ran up to 1941. This coach was sold in 1941 to the California Western Railroad as their number M-200 for the Skunk Train from Willits, California, to Fort Bragg, California. It was sold to the Niles Canyon Railway in 1975. World War I In 1914 Searles Lake was one of only two known potash deposits outside of Germany. By 1916 potash was transported via the Trona Railway to farmers, who needed fertilizer, to feed the nation during World War I. Three Elephant Route The name Three Elephant Route was created, because many of the railroad's employees were British and did not understand, why the company should hang on to its heritage of 20 mule teams. As the story goes, they felt that three elephants could have done the job as well, if not better, than a herd of mules. The slogan was used as a brand and logo, which adorned Trona Railway equipment into the late 1940s. Diesel locomotives In April 1949 the Trona Railway purchased two new Baldwin DT-6-6-2000 locomotives (numbered 50 and 51) to replace the three steam locomotives that were operating at the time. These weighed 180 tons each and had 2000 hp motors. These locomotives were unique in that they had center cabs, not the traditional cabs in the front. Locomotive No 52 was a smaller Baldwin AS 616 that only developed 1,600 hp. Eventually, two more AS 616 locomotives were added to the fleet to bring the total to five. A small diesel-electric locomotive called Dinky was used for switching in the rail yards. A crew car was used for safety inspections of the rail track and to bring employees to the site of track maintenance. The Baldwins were sold in late 1992, replaced with six leased EMD SD45-2's, all painted in red and silver similar to the earlier Baldwins. These in turn were replaced in 2004 by the current fleet (as of February 2021) of seven EMD SD40-2 and EMD SD40T-2 locomotives, all of which remain in the faded color schemes of their former owners, Union Pacific and Southern Pacific. At least one EMD SW1200 switcher is also on the roster. Operations The main line runs from Trona to the interchange with the Union Pacific's Lone Pine Subdivision at Searles, a distance of . It has a maximum grade of 1.9% and has gentle curves, which permit a maximum speed of . The railroad