“John Bull” Steams Again
In 1980 , John H. White , Jr. , and his colleagues at the Smithsonian Institution ponder how to tick off the hundred-and-fiftieth day of remembrance of the locomotive " John Bull . " presume they carefullysteamup and really engage the oldest locomotive in America ? After all , it did pass 35 eld in approximative railroad track divine service , and the good way to learn how machinery actually worked is to operate it . There were risks , but much to be learned in the appendage .
The firm of Robert Stephenson in England constructed the engine for the Camden and Amboy Railroad and delivered it in August of 1831 . By 1866 , the " John Bull " was out of service - but the railway recognized its historic grandness and preserve it inviolate . After the Pennsylvania Railroad take in the C&A in 1871 , it exhibited the " John Bull " at various expositions and in 1885 presented the locomotive to the Smithsonian Institution .
Almost a hundred year later , Smithsonian stave and volunteers completely disassemble and inspected the ancient engine . After many tests and lot of tender fear , the " John Bull " steamed again , hauling its companion rider auto over branch job near Washington , D.C. Over a period of several week in the fall of 1981 , the engine teach its keepers more about early steam power than any schoolbook possibly could . It looked , smack , sound , and behaved exactly like the yard of steam engine that survey it – to the delight of curators and runway fans likewise .
The PCC Car
Most of the 75,000 trolley car run around the United States in the 1920s were old and stock , and it seemed the way to revitalize the industry was to design a novel case of streetcar - one that would supersede the box-shaped and rattling old traditional streetcars and bring the look-alike of modern comfort and design to the street railroad industry .
A planning group formed of late in 1929 to study the problem . representative of railroads and the manufacturing industry collaborated to evaluate everything about the streetcar , from controllers and brakes to the shape of seat and exterior coming into court . Their young design , name the PCC ( after the President ’s Conference Committee ) Car , was modern in appearance and featured innovations that made it lighter , unruffled riding , more prosperous , and more durable than early cars .
The first was placed in service in Brooklyn during other 1936 , and lines in Baltimore and Chicago shortly commit order . Almost 5,000 PCC cars were built , most of them ending up in perhaps 30 cities across North America .
The PCC did not save the street railroad manufacture , but it help slow the inevitable decline . The PCC car ’s enduringness and relatively low sustentation price allowed several transit operations to survive during the postwar period , and these venerable streetcars can still be check serving transit riders in Philadelphia , Boston , Pittsburgh , Newark , and Toronto .
The Pioneer Zephyr
Most famous of the motor wagon train was the Zephyr , named after the Greek god of the west wind . It was a complete , compact , self - propelled three - gondola train , clad in glint untainted sword and wait every bit like the train of the future .
Christened in April of 1934 , the diminutive power train tour the East and Midwest while plans were place for a spectacular promotional stunt . The stubby lilliputian Zephyr was to make the 1,015 - naut mi misstep from Denver to Chicago in a break of the day - to - nightfall dash of 14 hours-12 hours under the fast regular overhaul . The head trip got off 65 minutes lately on May 26 , 1934 . The shovel - olfactory organ streamliner reached a top speed of 112 miles per time of day as it hurtled across the Plains . Its onward motion , closely follow by the insistence , was announce to visitor at Chicago ’s Century of Progress Exposition .
The train wear out a timing tape in Chicago at 7:10 p.m.-13 hours , 4 minute , and 58 seconds after it left Denver - and rolled onto the stage at the climax of the " Wings of a Century " pageantry at the exposition . There , with Lake Michigan as a background , the Zephyr bespeak the close of the Steam Age , claiming the time to come for the diesel - electric streamline train .
The Super C Train
In January of 1968 , the Atchison , Topeka & Santa Fe caught the attention of the trade press ( and shippers ) with the inaugural of the Super C - a 40 - minute piggyback and container wagon train on the 2,200 - stat mi route between Chicago and Los Angeles . This six - days - a - workweek service was as fast as the Super Chief - hence the name ; medium speed was more than 55 miles an hour , topping out at 79 .
Trains were light . No more than about 20 car were projected , though in realness they would often go with as few as two or three . As originally think , the train were a neat guess - no classification , no choice - up or drop - off . There were , however , 17 crew changes en route , an indication of the antediluvian nature of the employment rules at thattime .
Naturally , the Super C was a premium - price service , costing about double the usual COFC / TOFC rates , in fact . Because of the gamy price , the wagon train had some trouble attract a firm clientele . The mathematical operation ’s innocence was further compromise by the addition of a Kansas City pickup , as well as combinations with gearing west of Barstow , California .
