A point of information for those too young to have witnessed the practice, the Southern Pacific (and Union Pacific, as well) used to display the train number of regularly scheduled trains in the lead locomotive's number indicators. The silver door, under the hand grab, allowed crew access to the rack that held those numerals in place. If a train was an "extra," and thus had no train number, the locomotive number, preceeded by an "X," was displayed, as shown in Paul's photo. In the odd case, where a train had more than one unit, for instance the 5623 and 5705, and ran and out-and-back schedule as "X5623," on the return, the 5705, now in the lead would still display "X5623" in the indicators.
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