Thank you for that clarification, Hol. I look forward to receiving my calendar (the mules have been slow crossing the Sierra this winter). Your post brings to mind a couple questions that have been rattling around in my head awhile.
(1) Could you tell me what color the 300-ton wooden tower in Rice yard was? This is the often photographed tower (unfortunately, always in black & white) built by Fairbanks Morse, which was torn down in the mid to late 1940s. A few years back, I bought one of the old Model Masterpieces kits for this one. I haven't built it yet and am not entirely sure I will, as it's a bit large for my layout concept, but if and when I do, I'd like to get the color right.
(2) In a discussion here several years ago, you mentioned that while CB&Q's coaling TOWERS might be painted either black or mineral red, their coaling TRESTLES always were painted black. I am wondering whether that applied to the C&S as well, and specifically to the narrow gauge trestles that existed at Pine Grove, Dickey, and Como. I also have a kit for a C&S coaling trestle (can't recall the manufacturer; it's a generic kit, not a specific copy of any of those three), and I do plan to build it, since my interest in the C&S narrow gauge is as strong as it is in the standard gauge. In some of the late photos of these docks, the wood appears to be unpainted (perhaps it was only creosoted?), but what I see may be just weathering. In earlier photos, the wood does look painted. A number of modelers have painted theirs red, perhaps in imitation of the RGS's Vance Junction facility, but in light of what you said earlier, I'm skeptical that would be right.
Thanks for any information or insight into these questions. And by the way, nothing you have written, either on line or in books and bulletins, has been "more than I ever wanted to know." It is always interesting and apt, as well as some of the most intelligent and literate railroad writing I've read.
Best wishes,
Jonathan