Building and operating a full-scale railroad in your backyard would be a dream come true for many devoted railfans, and renowned Disney animator Ward Kimball lived that dream for more than 60 years at his Southern California home.
The iconic San Gabriel backyard railroad was dubbed the “Grizzly Flats Railroad – The Scenic Wonder of The West” by Kimball – a fanciful name for a line with 900 feet of track on two acres, surrounded by citrus groves.
I had heard of the Grizzly Flats Railroad, but my personal connection began recently while working on a volunteer project to sort photo-historian L.T. Gotchy’s enormous photo collection donated in 2023 to the San Bernardino Historical and Pioneer Society. Gotchy, 92, died in 2014.
It was during my volunteer work, that I found Gotchy’s connection to Kimball, in a box of nostalgic images appropriately labeled “Grizzly Flats Railroad.”
Through further research, I found Dick Donat, a former friend and colleague of Gotchy’s who had extensive knowledge of the late photographer’s life and his time on the Grizzly Flats Railroad. Donat joyfully shared some of his memories of the times they spent at Kimball’s backyard railroad.
Kimball (1914 – 2002) became an animator for Walt Disney’s studios in 1934, and while art and music were his life’s work, trains were his passion. Kimball was one of Disney’s “Nine Old Men,” a group of the studio’s core animators from the 1920s to the 1980s.
Kimball and Walt Disney shared a love of trains, and that became a bond that strongly influenced both men’s careers and hobbies. Kimball’s backyard railroad inspired Disney, and his passion for trains was deeply woven into the fabric of Disneyland.
Grizzly Flats Railroad began in 1938 with Kimball’s purchase of a dilapidated wooden passenger coach for $50. His wife Betty encouraged him to go big and build a full-sized railroad on their ranch property.
In this photo from May 15, 1949, Ward Kimball is aboard his 1914 Fire Truck, with his family in front of the Grizzly Flats Station. The Disneyland Railroad station at New Orleans Square was modeled after this building. From left, Betty Kimball, Kelly, John, and baby Chloe. Ward played in a popular Dixieland jazz band known as “The Firehouse Five Plus Two,” and this fire truck was often used at the performances. (From the L.T. Gotchy Collection at the San Bernardino Historical and Pioneer Society)Within a few short years, Kimball’s quirky hobby blossomed into an operating piece of railroad history that included two steam locomotives, a caboose, a passenger coach, a boxcar, a depot building, a train barn, a water tank, signs, signals, a wooden windmill, and 900 feet of narrow-gauge track — 3-feet between the rails.
In the late 1940s, Gotchy, a documentary photographer and railfan extraordinaire, met up with Kimball, the ultimate railfan with a real railroad in his backyard.
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Disneyland Railroad to reopen with new track after 3-month refurbishment Disneyland’s river rides and railroad open to the public with new route Disneyland Railroad gets new track and a little TLCGotchy was born in Utah in 1922, and he moved to Los Angeles with his family in the 1930s. The streetcars of the Los Angeles Railway and the Pacific Electric Railway ignited his passion for railroads, and from his teens he had a camera tethered to him. He moved to Hesperia in the 1960s, and he lived there until his death in 2014.
Gotchy was a natural fit in the group who became unofficial partners, operators, and volunteers on the Grizzly Flats Railroad. Along with Kimball, they spent untold hours building, repairing and maintaining the line.
Gotchy was willing to lend his engineering and fabrication skills to projects and events on the suburban railroad. He loved Ford Model Ts, and he often brought his own Model T to Grizzly Flats, adding a touch of “period realism” to the surroundings.
In the early 1950s, Gotchy went to work for the Automobile Club of Southern California as a signposter, and he found Kimball had a passion for collecting old street signs. Gotchy supplied Kimball with many unique signs that adorned the buildings and signposts at Grizzly Flats.
This photo from 1949 shows L.T. Gotchy in a conductor’s outfit, handing train orders to engineer Ward Kimball, on the Emma Nevada. The locomotive was built by the Baldwin Locomotive Works in 1881 for the Nevada Central Railroad. It was restored by Kimball and his crew of volunteers between 1938 and 1943. (From the L.T. Gotchy Collection at the San Bernardino Historical and Pioneer Society)During the peak operating years of the 1940s through 1970s, Kimball would call in his friends, volunteers, and celebrities to steam up the locomotives, and they would have a full-blown railroad shindig.
One event dubbed the “Great Model T and Locomotive Race” was held Aug. 24, 1947, and it pitted Kimball’s Emma Nevada locomotive against a 1912 Model T. The race had an official starter, and when his flag dropped, both operators gave their machines full throttle.
Donat recounted the race; “Gotchy photographed the race, and according to L.T., the Model T won the race, much to Ward’s chagrin.”
Donat shared another story that Kimball told him about finding his beloved wooden-bladed windmill.
“Ward always wanted a wooden-bladed windmill for his railroad, but he could never find one,” Donat said. “In the earlier days of World War II, Disney used to send out some of his animators to military bases, and they did the equivalent of a USO show.
“On one of these occasions, Ward was with a carload of these animators, and they got lost on a stormy night somewhere out in Riverside County. Suddenly the sky cleared, and Ward looked out the window, and there was a wooden-bladed windmill. ‘Stop the car, stop the car, he shouted!’ Ward went running up to the house and banged on the door, and he finally got somebody to answer. He said, ‘I want to buy your windmill.’ And of course, the guy was kind of stumbling around, thinking ‘what have I got here?’ Ward said ‘please, I want to buy your windmill, give me a price, I really want this for my railroad!’ The homeowner was still giving him a puzzled look, and then his eyes kind of lit up. He was looking around and over Ward, and here comes the other guys from the car, and they have put on their artist’s smocks. So they’re wearing these white coats, and they come up and say, ‘It’s alright Ward, we’ll take you back now, everything’s OK.’
Kimball said it took a personal letter from Walt Disney, and they explained that he really was sincere, and did want to buy the windmill, Donat explained, “and eventually he did, and there it was in San Gabriel.”
Kimball began donating his Grizzly Flats rolling stock to the Southern California Railway Museum in Perris in 1992, and most of the equipment is now at the museum. Find details at socalrailway.org/collections/grizzly-flats/.
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From 1938 to 2006, Grizzly Flats Railroad was the center of countless fantastic events, untold hours of hard work, spending time with good friends, and sharing trainloads of amazing stories.
Mark Landis is a freelance writer. He can be reached at [email protected]
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