all those cukes from Michigan!),

This may be a ballast cleaning operation, from the daisy-chained conveyors. David Soderblom Baltimore MD USA drs@...

That is an *exquisite* model and finishing job. Extraordinary. David Soderblom Baltimore MD USA drs@...

About matches: When Giant Sequoias were being logged ca. 1900 their enormous trunks were used for matches. David Soderblom Baltimore MD USA drs@...

Given that a journal is clearly missing its lid, I’d say he’s tacking a Bad Order card to get that fixed. David Soderblom Baltimore MD USA drs@...

I’d say Crown Flour is in an industrial area and that track has empties from several industries we can’t see. No profund answer is required. David Soderblom Baltimore MD USA drs@...

A double-ended business car! David Soderblom Baltimore MD USA drs@...

The car is clearly stenciled: “Bad order Do not load” and is a G27. Guess somebody was functionally illiterate? David Soderblom Baltimore MD USA david.soderblom@...

A lot of coal was shipped fairly finely divided, in small pieces, large chunks with air gaps less so. A reference book I have quotes the density of coal as 75 to 94 lbs/ft^3, so you could use the lowe

A lovely image with so much going on: - Such skinny logs for that long ago; not old-growth at all, and with tangled branches. Not worth harvesting for many outfits at that time. - A recently construct

I knew, absolutely KNEW, somebody would nit me on that. About as life-threatening as getting the journal box cover misidentified. Let’s just agree on Eastern something, with the onion domes. David Sod

Thanks so much; there are so many scenes that beg to be simulated in scale. I wouldn’t care to do the Russian Orthodox church, but there are all those lovely details: the combination of concrete and s

I note that the gondola to the left has the pole holders on the car’s outside. I had thought they were inside so the pole would rest against the car’s floor. David Soderblom Baltimore MD USA drs@stsci

An interesting aspect of this photo is the rust on both trucks. Maybe it’s “boxcar red” overspray, but I personally don’t recall seeing rust on freight car trucks because they always have so much oil

A lovely scene. The car is on blocks, yet retains all its fittings (brake hose, coupler, …). And then there’s the siding. I would love to see someone reproduce that sketchy track, with its odd angles

I’m inclined to agree with your comment about griminess, but bear in mind that the photographic emulsions a century ago were primarily blue sensitive rather than panchromatic as they were later. That