Hey Guys, it's Big Diehl here again with something from the archives? It's footage I've been sitting on since 2019 of Union Pacific's 'Big Boy' #4014 as it stretched its legs across Arizona on its 'Great Race Across The Southwest' tour. So, for this video, we’re along side the former Southern Pacific’s Sunset Route where we catch Union Pacific’s number 4014, the “Big Boy” this tour, which took it from Cheyenne to Los Angeles, through Tucson, onwards to El Paso and ultimately to San Antonio before swinging back to Denver and home to Cheyenne. Most of the footage here was shot by my Dad, but thanks to my own idiocy of having it put on a stabilizer and having the camera zoom in and out, well, the footage was quite bouncy… Sorry guys, my fault.

We'll follow from Tucson at the Irvington Power Plant as it leaves Yard Limit (YardLimit, Yard Limits? No, there's no YL here as it's just main line, unless you're thinking of the old Pacific Fruit Express Yards, aka, 36th Street Yard in Tucson along side Aviation Parkway) and onwards to Mescal where the Southern Pacific and the El Paso & Southwestern met and interchanged, and today is the end of the 'split rail' between Vail Arizona and here. Mescal and its distant signal is located just to our right/behind us. Next, we'll hop over Benson and the San Pedro River to near Tully and Sibyl (there used to be a Stuckey's here, no Pecan Logs today). From there we'll hop over Dragoon Pass and look back towards Cochise Stronghold as the BigBoy pulls into Willcox (Wine! Apples! Rex Allen! Big Diehl!, yeah, I"m from here). After leaving Willcox we'll hit up as it climbs Razo / Railroad Pass, and down into Bowie (Boo-eee, not Bow-ee, like Boo-Urns, not Ziggy Stardust). Oh yeah, and at the end, you'll have to see my face as I explain why I've decided to call this (and my favorite photo from the trip) 'Big Boy in the Land of the Gila monster'... Spoiler, it's not about the giant lizard.. But instead, I'll show you the Southern Pacific AC-9 'Yellowstone' class of engines, the 2-8-8-4 behemoths that were reversed 'Cab Forwards', (so you mean normal locomotives?) that were known as Espee's "Cab Behinds" but another nick name for them was 'Gila monster' which looking at them wouldn't be hard to say, and the fact they ran alot south of the Gila in the Gadsden Purchase in Baja Arizona, El Paso, and into Tucumcari (Tonight!... Route 66 joke) via the El Paso and Northeastern.

Honestly, if you've read this far into the description, congrats. And if you don't like the quality of this video, please check out Steam Train Videos production on this. James's video quality is much better.