The Cable Car Home Page - Bibliography
by Joe Thompson

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    Books

    • Beebe, Lucius and Clegg, Charles. Cable Car Carnival. Grahame Hardy, Oakland, CA. 1951. Beebe's unique descriptions of San Francisco transit.
    • Blanchard, Leslie. The Street Railway Era in Seattle. Harold E Cox, Forty Fort, PA. 1968. An excellent survey of Seattle's rail transit history.
    • Burden, Maria Schell. Professor TSC Lowe and his Mountain Railway. Borden Publishing Co, Los Angeles, CA. 1993. About the Mount Lowe Funicular and the remarkable Professor Lowe.
      Check Amazon.Com (includes comments by the author)
    • Burrows, Edwin G and Wallace, Mike. Gotham/A History of New York City to 1898. Oxford University Press, New York, NY. March, 1999. A good general history of the city.
      Check Amazon.Com (includes review)
    • Burton, Virginia Lee. Maybelle the Cable Car. Houghton Mifflin Co, New York, NY. March, 1997. A good children's book.
      Check Amazon.Com (includes review)
    • Cable, Clark (pseud), Halfway to the Stars/Memoirs of a Cable Car Gripman. 1stBooks, CA. 2001. A variety of anecdotes.
      Check Amazon.Com (includes review)
    • Cable Railway Company, Cable Railway Company's System of Traction Rail Ways for Cities and Towns. San Francisco, CA. 1880. What the Trust had to offer.
    • Caen, Herb. The Cable Car & the Dragon. Chronicle Books, San Francisco, CA. March, 1986. A good children's book.
      Check Amazon.Com (includes review)
    • Callwell, Robert and Rice, Walter. Of Cables and Grips: The Cable Cars of San Francisco. Friends of the Cable Car Museum, San Francisco, CA. 2000. An excellent book about cable cars, with many wonderful illustrations.
      Read the text of the second edition on this site.
    • Campbell, Joseph. Funicular Railways/From Angel's Flight to Shasta Springs. Borden Publishing Co, Los Angeles, CA. 1993. California funiculars.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Demoro, Harre W. The Key Route, Part 1: Transbay Commuting by Train and Ferry (Interurbans Special, 95). Interurban Press, Glendale, CA. 1985.
    • Demoro, Harre W. The Key Route, Part 2: Transbay Commuting by Train and Ferry (Interurbans Special, 97). Interurban Press, Glendale, CA. 1985.
      Good books by a guy who died too young.
      Check Amazon.Com (part 1)
      Check Amazon.Com (part 2)
    • Fairchild, Charles Bryant. Street Railways: Their Construction, Operation and Maintenance. Street Railway Publishing Company, New York, NY. 1892. To quote the subtitle: "A Practical Handbook for Street Railway Men".
      Available at Google Books
    • Fickeworth, Alvin A. California Railroads. Golden West Books, San Marino, CA. 1992. To quote the subtitle: "An Encyclopedia of Cable Car, Common Carrier, Horsecar, Industrial, Interurban, Logging, Monorail, Motor Road, Short Lines, Streetcar, Switching and Terminal Railroads in California (1851-1992)"
      Check Amazon.Com (includes review)
    • Francis, Ric, and Ganley, Colin. Penang Trams, Trolleybuses and Railways. Areca Books, Penang, Malaysia. 2006. A detailed history of public transit in Penang.
    • Guido, Francis A, ed. San Francisco Municipal Railway 5-Year Plan 1979-1984. The Western Railroader Vol 42, San Mateo, CA. March, 1979. Not much of it happened.
    • Hilton, George, The Cable Car in America. Howell-North Books, San Diego, CA. 1982. The one indispensable book. New edition is here!
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Holtzer, Susan, Cable Car Confidential. Caddo Gap Press, San Francisco, CA. 20022. An enjoyable collection of stories from gripmen and conductors
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Jansen, Joyce, San Francisco's Cable Cars. Woodford Press, San Francisco, CA. 1995. Good pictures. A few inaccuracies (nobody's perfect).
      Check Amazon.Com (includes review)
    • Kahn, Edgar M., Cable Car Days in San Francisco. The Friends of the San Francisco Public Library, San Francisco, CA. 1976. A reprint of an enjoyable 1940 book which fell into disfavor because its author did not oppose city plans to get rid of the surviving cable cars.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Keating, John D, Mind the curve!/A History of the Cable Trams. Melbourne University Press, Kingsgrove. 1970. A thorough history of cable trams in Melbourne.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • LaBounty, Woody, Carville-by-the-Sea, San Francisco's Streetcar Suburb. Outside Lands Media, San Francisco, CA. 2009. A history of the lost San Francisco neighborhood.
      Order the book using the supporting website: http://www.carville-book.com/
    • McKane, John, Inside Muni. Interurban Press, Glendale, CA. 1982. Description of current operations.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Neubauer, Eric, Early Pullman Car Freight and Passenger Car Production. Eric A Neubauer, Glendale, CA. 2010. Pullman passenger and freight car production from the 1860s to 1911.
      Eric's Railroad Car History (to order, follow the Eric's Books link)
    • Parker, Frank, Anatomy of the San Francisco Cable Car. James Ladd Delkin, Stanford University, CA. 1946. Beautiful diagrams and explanations
    • Perles, Anthony, The People's Railway. Interurban Press, Glendale, CA. 1981. Interesting stories about attempts to get rid of cable cars.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Post, Robert C, Street Railways and the Growth of Los Angeles. Golden West Books, San Marino, CA. 1989. A neat book about the development of transit in Los Angeles.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Rice, Walter, and Echeverria, Emiliano. San Francisco's Cablfornia Street Cable Car/Celebrating a Century and a Quarter of Service. Harold E Cox, Forty Fort, PA. 2003. A good history of Cal Cable.
      Order from the Western Railway Museum
    • Rice, Walter, and Echeverria, Emiliano. San Francisco's Powell Street Cable Cars. Arcadia Publishing, San Francisco, CA. 2005. The first history of the Powell Street lines.
      Order from the Western Railway Museum
    • Siever, Wald. Steam Dummies of San Francisco. The Western Railroader, San Mateo, CA. 1960. An important source.
    • Smallwood, Charles, Miller, De Nevi, The Cable Car Book. Celestial Arts, Millbrae, CA. 1980. A good book by a good man.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Smallwood, Charles, The White Front Cars of San Francisco (Interurbans Special #44). Interurbans, Glendale, CA. 1978. A good source about the later days of San Francisco lines.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Smith, J. Bucknall, Hilton, A Treatise Upon Cable or Rope Traction. Owlswick Press, King of Prussia, PA. 1976. A reprint of and commentary upon an 1887 book. As of August, 2000, this book is still available from: Owlswick Press, 123 Crooked Lane, King of Prussia PA 19406-2570. Price as of August, 2000: $14.50.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • Stewart, Graham, The end of the penny section: A history of urban transport in New Zealand. AH and AW Reed, Wellington, NZ. 1973. An enjoyable study of New Zealand history.
    • Stindt, Fred A, San Francisco's Century of Street Cars. Fred A Stindt, Kelseyville, Ca. 1990. A good overview.
      Check Amazon.Com
    • White Jr, John H, Horsecars, Cable Cars and Omnibuses. Dover Publications, Inc, New York, NY. 1974. Builder photos from John Stevenson.
      Check Amazon.Com

