The Friendly Californian

This brochure presents the Californian as a direct competitor to the Challenger, Union Pacific’s budget alternative to the Los Angeles Limited and Overland Limited. The Challengers operated at approximately the same schedules as their higher-priced counterparts, leaving Chicago or the west coast just a few minutes later.

Click image to download a 3.8-MB PDF of this brochure.

That’s the way the Californian operated in 1938, but by 1941, when this brochure was issued, it was scheduled roughly twelve hours apart from the Golden State. This allowed it to serve communities in daylight that the Golden State reached only late at night. The Union Pacific had the Pacific Limited for this kind of service, but SP/CRI&P couldn’t generate enough traffic to justify a third daily train on the Golden State route. Thanks to Bill Hough for providing the PDF of this brochure.


Leave a Reply