Missoula Coal and Transfer Structure Height?

[hegstad1]

I have made my own calculations but I'll ask you all your opinion.  Based on this photo, how tall would you say this structure is?  Thanks!

[carlso]

QAndrew,

my uneducated guess is 40'. I am assuming the men standing on the ground are 6 footers, may not be.

Carl

[QMike]

I opened the photo in another browser tab and blew it up to fill the screen.  I measured the men at 3cm.  I measured the door at 3.5 cm.  So for a standard door, the men are 5.5ft.  But maybe the door is smaller - I do not claim to know the history of door heights.  So as an alternative, we can go with 6 foot as their height.  Because the building is behind them, I measured the closest thing to them, the open framework.  It was 20.5cm high, so depending on the height of the men, it would be either 41 or 38 feet high (using 6ft or 5'.5ft, respectively).  The framework attached to the building proper at a measured height of 17.5cm.  The measured height to the peak of the building roof was 20cm.  So the computed height of the building would be either 20cm/17.5cm*41ft = 47ft for 6ft men or 20cm/17.5cm*38ft = 43ft for 5.5ft men.  Take your pick, but either way I think the 40ft estimate is a little low.

[hegstad1]

Thanks guys,

I came up with 40' too based on 6ft men.  I guess we could assume that they are shorter.  People are taller now than they used to be.  45' might be a good number.

[Cajonpassfan]

[ Guests cannot view attachments ] Andrew, you pick the most photogenic structures to model...
I would base the dimensions off that wonderful "ladder" on the foreground support leg. The rungs are evenly spaced, and I'd bet they are 16" o.c., which would make the post about 40' long, the sign 8' tall, the office boards 6" wide, and overall height to the top of the gable about 48'?
Or, I could be all wet, too
Have fun with this one!
Otto

[Mark5]

I'd say more like 50'.

The building next to the men is about 15' tall and the structure is at least 3 times that.

[hegstad1]

I'd say more like 50'.

The building next to the men is about 15' tall and the structure is at least 3 times that.

Mark,

I was working on my drawing and came up with a similar conclusion.  It's got to be closer to 50'

[nkalanaga]

How tall is that auto on the right, next to the open frame?

[hegstad1]

How tall is that auto on the right, next to the open frame?

 A  Model A is 7 1/2' tall.

[hegstad1]

Another question.  What would the trackside of a structure like this look like?  There are no good pictures or drawings of this one from that perspective.  I've done a bit of google searching but I am not coming up with anything satisfying. 

[mmagliaro]

I liked nkalanaga's idea of using the car parked near that braced framing at the far right because that framing ties directly into the building and it's easy to get a correct height that way without worrying about photo distortion.  Looking up some drawings for 1920s cars like the ones shown in the photo, they seem to mostly be around 69 or 70" in height.  He said 7-1/2 feet, but that car appears to be a lower profile model (with that small oval window in the back), not as tall as the one over on the far left of the photo.  Maybe it's a later 20's or early 30's car, when they were lowering the heights.

Based on that, I scaled in a drawing program with some lines and got 45 feet from the ground to the top of the roof peak on that building.

[Chris333]

What town was that building in?

[hegstad1]

What town was that building in?

Did you read the title

[Chris333]

Trying to figure out where it was:

[Point353]

Another photo of the coal dock from the opposite side. Maybe the rail cars can provide a reference for the dimensions.