Main Line Routes of the Sante Fe Lines

“Sante Fe – All the Way!”

This pictorial map of the Atchison, Topeka, and Sante Fe Railroad was published in the mid-20th century to serve as a placemat on the company’s dining cars, operated by the famed Fred Harvey company. Lines are shown running from Chicago to California across an abstract map of the western United States, filled with illustrated vignettes of local industries, natural features, and cultural icons. According to the Colorado Railroad Museum;

“AT&SF was not only known for the food it served, but also for the beautiful illustrations and paintings on its dining car menus and advertising materials. Menus featured paintings by artists such as Eanger Irving Couse (1866-1936), a Michigan native who studied in New York and Paris, but also had a studio in Taos, New Mexico. Couse was actually a founding member of the Taos Society of Artists, along with other well-known artists like Ernest Blumenschein and Joseph Henry Sharp. Due to his prolific work at Taos, the AT&SF commissioned Couse’s works between 1922 and 1934 for its dining car menus and brochures, which helped lure tourists to visit the beautiful American Southwest.”

Source: Colorado Railroad Museum