Barry

I have a JPG color sampling of ACF box car reds from Ed Hawkins,
each color on a vertical strip, all the same size. If I change
the "background" color of the strips from white to black, there
is an immediate strong shift in perception that the colors are
now darker and more similar to each other than when the background
was white. The PFE emblems are white lettering on dark backgrounds.
The dirt layer is simply dark over an orange background. Take
the photo into Photoshop and clip the heralds, and play with
different background colors. I think you will perceive them very
differently depending on the background colors and brightness.

Tim O'Connor

Two philosophical questions then:

1. If two cars were built the same day at the same place and painted from the same drum
of paint, coupled together and run together hauling the same cargos for ten years, would
you expect the colors of the two be virtually the same or markedly different after ten
years?

Kurt, please identify a single example.

2. If two cars were built the same day by two different shops for two different railroads
and painted in markedly different colors, coupled together a week later and run together
hauling the same cargos for ten years, would you expect the colors of the two be virtually
the same or markedly different after ten years?

Can you identify a single example?

The point is that color shots of yards show many different color shades.
It's not that you shouldn't try to be in the "ballpark" of the railroad's
color for a car 1-5 years old, but I don't think you need to sweat it too
hard either, unless the car is fresh out of the shop!

I once posted two shots of the same car, same day, same roll of film --
two completely different colors. The only variable was sunlight. So what
color was the car? Answer: both colors!

Tim O'Connor

Hi,

Tim restates and "re-examples" something I've been going on
and on about for over a decade now. Even after weathering in
which considerable care is taken to ensure "lots" of variations
from car to car - when you look at a yard on a layout (any layout)
the variation in the shades/variations of the freight cars is far too
small.
There are many reasons why this happens ...

1) Each mfgr seems to have a small number of shades of
"box car colors" ... and they work hard at making this
run of cars match the prior run(s).

2) Even when the models are custom painted the tendency
is to use what paints are available - and to repeat the
same colors over and over (see #1). How many times
have you heard someone complain about how the paint
from a particular mfgr has 'changed color' over the years?

3) Often our research is done on the details of the prototype
but we tend to 'discount' the variations we see in the
colorsshades in those same photos ... and/or our research
is based primarily upon B/W photos.

4) Even when we know (and are paying attention) to the fact
that we've seen photos which show significant variation
in the color we often are 'trapped' in the belief that there
was "a -particular- shade of tuscan (/whatever) that was
used" by a particular RR. What I'm saying is that even in
the face of actual evidence we hear guys talk about how
"that's just because of variations in lighting conditions",
"the film used is important to the color", "the printer is
the one who actually decides what color we see" and
other such arguments. These arguments aren't wrong.
Those things actually do affect the color(s) that we see.
But photos such as the one Tim linked us to make
those arguments "suspect" ...

5) Often we tend to think that we can "weather it in that
direction" ... and we can ... but so far I've never seen
any one who could weather two cars that started with
the same color ... and achieve the variations that Tim
and Tony point out in the cars in that photo.

6) And let's not forget how much an affect "era" (when it was
last painted) has upon the 'shade' of a particular car. And
that all the RRs (each of them, one by one) went thru their
own variations over time. For instance - just think about
how the RRs went thru "identity crises" and came out with
new paint schemes. This happened every 10 to 15 years.
And if you name any particular RR you can find at least one
paint scheme (and often more) that lasted a relatively short
time or was applied to only a particular car type (and often
not even to all of that car type). And cars painted in different
eras used paints that were significantly different - and that
weathered differently ... in fact the way a particular paint
changed over the years was often the reason why new
paints were used by the RRs in later years.

7) I'm a member of a club that has a very stable membership.
And, unlike most clubs, we don't have any permanent
rolling stock on the layout - we bring our trains out, put them
on the layout, have the run, and then take them home. And
we don't bring out the same cars every time - quite the
contrary. Yes, there are some cars that are unique - such
as my flat car with a ship propeller load. But other than
those cars you can't predict what any member will bring
out on any one day.
But you know what? At the end of the day when we
are packing up ... every one "just knows who that car
belongs to" ... and certainly can recognize their own cars.
My point? Each of us has certain 'techniques' and/or
'preferences' in what/how we model that makes our
freight cars recognizable ... so much so that we can usually
establish "ownership" without checking "whose car is that".
The same thing is true when you go to layouts that are
the work of "one" person - such as the large layouts with
their own set of cars. And I visit a club frequently that has
freight cars that belong to the individual members - but the
cars are "permanently" on the layout ... and it doesn't take
long to start picking out which car belongs to which member.

