A 6-car freight heads for Keeler. With a full head of steam, the Southern Pacific's Baldwin Locomotive #18 takes a 6-car freight past the water and fuel tanks in the yard at Laws, California, heading south toward Keeler with multiple stops planned at industrial sites along the way.
This image was created during a March, 2023 photo shoot at the Laws Museum, near Bishop, CA. This train includes just about all of the operable rolling stock at the Laws Museum that is equipped with knuckle couplers. When the shoot was planned, we were prepared to be limited to perhaps a 2-car train, but the folks from the Laws Museum and the Carson & Colorado Railway pulled out all of the stops, permitting us to field a train that was much more representative of what ran on the Keeler Branch toward the end of operations.
Of interest in this photo is the little, yellow critter pictured at the far left. This is the little diesel-powered Plymouth Locomotive that is used by the Laws Museum for shuttling equipment around, as there is normally no steam power here. For those concerned about the authenticity of such a locomotive in this image, rest assured that the Plymouth does indeed pre-date the end of steam operations on the Keeler Branch.
Images from the March, 2023 Lerro Photography photo shoots at the Laws Museum, near Bishop, California, featuring the Southern Pacific's Baldwin 10-wheeler #18 on her second visit since her 2017 restoration.
