For the record:
https://ngdiscussion.net/phorum/read.php?1,115657
Courtesy: Wade Hall "Several asked about historical standards on the "flying Rio Grande" herald. Here is some of what I know from historical research. Much of this is "old news" to Rio Grande historians, but I'll repeat.
The "flying Rio Grande" herald was designed by a secretary in Denver offices of the D&RGW and submitted as part of an employee contest. This was well-covered in an issue of the "Green Light," the employee magazine of the D&RGW, a number of years ago. I don't have a copy of that so I'm going by memory here. I believe the lady got a $100 bonus for having the winning design--equivalent to about a month's salary for an office job in the late 1930's.
The D&RGW did not start actually applying the herald to steam locomotives until sometime in 1940, from what I have been able to ascertain from photographs. Some early efforts were obviously "hand drawn" affairs, including one done on one of the Salida standard-gauge switch engines. Early on, though, it appears that a standard set of stencils was produced. These were of a standard dimension--applied to all locomotives. The herald was the same size, whether applied to a C-19 narrow gauge Consolidation, or to an L-131 standard gauge articulated. It is also clear from photographs that the D&RGW instituted policy that all tenders on active locomotives would be repainted with the new herald as soon as they were cylced through the shops. I do not recall seeing any photo dated after 1941showing the old Royal Gorge/Moffat Tunnel herald on an in-service locomotive.
The obvious standard was that the "Rio Grande" would "fly," or slant, toward the front of the locomotive. Thus, the left and right side stencils were born. Largely, this convention was followed over the years, with some notable exceptions. Most usually, the exceptions involved the use of the "left-side" stencil on the engineer's side of the tender. These included, at various times, the 487 and 497 on the narrow gauge. Much less common was the use of the "right side" stencil on the fireman's side of the tender. A strange circumstance involved the tender apparently interchanged a couple of times between the 340 and 318 in Montrose. On this particular tender (seen with both locomotives at various times), the herald flew the wrong way on both sides of the locomotive. Another notable exception was the use of the right-side stencil on the fireman's side of the last operating standard-guage steam locomotive, D&RGW 1151. On its last runs in 1956, the herald on the fireman's side was flying "wrong-way." Finally, the "right-side" herald was used on the fireman's side of the tender on at least of a couple of the K-28's in Durango during the late 1970's. Undoubtedly, there were other incorrect applications of the herald, in violation of the standards, but there is no doubt what the standard was.
I was told by an old Grande employee, but I was never able to confirm, that the "wrong side" application on 487 and 497 was caused when the Durango shop lost/destroyed its "right-side" stencil and the right-side stencil was sent from Alamosa to replace it. That left the Alamosa shop without a right-side stencil--presumably during the period when the 487 and 497 got their tenders painted. I'm suspicious of this explanation because, at about that time, 497 was in Alamosa, but 487 was working out of Salida. It also appears that 487 had "wrong-side" lettering much earlier (1951) than 497 did. Someday, I'm really going to have compare photographs to trace this out. The same employee told me that when the shops in Alamosa were closed, and shop equipment was moved to Durango, the left-side stencils were lost--thus the re-painting of the K-28's with "wrong-side" lettering on the fireman's side during the 1970's. I find this a little more plausible.
The re-lettering of freight equipment was much more "leisurely" in time frame, though--on the narrow-gauge especially--it seemed common to paint out the old Royal Gorge/Moffat Tunnel herald even if the flying Rio Grande was not applied. Of course, in later years, quite often only the car number was re-stencilled on narrow-gauge freight equipment. There was not the obvious standardization of herald size on freight equipment, either. One thing that never appeared on the narrow gauge was the Rio Grande "Action Road" herald that sported the smaller "Rio" and larger "Grande." This herald was introduced around 1966.
As I have posted before, the amazing thing about the Rio Grande herald is that it still looks modern today--nearly 70 years after it was designed. Few trademarks can claim that. In fact, I've had several tourists ask why such a "modern" lettering design is used on the C&TS locomotives. They were amazed when I told them that the basic design of the herald was applied to those locomotives when they were only 16 years old! All the more reasons that I think that both the Rio Grande and Cumbres & Toltec heralds need to be applied dimensionally and aesthetically correctly--period."