8) And just how many times have you heard someone describe
the look of a freight yard as "a sea of brown" or of a train
working its way thru a canyon as "a long brown snake".

9) And I'm not even going to "go there" with respect to how
we go on and on about stuff such as "what color was used
on the PFE reefers?". Tony has commented on this many
times.

10) I tried about a decade or so ago - in fact I didn't just try ...
it was more of a "quest" ... to find a way to chemically (or
otherwise) produce "the effect of time" on a paint job. The
'success' was very limited. It did result in some subtle
changes in my methods and I'm happy with what happened.
But it didn't produce the variations Tim pointed out in that
picture!

11) And let's not forget the realities of what it means when you
sit down to produce a string of 10, 20, or even 60-80 cars
at a 'single' sitting! Hey, I'm gonna finally get those Stewart
coal hoppers on the layout ... all 200 of them!

12) The era we model has a significant affect on this color stuff.
The freight cars from the STMFC era are considerably
different from more modern eras ... and have considerable
differences within the STMFC era if you consider what
happens if you introduce something as simple as "what
decade is this layout placed in?"

Yes, the RRs tried to have/used particular colors for particular
cars. And they had "rules/standards/practices" intended to produce
cars of "identical" colors. Paint departments had drift cards and
paint diagrams and ... well you all know this aspect.
But the reality is that the actual practices/actions used on any
particular freight car on any particular day at any particular
location ... made it a certainty that there would be variations.
Significant variations. Often even -startling- variations. Of
cars that were painted using the same set of "rules/practices".
And on cars that were "painted in the same paint scheme". And,
although less common, even of cars that were "painted on
the 'same' day in the 'same' paint shop and had been in the
'same' service since being painted". It is possible for two such
"identically painted cars" to 'drift' away from each other in
amazingly short amounts of time - sometimes it isn't so much a
'drift' as a "rush". And when you are starting with two cars that
came from the same RR and are of the same class and in the same
paint scheme ... but could have had significant variations on the day
they rolled out of the paint shop because one was painted in L.A.
and the other in Texas - let's just say that the 'starting point' can
be ... and often is ... significantly different.

And yet ... I'll be the first in line to say that "you need to have
some 'standards' in how you paint your models ... that if you
don't you will have problems". Are we our own worst enemies?

Regrettably - it appears that we have a "strong tendency" to
produce models that don't reflect the variations that Tim points
out in the photo. And there are -many- reasons why we tend to
produce models that tend to "look alike" rather than look like
"variations on a theme".

I remain ... that guy who says "Viva La Difference" ... Jim

P.S. And -today- I wish I had never said "that color on that model
looks wrong" ... or even that I could tell you "I'll never say that
again". Not likely. At least I'm in good company? In fact I'm
going to be among the first to admit that there are times when
I look at a model and "just know that it is wrong" ... when the
evidence seems to be that any such statement is, in fact,
flawed because "anything is possible on any one car".
*Sigh*

P.P.S. Blind copies sent to some "interested parties" ...

On those dirty ol' reefers the UP and SP heralds/logos stand out is though they do not have the same coat of smuts as the rest of the sides. Except for the repack fields, the cars do not otherwise seem to have been sponged off, so does this result from the paint on the heralds being smoother and less retentive of road dirt?

Barry Roth

Translations for the non-UP experts out there:

ROTS: "Road Of The Streamliners"
SAW: "Serves All the West"
BSSUP: "Be Specific - Ship Union Pacific"

Regards,

-Jeff


From: STMFC@yahoogroups.com [mailto:STMFC@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Dick Harley
Sent: Friday, December 04, 2009 4:17 PM
To: STMFC
Subject: [STMFC] RE: UP freight car lettering color dates/repaint intervals.



Here are some dates that may be of interest:

1936 to Nov. 1949 - ROTS slogan on right side / SAW slogan on left
side of UP boxcars.
Roman style lettering & slogans are initially white lead;
slogans become Armour Yellow in late 1930s.

