West Riverside Fire Station

You drive passed it all the time, so much so that you never even notice it any more. But you should! The West Riverside Fire Station No. 18 is a great piece of Jurupa history! Built in 1934 as a WPA project, the station is built from large pieces of granite which are thought to have been quarried from nearby Rattlesnake Mountain. The walls are said to be 18 inces thick(!) but I haven't measured them. It was built on land donated by the Harvest Festival Association, which once owned a huge piece of property that stretched from Mission Boulevard up to the hills to the north. To see a great old photo of this fire station, go to the link below.

http://www.rvcfire.org/opencms/facilities/FireStations/NorthWestDiv/WestRiversideStation18.html

1908 Train Wreck in Pedley

The big happening in February 1908 was a train wreck near the Pedley train station. The Pedley train station was located where the Metro Link station is located today. The Los Angeles limited was going approximately 40 miles an hour when it left the tracks at about 9:15 P.M. The accident occurred 200 yards east of the Pedley station. It looked like the cause of the wreck was a broken wheel flange. This caused the engine and tender and all of the cars except the mail car and observation card to leave the tracks and go pounding over the ties. None of the cars overturned but the dining car was tilted at a 45-degree angle. Inside that car was the eight-man car crew. We can assume they were bounced around a bit. 

The eighty passengers on the train were thrown around and one woman, Mrs. Murray of Los Angeles, broke her collarbone. A wrecking train was sent out from Los Angeles and arrived at 3 AM. They immediately began laying a “shoofly” track around the wreck. Overland Train No.2 was trapped at Ontario and was sent back to LA and then over the Santa Fe tracks via San Bernardino so it could get on to its destination. The emergency tract was competed at 6:30 AM and the local and overland trains could get through at their scheduled times