Livermore 1910 Western Pacific Railroad Mural
This mural commemorates the 1910 Livermore Western Pacific railroad depot - part of a public art and youth community-art workshop project, initiated and led by local artist and arts educator, Thomasin Dewhurst. - was completed in 2023. The mural serves to document Livermore's historic Western Pacific depot, which was demolished in the 1950s, and recreates an important and forgotten aspect of Livermore's history.
The mural also depicts the first passenger train to stop at the depot - a #94 Western Pacific steam train that traveled along the Western Pacific Feather River route from Salt lake City, Utah to Oakland, California. Crowds of people out to greet the train, and celebrating the opening of the Livermore depot, take center stage in the mural painting. Their clothes, and the flag flying above the depot, flutter in the breeze of a Californian summer's day.
The mural is situated almost exactly where the original depot building stood. It is painted on the east-facing wall of Allen's Towing, in the parking lot of the Tri-Valley Haven food pantry / CommonPoint Nonprofit Center at 1111 North L Street in Livermore. The mural lies between the L-Street Astronaut mural and the current Livermore railroad tracks.
The painting style of the train and the depot is a clear and detailed realism, depicting historically-educational images. The third subject of this mural – the central crowd of people – with its sunny, breezy outdoors scene, lively brush marks, simplified realism, and snapshot feel of people in early 20th century clothing, is painted in a style reminiscent of American Impressionism, which was prominent in the 1900s.
The mural explores and celebrates the concept of time and timelessness, bringing history out of the archives and into contemporary life. The mural is a virtual stage on which a celebratory day in 1910 is re-enacted, and re-experienced by today's people in the bustling parking lot of Tri-Valley Haven's Food Pantry. Passing trains are greeted by the image of the #94 WP steam train emerging from the mural's dramatic perspective. This perspective, too, symbolically brings past events out of the misty vanishing point of history into the life-size actuality of the present day.
Careful portraits were painted from historic photographs of the celebrations, honoring actual people alive in Livermore and nearby areas in 1910. Several prominent historic Livermore figures from the same date feature in the mural too.
The mural was one component of a two-part public art project. The second component comprised a youth workshop that offered an art-education opportunity for young artists to learn about mural-making and public art. The aim was to give the students a real-world opportunity in painting a mural of their own design. Around 15 Livermore art students, ages 10 to 16, participated in the workshop, learned about the making of the 1910 Livermore Western Pacific railroad depot mural (some of whom added their work to the mural), and then created a youth-led donor wall mural for the Tri-Valley Haven (https://www.thomasindewhurst.com/tri-valley-haven-donor-name-mural.html).
The mural and workshop were sponsored by Alan and Mary Burnham, Allen's Towing, Livermore Valley Arts, the Livermore Heritage Guild, Community Health and Education Foundation (CHEF), the Western Pacific Railroad Museum, and the Tri-Valley Haven. These organizations gave financial support, supplied research materials - photographs and historical information, and gave classroom space and project opportunities for the youth workshop. Special thanks are given to Alan Frank for his very helpful discussions, and to Alan Burnham for his information, help and tireless search for historic photographs. 
