Southern Pacific Railroad - 1920s - medium poster

The Southern Pacific Transportation Company, earlier Southern Pacific Railroad and Southern Pacific Company, and usually simply called the Southern Pacific or (from the railroad's initials) Espee, was an American railroad. The railroad was founded as a land holding company in 1865, later acquiring the Central Pacific Railroad by lease. By 1900, the Southern Pacific Company had grown into a major railroad system which incorporated many smaller companies, such as the Texas and New Orleans Railroad and Morgan's Louisiana and Texas Railroad, and which extended from New Orleans through Texas to El Paso, across New Mexico and through Tucson, to Los Angeles, throughout most of California including San Francisco and Sacramento; it also included the Central Pacific Railroad extending eastward across Nevada to Ogden, Utah and had lines reaching north throughout and across Oregon to Portland. The Southern Pacific had noticable social impact along its route: some towns prospered because of it and it founded a number of important hospitals in, among other places, San Francisco and Tucson. Southern Pacific's total route mileage has varied significantly over the years. In 1929, the system showed 13,848 miles (22,286 km) (on its own); before the D&RGW merger Southern Pacific's mileage had dropped to 10,423 miles (16,774 km), mainly due to the pruning of branch line mileage. But by combining the mileage of subsidiary, St. Louis Southwestern Railway (Cotton Belt), SP system mileage totaled around 13,508 miles (21,739 km). This was because the Cotton Belt had almost doubled in size to 3,085 miles (4,965 km) with the purchase of the Golden State Route.