June 1939 - Gothic circle "O" style lettering starts on UP freight
cars.
Lettering is white; slogans are Armour Yellow.

July 1947 - change lettering color to Armour Yellow on most UP
freight cars (e.g. not tank cars).

Nov. 1949 to Nov. 1953 - ROTS slogan on right side / BSSUP slogan
on left side of UP boxcars.
Lettering & slogans are Armour Yellow.

Dec. 1950 - spacing between two lines of BSSUP slogan increased to
18".

Nov. 1953 to 1961 - BSSUP slogan on both sides of UP boxcars.
Lettering & slogans are Armour Yellow.

Aug. 1956 - "Union Pacific" lettering changed from 10" circle "O"
style Gothic to 20" oval "O" style Gothic on UP boxcars.

While I have no firm data, I would think that a generalized interval
for freight car repainting would be hard to come by. Economic
conditions (car use, labor availability - already busy painting new
cars, money for paint), political conditions (wars, public image),
management ideas (do they care if the cars are clean or dirty), etc.
were not constant, yet all would affect freight car repaint
intervals. It took a few years to repaint all the captive UP
cabooses from red to yellow starting in 1947. Without shop records,
photos are the next best evidence. And, what you are trying to
determine is whether the lettering and slogan are the same color on
each car. So even if dirty, we're comparing dirty white against
dirty yellow.

Cheers,
Dick Harley
Laguna Beach, CA

Two philosophical questions then:

1. If two cars were built the same day at the same place and painted from the same drum of paint, coupled together and run together hauling the same cargos for ten years, would you expect the colors of the two be virtually the same or markedly different after ten years?

2. If two cars were built the same day by two different shops for two different railroads and painted in markedly different colors, coupled together a week later and run together hauling the same cargos for ten years, would you expect the colors of the two be virtually the same or markedly different after ten years?

This comes up in the armor modeling world as well.

The thing to keep in mind is that all paint jobs were new *at some point*. They change as they age and in modeling this is called "weathering". You get better (more realistic) results starting from a common point then just being - frankly - lazy, and painting it whatever color you have handy. That's not to say that you must use the clean, fresh color as your first coat, but that any weathered, chalked, faded, stained, or cindered shade you are choosing as your base should be selected to represent what that clean, fresh color would look like after a time under your RR's conditions.

KL

This photo nicely illustrates why "which color is correct"
is moot unless you're modeling a brand new car -- In the
background of this shot you can see two IC box cars, and
then two P&LE box cars. Note the great contrast in the colors
of cars belonging to the same railroad.

<<That one I can't answer, but I'd be REALLY surprised to hear that
it "can't be matched.">>

"Can"t be matched" and "is it worth out time and money to match it?"
are two slightly different things. I am not a professional coloursit
or paint chemist and I have never played one on TV or even on the
internet, but I do enjoy playing with paint and have been doing it for
a while

Lead free paint seems to have it's own colour space very slighly
different to full strength leaded paint. I think at least part of the
problem with colour matching is that all the modern substitutes for
leaded pigments don't have quite the same covering power. Real Flake
White for example made a really solid opaque white and modern
substitute combinations of titanium and zinc oxides are only the next
best thing

Of course the use of lead based pigments raises another question -
how old is the paint chip you are trying to match? The colour of lead
pigments changes with exposure. Sulphur in the atrmosphere -
something very likely to be found around STMFCs - will cause lead
based pigments to change colour over time with some combinations of
pigment and environment tending to black over time; lead oxides which
are white become lead sulphides which are brown the blackish. For
example look at the white paint buildings near the tracks in steam era
photos - that greyish colour wasn't just soot, but could often be an
actual change in the pigment

A coat of varnish helps seal the outside surface and slow the process
due to external sulphur, but it can't help if the sulphur compounds
are included in the paint itself. Mixing the flake white with some
other pigments could also affect the colour over time. Artists and
painters would be aware of many of of the known reactions - mixes of
flake white and vermilion and ultramarine were avoided by water
colourists. Cadmium based pigments are another set that can cause
problems with lead

So just what colour are we trying to match?

