Walter Lee Simms, of Kansas branch-line fame, informs me that on the eve of Amtrak Santa Fe was examining options for staying in the passenger business by stealing an idea from Union Pacific's playbook. He tells me that Santa Fe had gone as far as filing a formal petition with the ICC and posting notice of such in the various passenger stations. The plan was that Nos. 23 & 24 and the Tulsan would be axed with all the Chiefs combined into one train out of Chicago. The "Super-Duper Chief" (my own appellation) would leave Chicago once a day as one enormous train operating combined as far as Newton, Kansas. There it would split into three sections: The San Francisco Chief section would head south for Wichita and then west via Waynoka, Amarillo and Belen while the Texas Chief section would continue south for Oklahoma City, Fort Worth and Houston. Meanwhile the Super Chief/El Capitan section would travel west on the passenger main through Raton for Albuquerque, where it would rejoin with the San Francisco Chief. The California sections, combined, would proceed west to Barstow where they would split again with the Super Chief/El Capitan terminating in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Chief proceeding north up the valley to Richmond and the Bay Area.

Unfortunately for fans of private passenger rail, Santa Fe's petition was rejected by the ICC. If they wanted to stay in the passenger business they would be forced to continue operating all of their trains separately, including the ex-Grand Canyon. Walter is of the opinion that Amtrak and its government masters had their eye on Santa Fe's treasure trove of superbly maintained modern rolling stock...which indeed would form much of the core of Amtrak's initial fleet. Whatever the machinations going on in the background may have been, once Santa Fe's last-ditch plan was nixed they decided to throw in the towel and join Amtrak.

Amtrak would discontinue the San Francisco Chief effective with its takeover of passenger service on May 1, 1971, leaving only the Super Chief/El Capitan, Texas Chief, and San Diegans operating over Santa Fe trackage. There is a persistent rumor in railfan circles that then-Santa Fe president John S. Reed had commented to the effect that, even without the "Super-Duper" combination, if the ICC had let them drop everything other than the trains Amtrak actually kept he would have gone to the Board and would probably have received the green light to keep operating them. If only, if only....