1800's Steam Locomotive Identification

[velyrhorde]

I need to know how a couple of outlaws would have identified a specific train. I've been told they'd likely know the locomotive, but I have no idea if they'd know the number -- and how? -- or if locomotives actually had nicknames or something. This would have been the Union Pacific line, in Southern Wyoming, around 1875. If it helps, it's a special

Comments

[ffutures]

How many trains were there going to be on the route that interests you? One a day? One an hour? It makes a big difference! Your essential resource for this is the film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, which has a lot of detail of the process of robbing a train, but earlier westerns, especially those made in the 1930s, may be more accurate about the actual operation of the railways. There's also a Korean film called The Good, The Bad, The Weird, a homage to spaghetti westerns, which has possibly the best train robbery sequence ever, set in 1920s-30s Manchuria.

My guess is that assuming the thieves knew when the train they were interested in left its depot, and the route it was taking, there would probably be only one train on the lines at anything like the right time

[swiftgold]

I used to work at a railroad museum and it has a large reference library including many historical railroad timetables, so if you really wanted to get accurate they might be able to help you. It's also right in the area where the story's set (Colorado), so I'm sure it has the applicable line info. http://coloradorailroadmuseum.org/library/collections/ is the library section of the site that includes the email (I hesitate to post it out here for spam scrapers, heh) for inquiries.