Aidrian

This is a personal favourite. Standard Railroad of the World modellers on this list can opine on standard PRR freight car red, but here's at least nine PRR hoppers, each of a slightly different hue--

http://www.shorpy.com/node/2799?size=_original

CN was anal retentive in our era with their Red #11, using wet paint reference samples that manufacturers had to match. Yet a David Shaw collection colour photo of the yard at Palmerston, Ontario in the late 1950's shows 12 or so CN cars, each again with a different hue of CN Red #11.

One has a lot of leeway in matching STMFC colours.

Steve Lucas.

Tim,

I fully agree. We seem to get too hung up on "perfect".

Greg Martin

Tim O'Connor wrote:

This photo nicely illustrates why "which color is correct" is moot unless you're modeling a brand new car -- In the
background of this shot you can see two IC box cars, and then two P&LE box cars. Note the great contrast in the colors of cars belonging to the same railroad.

http://www.godfatherrails.com/photos/pv.asp?pid=140

And how about those three PFE reefers? <g>

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@signaturepress.com
Publishers of books on railroad history

This photo nicely illustrates why "which color is correct"
is moot unless you're modeling a brand new car -- In the
background of this shot you can see two IC box cars, and
then two P&LE box cars. Note the great contrast in the colors
of cars belonging to the same railroad.

http://www.godfatherrails.com/photos/pv.asp?pid=140

Tim O'Connor

And please, let's NOT revisit that thread about whether or not
the EXACT correct prototype color is really the right thing to put on
(indoor) models.

Tony Thompson

Agreed!!

SGL





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Schuyler Larrabee wrote:

Sure you can go to the paint store and get any color you can find matched, at least pretty close. But that's latex, generally, and your average house painter or housewife who's decided it would be great if the dining room were painted a nice green is not the same customer who is going to take a bottle of paint and airbrush a swatch of
it onto a card and go hold it against some prototype in a museum . . .

Um, no one mentioned house paint until now, Schuyler. You will notice I was quite specific about art supply stores, not hardware/ paint stores. And BTW, the ability of the modern paint store to match pretty darn accurately, anything you bring them, can be pretty useful if you're, say, restoring a depot. But that's not what I was on about.
And please, let's NOT revisit that thread about whether or not the EXACT correct prototype color is really the right thing to put on (indoor) models.

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@signaturepress.com
Publishers of books on railroad history

Schuyler Larrabee wrote:

Mmmm, certainly not what the paint chemist who mixed Scalecoat told
me . . . Weaver at Quality Craft referred me to the chemist to ask
about mixing such a paint. He said that he was in the process at
that time (this is ca. 1982 or so) of finding suitable substitute
coloring agents to be able to match the colors he'd created when
lead was an acceptable component of paint, and that it was proving
to be an extremely hard and frustrating exercise. He believed that
it was simply not possible to achieve a dead match to colors
prepared with lead compounds. IIRC, this also applied to a few
other coloring agents, but I don't

Two points: first, I was responding to Denny's comment about
VIVID colors, not about precise color matches. And second, if I were
going to do color matching, I'd hire an artist, not a chemist. Visit
any art store and tell me you can't get colors to be mixed. About that
Erie green? That one I can't answer, but I'd be REALLY surprised to
hear that it "can't be matched."

Tony Thompson

VIVIDness is exactly what the Chemist was talking about. And you need a chemist when you're working
with the elements in the coloring agents that go into the paint and you want it to be stable. I
remember that he was lamenting that to create a yellow, EL Yellow, since he knew I was interested in
that, without the ability to use chrome, was a real trial. Sure you can go to the paint store and
get any color you can find matched, at least pretty close. But that's latex, generally, and your
average house painter or housewife who's decided it would be great if the dining room were painted a
nice green is not the same customer who is going to take a bottle of paint and airbrush a swatch of
it onto a card and go hold it against some prototype in a museum and bitch that it's not

EXACTLY<<<< correct, and also will expect that paint to look exactly the same 30 years from now.

Dining rooms get repainted every once in a while, and probably not the same color.

There are two ERIE greens. The dark is the same as NP dark green. The lighter color, really a
gray-green, is NOT a match for the NP color. According to Ron Sebastian who has the original paint
materials from EMD, that gray-green color was not used on ANY other EMD locomotive.

