Southern Pacific Transportation Company
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![Southern Pacific routes on the Pacific Coast, 1885](/Images/godic/202502/12/The_Great_Pleasure_Route_of_the_Pacific_Coast_Southern_Pacific_Railroad_18855215.jpg")
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The Southern Pacific Transportation Company (reporting markSP), earlier Southern Pacific Railroad and Southern Pacific Company, and usually called the Southern Pacific or (from the railroad's initials) Espee, was an American Class I railroad. It was absorbed in 1988 by the company that controlled the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad and eight years later became part of the Union Pacific Railroad.