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Denver, Mesa & Gunnison Railroad
   
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Description
All of the liveries for the Denver, Mesa & Gunnison Railroad, my entry in the 2021 Railroad History Jam. Roughly separated into three eras (for now): early (1898-1918), prewar (1919-1940), and postwar (1945-1970). A fairly prosperous and far-reaching railroad, the DM&G had an extensive rolling stock fleet, from small steam engines and ore jimmies to sleek, powerful electric traction.
Items (24)
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 19
Created by Dark Derby
The Denver, Mesa & Gunnison Railroad is one of the more obscure railroads of the Western US. Founded in 1898, it initially ran between Grand Junction and Mesa, Colorado as a mining road. By 1910, it had reached Denver to the east and Gunnison to the southe...
DM&G No. 19 Tender
Created by Dark Derby
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 19 was delivered as a wood burner with a conventional tender, but after a wreck in 1906, it was rebuilt for coal firing and given this Vanderbilt tender. "Vandy" tenders became a staple of the DM&G until the introduction of Ka-c...
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison Boxcar (Early)
Created by Dark Derby
Typical of its era, wood boxcars like this carried any and all freight shipped on the DM&G. These boxcars also carried the earliest version of the DM&G's "Mountain" logo, which would be revised and updated several times into the 1970s....
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison Ore Hopper
Created by Dark Derby
From the start, the DM&G's bread and butter was mining. Dozens of "jimmy" hoppers like this rolled from the mines around Grand Junction to customers along the main line, loaded with just about anything that came out of the ground in Colorado: coal, copper,...
DM&G Pullman (Early)
Created by Dark Derby
Though they started out with older wood passenger cars, the Denver, Mesa & Gunnison was quick to replace them with steel heavyweights like this. Beginning in 1900, the branding "Rocky Air Line" was a mainstay of the DM&G's passenger services--"air line" wa...
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 22
Created by Dark Derby
Beginning around 1909, the DM&G began taking new engines in a simple black livery, in stark contrast to the vivid red and gold of their first five. No. 22, a Baldwin engine from 1910, is typical of the time. It served as a versatile freight engine through ...
DM&G No. 22 Tender
Created by Dark Derby
The tender for DM&G No. 22, displaying the railroad's signature wraparound striping....
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 26
Created by Dark Derby
In 1923, the DM&G introduced an elegant new scheme for its passenger locomotives. Harkening back to the first five engines on the line, these new engines wore white-and-purple pinstriping and dark green boiler jackets; only slight differences from the frei...
DM&G No. 26 Tender
Created by Dark Derby
No. 26's tender boasts distinctive Rocky Air Line lettering and, to separate it from the freight livery, a subtle purple accent on the striping and lettering. Repainted DM&G passenger engines could still be identified by the high-set "Denver, Mesa & Gunnis...
DM&G Boxcar (Prewar)
Created by Dark Derby
The DM&G began using steel-sheathed wood boxcars like this one in 1929, to replace their aging wooden fleet. A few those were even rebuilt into these, especially once the Depression hit and the DM&G put new car orders on hold....
DM&G Hopper (Prewar)
Created by Dark Derby
As the ore jimmies of the 1890s began to show their age, the DM&G retired them in favor of larger, all-steel hoppers. This is a typical example, built in 1932 of a design the railroad had been ordering since 1926. Some of these would still be hard at work ...
DM&G Pullman (Prewar)
Created by Dark Derby
In 1916, the DM&G began repainting their passenger cars into a more modern olive green, out of the red that had been used since the railroad's founding. It looked good on its own and went especially well with the passenger locomotive livery rolled out in 1...
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 223
Created by Dark Derby
As the DM&G expanded operations in the 1920s, the need arose for a heavy-duty, mixed-traffic locomotive. Not only did it have to be powerful enough for coal and ore drags through the mountains, it had to have a lower-than-usual center of gravity to safely ...
DM&G Ka 223 Tender
Created by Dark Derby
The tenders for the DM&G's K class, unlike the engines themselves, changed very little throughout their service life. They were painted with both the "Rocky Air Line" passenger lettering and the "King of the Rockies" freight logo to reflect the engines' mi...
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 165
Created by Dark Derby
World War II ramped up traffic for just about every major American railroad, and the DM&G was no exception. And like many railroads, it was soon found that their engine fleet was struggling to keep up. Double-headers were the norm, and the new K-classes in...
DM&G No. 165 Tender
Created by Dark Derby
The tenders for the DM&G's Big Boys were almost identical to the UP's "centipede" tenders. At first, they were painted with just the DM&G logo; the numbering was added in 1947 for easier identification....
DM&G Hopper (Postwar)
Created by Dark Derby
Starting in 1947, the DM&G began to paint their hoppers in this oxide red livery, which had been used on their boxcars since the railroad's beginnings....
DM&G Postwar Boxcar
Created by Dark Derby
One of the first changes the DM&G made after the war was the two-tone gray "Mountain" scheme. It was first applied to boxcars like this in 1948 and became the road's signature passenger livery. Having boxcars in the livery made them decent express cars in ...
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 442
Created by Dark Derby
One of the biggest gambles the DM&G ever took was the adoption of electric traction. Long tunnels and steep grades on the main line had been trouble since the beginning, patched up with extra sand on the locomotives and special oxygen masks for the crews. ...
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 445
Created by Dark Derby
One year after the DM&G's V8s were repainted, the 400-class "side-rods" got their turn. This attractive oxide red scheme was designed for versatility: it matched the oxide-painted freight cars and, if need be, the "Mountain Gray" passenger equipment. In us...
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 632
Created by Dark Derby
While hampered slightly by a little thing called the Great Depression, the DM&G's electrification efforts were generally successful, especially when coal shortages threatened their steam fleet. Arguably, those first electric engines were what carried the r...
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 649
Created by Dark Derby
In 1949, the DM&G's passenger electric fleet got a new look, ditching the old olive green for the railroad's new Mountain Gray scheme. Sleek and shiny, the new paint scheme was...essentially the old one, but refreshed for the forward-looking 1950s. The rep...
DM&G - Mesa 1928
Created by Dark Derby
Introducing my first released layout! A proper home for the DM&G rolling stock fleet--the Mesa Yards in the spring of 1928. Hidden in the shadows of Grand Mesa, the largest flattop mountain in the world, Mesa’s still the same dirt-road, wooden-cabin sort o...
Denver, Mesa & Gunnison No. 1320
Created by Dark Derby
For a relatively extensive railroad, the DM&G was curiously late to dieselize. The last of their steam fleet--the 160-class Big Boys--was retired in 1961, and apart from a smattering of diesel switchers, the DM&G was solidly electric. That changed in 1966 ...