28 Photos included after text.

The ATSF or the Santa Fe, was always interesting to the average railfanner.  Since the time that the Santa Fe started painting their locomotives from the bland blue with yellow stripes, to the much more flashy Warbonnet paint scheme, the freight engines began to be better looking and more photographable.

The older silver and red Warbonnet paint that adorned the passenger fleet of F units, F and FP45's, and the GE U28CG's, was fantastic to see even after the arrival of Amtrak and the removal of all Santa Fe passenger trains.  To bad it lasted only a short time thereafter. 

A couple of years after the demise of the original silver and red Warbonnet, the Santa Fe started painting their locomotives in the blue and yellow Warbonnet scheme, but there was another interesting feature of Santa Fe trains that made photography fun.  The Santa Fe would run ANY locomotive within a consist to get the train across the rails.  It was not uncommon to see an older GP30 along with an SD40-2 or a GE 28-7, and/or a "B" unit in the same consist.

All through the 70's, 80's, and 90's Santa Fe road power was, to borrow a phrase, "like a box of chocolates, you never knew what you were going to get."  It seemed like the Santa Fe would rebuild anything and put it back on the rails.  So road power lash-ups were interesting to say the least.  Then in June of 1989 the new President of the Santa Fe Mike Haverty, surprised everyone.

He had originally brought the idea of repainting the SDFP45's in a version of the original silver and red Warbonnet paint scheme to the top management of the Santa Fe in the spring of 1989 when he was VP of Operations.  That idea didn't make the desision makers very excited, so the idea was not adopted at that time.

Just after that, the current President of the Santa Fe announced that he would step down and retire as President earlier than expected.  The desision to make Mr. Haverty the new President was almost immediate and became official on June 1, 1989.

Now that Mr. Haverty was the President of the Santa Fe, the first two (of eight), SDFP45's were in the silver and red paint by the end of the month.  The now President Mike Haverty stated that he wanted to not just meet top shippers expectations for fast quality service, but establish new limits and exceed them.  He thought that the new engines would honor the history of excellence established by the previous engines painted in those colors, and again represent the new commitment to quality service for the growing intermodal market.

They were to be painted in the same silver and red Warbonnet as before but with one slight change.  Instead of the small black Santa Fe lettering on the side of the locomotives, the newer paint scheme would feature large red Santa Fe lettering on the sides.  Even though the silver and red paint scheme is sometimes concidered the most recognized paint scheme in the world, those large red letters on the sides really made the locomotives big attention getters.  That was exactly the effect the now President Haverty desired.

He dubbed them "Super Fleet" since they were expected to "power Santa Fe's super fleet of crack intermodal trains."  His maketing strategy worked.  Shippers were thrilled, and the public opinion became more than just favorable.  The public and railfans were beyond excited.  Then we learned that this "new" paint scheme was to be also used on all new locomotives being delivered from EMD and GE.

The next locomotive to wear the "new" paint was the GP60M.  The first pair were delivered in May of 1990, and they made their first revenue trip with two of the FP45's that month.

After the original FP45's in 1989, and the GP60M's a year later,  the GE Dash 8-40BW's began arriving around August of 1991.  All new locomotives for the Santa Fe were in the "Super Fleet" silver and red paint.  These models included the GP60B unit, the SD70M, and the GE Dash 8-40CW's and Dash 9-44CW's.

When the announcement came that the Santa Fe would be merging with the Burlington Northern, the majority of railfanners that I knew believed that no way would the new BNSF change what is already so successful and keep the beloved silver and paint scheme as their own.  I was thrilled when I saw my first BNSF locomotive still painted in the Super Fleet paint but with the "Santa Fe" removed on the long hood, and the new letters, in red, BNSF placed on the side.  "They were going to keep it!"  Or, so I thought...

Alas, the new BNSF did not keep the paint scheme and adopted their own, but this site page is not about the BNSF but rather the Santa Fe!  So I hope you enjoy my vintage photos of the Super Fleet locomotives and the older Santa Fe locomotives in the blue and yellow Warbonnet paint scheme.  I purposely included a couple of "roster" photos along with various "road" photos to show the different typs of locomotives that the Santa Fe used during this incredible era.

Please remember that almost all of these photo are older vintage photos taken with regular film and not digital, so they all had to be scanned.  Forgive, if you will, any imperfections.