    Magazine Articles

    • Clark, Kim, "A premium cable car ride". US News & World Report, July4-11, 2005. The virtues of the California Street line.
    • De Burgraff, G, "Tramway Funiculaire De Belleville". Le Magasin Pittoresque, 1890. A description of a cable car line in Paris.
    • Evans, Charles M, "Air War Over Virginia". Civil War Times, October 1996. Professor Lowe's Civil War service.
    • Fanton, Ben, "View From Above the Battlefield". America's Civil War, September 2001. More about Professor Lowe's Civil War service.
    • Greene, Charles S, "The Parks of San Francisco". Overland monthly and Out West Magazine, Volume 17, Issue 99 - March, 1891. Parks and public transit.
    • Hallidie, Andrew S, "The Wire Rope Street Railways of San Francisco, California". Scientific American Supplement, September 1881. Cable cars by the original promoter.
    • Hogg, Tony, "San Francisco Cable Car -- the gripping tale of an aged compact". Road & Track Magazine, April 1962. A road test of a Powell Street cable car.
    • Hubert Jr, Philip G, "The Cable Street-Railway". Scribner's Magazine, Volume 15, Issue 3, March, 1894. A good overview of cable railway technology.
    • Labourdette, Christina, "Drawing the Line: Streetcars Find New Quarters". New Orleans Magazine, September 1998, volume 32, number 12, page 31. Details the controversy in New Orleans over the exchange of California Street cable number 59 for New Orleans RTA 952.
    • Lanagran, David; Young, Bilione W, "How the Trolleys Came...and Went". MPLS-St Paul Magazine, June 1996, volume 24, number 6, page 58. The history of rail transit in St Paul, Minnesota.
    • Life Magazine staff, "San Franciscans Fight to Keep Historic Cable Cars". Life Magazine, February 24, 1947. The fight to save the cable cars begins.
    • National Geographic staff, "Geographica/Cable Carville Lives On in Memory". National Geographic Magazine, November 1999, volume 196, number 5. A brief item about San Francisco's Carville.
    • San Francisco News-Letter staff, "Market Street Railway Company, Past, Present and Future". San Francisco News-Letter, September 1925. A nice overview of the second Market Street Railway Company.
    • Schwartz, Frederic D, "The Streetcars of San Francisco". American Heritage, September 1998, volume 49, number 5, page 109. A brief description of the beginning of cable car service in 1873.
    • Scientific American staff, "The Los Angeles Cable Railway". Scientific American Supplement, No. 823 -- October 10, 1891. An illustrated description of a large system.
    • Time Magazine staff, "City I Love". Time Magazine, July 15, 1946. Profile of Mayor Roger Lapham.

    Manuscripts

    • Chamberlin, W D, "Market Street Railway/Notes 1903-1944". Unpublished notes about a long career in engineering and construction for the United Railroads of San Francisco and its successor, the second Market Street Railway.

    Newspaper Articles

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    Last updated 01-March-2010