At the same time , Northern Pacific was fielding a similar serve on the 1,875 - mi Seattle - Minneapolis Tokyo Express , which averaged 51 miles per time of day and was thus faster than the North Coast Limited , NP ’s premiere passenger train . Neither this gearing nor the Super C would linger for longsighted , but they shew how quickly inter - modal cargo could move by rail .
The California Zephyr
The CZ ’s death was dull , awful , and public . Western Pacific , the frail of its three operator , was the first to go to the I.C.C. to require out - in September of 1966 . The Commission was on the horn of a quandary , since the line was clearly demonstrating pregnant losses , yet the train was running full in summertime , with a twelvemonth - round load constituent of 78 pct .
moreover , a study showed a 95 percentage commendation rating by passengers . Although Rio Grande claimed losings , it still stood firm with pro - passenger Burlington in corroborate the train . The I.C.C. debate for five month , then ordered Western Pacific to run for the train for another year .
WP was back , lid in paw , as that full term expired , only to be rebuffed again by the I.C.C. , which feel that the railroad was only half - heartedly seek to ameliorate the power train ’s faltering equipoise sheet .
Then , in May of 1969 , the Rio Grande necessitate to discontinue its portion of the run , citing yearly losses of almost $ 2 million . By now , passengers were eventually beginning to abandon the CZ , disenchant by poortimekeeping , degenerate equipment , and years of discontinuation observation . The final stage come in February of 1970 , when the I.C.C. ruled that the WP could end its segment , with Rio Grande dropping back to tri - hebdomadary runs , connecting at Salt Lake City with Southern Pacific service to San Francisco .
The California Zephyr made its last run just over a calendar month afterward .
The Delaware Hudson Adirondack
As Amtrak went about saving the American passenger caravan in the 1970s , the corporation instituted substantial changes . One that was distinctly two - edged , however , was the calibration of high wide-ranging ancestors into look - like train .
One colorful exception was the Adirondack , a 24-hour interval train between New York and Montreal that was funded in part by the State of New York under a provision of the Amtrak Act that allowed states to mandate avail by funding a percentage of the price - two - third to begin with , afterwards one - half .
The Delaware & Hudson was a unforced wheeler dealer of this caravan between Albany and Montreal - a wonderfully scenic drive , much of it along the shoring of Lake Champlain - but on its terminus , which were that the equipment used would be its own , refurbish at country expense and painted in a fetch grim , yellow , and gray . The locomotives would be four typical Alco public address system , bighearted locomotives that D&H had purchased from Santa Fe in 1967 for religious service on the Laurentian and Montreal Limited .
Because D&H under Carl B. Sterzing , its thin-skinned untested president , wanted its identity front and center , Sterzing and Amtrak struck sparks almost from the time of the train ’s startup on August 5 , 1974 .
After the leased CP domes were returned , Amtrak provided dome charabanc in their stead , which D&H painted in its own coloring material , violate Amtrak officials . Amtrak ’s downcast and red promptly returned , and the passenger tummy play its horn card in this identicalness battle in 1977 by break the D&H equipment entirely with Turboliner trainsets .
The GG1
The United States never embraced railroadelectrificationin a freehanded way . Distances were in the main too great and traffic densities too low for electrification ’s expensive infrastructure to make mother wit . The Pennsylvania Railroad ’s multi - track main line between New York and Washington was a dramatic exclusion .
By 1934 , Pennsylvania had develop thelocomotivethat would become the operation ’s anchor for almost half a century - the mighty GG1 . The image , No . 4800 , was cloaked in a reasonably ungainly , riveted shell . Fledgling industrial couturier Raymond Loewy was given the of import designation of flex this proverbial ugly duckling into a swan .
The result was a shiny dark green carbody fox out with five refined gold pinstripes that plunged to vanishing points on the locomotive ’s shapely nose . pocket-size red-faced keystones cater discreet splash of color . One hundred and thirty - nine GG1s were built .
By the seventies the GG1s were aging ; though still capable to outhaul anything in plenty , their days were numbered . To supply a fitting last , a group call " Friends of the GG1 " restored one of Amtrak ’s " Gs " to its original pinstripe dodging . On May 15 , 1977 , GG1 No . 4935 was rededicated at Washington Union Station and put back into service .
Four eld after , the Jersey Central Railway Historical Society and NJ Transit restitute GG1 No . 4877 to glorious Loewy pinstripe - but in this case in Tuscan red ( worn by a smattering of Gs in the fifties ) . Like No . 4935 , 4877 entered veritable service and was on handwriting for the semisweet observance on October 29 , 1983 , when the last active GG1 was bed from divine service on Transit ’s North Jersey Coast Line .
