Film Booking Offices of America (FBO)

“An Amazing Photodrama of Flesh and Steel” is the tempting come-on of one lobby card (seen above). Today’s feature from the silent era was filmed in the Los Angeles area at both Santa Fe and Southern Pacific railroad locations.

My review pretty much just skips over the plot and concentrates on the train and locomotive goodness. Considering the movie is 100 years old, it’s a reasonably crisp print. A link to this movie can be found at the end of my narrative. Enjoy!

Southern Pacific Lines #2420 gets a fair amount of screen time and is seen here at full gallop. The 4-6-2 is from Espee’s P-1 Class and was built by Baldwin Locomotive Works in 1906. This was robust, speedy passenger power for its day including 77″ drivers, 200psi boiler pressure and just under 30,000lbs of tractive effort.

Sister locomotive #2423 is shown here for comparison, in this well-lit view from 1940.

Thirty year man, Engineer Bill Buckley has train #99 well in hand, as it swoops around a gentle curve.

Oh, Snap! Lovely (and wealthy) Esther Miller has got her foot caught in the tracks. Nearby, alert telegrapher Johnny Buckley spots the dire situation. Knowing #99 is due, he attempts to set the lower-quadrant semaphore to stop.

Drat! The head end passed before he could place the signal at its most restrictive aspect.

Quick as a flash, he’s out the door, running along the tracks and rendering aid and assistance. I like Johnny’s eyeshade.

99 is bearing down on them, eliciting a great face from Miss Miller. Ahhhhhhh!!!!!

With a fine backdrop of SP passenger cars, we see that Johnny has saved the damsel in distress — AND the horse she rode in on!; Dad Buckley is all smiles climbing down from the cab of 2420 (“That’s My Boy!!“); Needless to say, Esther and Johnny strike up an immediate friendship/budding romance trackside (“My Hero!”).

Not only is Esther a poor, little rich girl, but Daddy is President of the railroad. This one’s a keeper, Johnny. Hubba-hubba!

Roundhouse views! SP #2420 lined up with other power at the roundhouse. The boys are shooting the breeze in the locker/changing room. I think that last view is of SP #3612, a 2-10-2 Baldwin-built Class F-1 “Decapod”.

Esther’s folks are down at Santa Fe’s “La Grande” Station (with its distinct onion-domed roof) to catch #110 for San Francisco. Mrs. M has quite the trousseau being loaded aboard by the porters.

More Roundhouse views! SP #2665 – that’s a Class C-5 2-8-0 Consolidation built by Alco-Schenectady. SP #2420 opens up both cylinder cocks blasting impurities out of the boiler; SP #1389 is an E class 4-4-0 American type; From the cab – Bill Buckley striking the classic railroad engineer pose.

Anyhow, circumstances dictate Esther’s parents hurry back on a special train (#66) which has rights over everything (Being President does come with its perks). Meanwhile, #99 is getting its train number boards set up and is soon speeding on its way.

Wouldn’t you know, some dastardly fiend is plotting a cornfield meet for #66 & #99. Fortunately, good triumphs over evil as Johnny manages to stop both trains with a trackside brush fire and a railroad fusee.

“What is it Johnny? Stop him! Stop 99!“

Highball! Everyone’s happy now that Johnny’s getting hitched to Esther and riding off to their honeymoon on Daddy’s private car. I love a happy ending.

If you’d like to watch it yourself, the link is here:

That is, if it’s still on YouTube…

Here’s what IMDb has to say about The West~Bound Limited:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0348369/

If you have ANY information about this movie you’d like to share, please contact me at: Lindsay.Korst@gmail.com, or leave a comment.  Thanks and enjoy the blog!

THE END