SGL






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Schuyler Larrabee wrote:

Mmmm, certainly not what the paint chemist who mixed Scalecoat told me . . . Weaver at Quality Craft referred me to the chemist to ask about mixing such a paint. He said that he was in the process at that time (this is ca. 1982 or so) of finding suitable substitute coloring agents to be able to match the colors he'd created when lead was an acceptable component of paint, and that it was proving to be an extremely hard and frustrating exercise. He believed that it was simply not possible to achieve a dead match to colors prepared with lead compounds. IIRC, this also applied to a few other coloring agents, but I don't

Two points: first, I was responding to Denny's comment about VIVID colors, not about precise color matches. And second, if I were going to do color matching, I'd hire an artist, not a chemist. Visit any art store and tell me you can't get colors to be mixed. About that Erie green? That one I can't answer, but I'd be REALLY surprised to hear that it "can't be matched."

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@signaturepress.com
Publishers of books on railroad history

Lead compounds don't necessarily provide more vivid color,
but are often the cheapest source of color. It is perfectly possible,
as many art supplies testify, to have FAR more vivid colors than
anything we use as modelers, and without a trace of lead. Next time
you're at the art supply store, browse the paints and you'll see what
I mean. Yes, there are plenty of lead-containing paints, but there are
also plenty of bright colors without lead.

Tony Thompson

Mmmm, certainly not what the paint chemist who mixed Scalecoat told me. I was then (and still am,
for that matter) hoping to get a Scalecoat version of the two ERIE greens used for passenger
service. Or, actually, anybody other than Accupaint's versions. I was never able to get Accupaint
to work for me. But to get back to the point, Weaver at Quality Craft referred me to the chemist to
ask about mixing such a paint. He said that he was in the process at that time (this is ca. 1982 or
so) of finding suitable substitute coloring agents to be able to match the colors he'd created when
lead was an acceptable component of paint, and that it was proving to be an extremely hard and
frustrating exercise. He believed that it was simply not possible to achieve a dead match to colors
prepared with lead compounds. IIRC, this also applied to a few other coloring agents, but I don't
recall them at this remove.

The upshot was that he was not interested at all in working with me to create these other colors.
He had far too much to do to finish reproducing the line lead-free.

SGL





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Here are some dates that may be of interest:

1936 to Nov. 1949 - ROTS slogan on right side / SAW slogan on left side of UP boxcars.
Roman style lettering & slogans are initially white lead; slogans become Armour Yellow in late 1930s.

June 1939 - Gothic circle "O" style lettering starts on UP freight cars.
Lettering is white; slogans are Armour Yellow.

July 1947 - change lettering color to Armour Yellow on most UP freight cars (e.g. not tank cars).

Nov. 1949 to Nov. 1953 - ROTS slogan on right side / BSSUP slogan on left side of UP boxcars.
Lettering & slogans are Armour Yellow.

Dec. 1950 - spacing between two lines of BSSUP slogan increased to 18".

Nov. 1953 to 1961 - BSSUP slogan on both sides of UP boxcars.
Lettering & slogans are Armour Yellow.

Aug. 1956 - "Union Pacific" lettering changed from 10" circle "O" style Gothic to 20" oval "O" style Gothic on UP boxcars.


While I have no firm data, I would think that a generalized interval for freight car repainting would be hard to come by. Economic conditions (car use, labor availability - already busy painting new cars, money for paint), political conditions (wars, public image), management ideas (do they care if the cars are clean or dirty), etc. were not constant, yet all would affect freight car repaint intervals. It took a few years to repaint all the captive UP cabooses from red to yellow starting in 1947. Without shop records, photos are the next best evidence. And, what you are trying to determine is whether the lettering and slogan are the same color on each car. So even if dirty, we're comparing dirty white against dirty yellow.

Cheers,
Dick Harley
Laguna Beach, CA

Could "C" be "Coal"?. "MR" could then be "Mine Run". "Slack" means bituminous coal smaller than 1/2". No idea on "RM", but "SPL" usually means "Special".

If written on different days, RM and MR could well mean the same thing.

Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@signaturepress.com
Publishers of books on railroad history

I don't know exactly what the "C" kind of car is – a spot check of some of the car numbers in the January 1953 ORER showed a mixture of gons and hoppers. Forty-three of the 48 cars were in the same train on October 31, 1951. Most of these 43 cars (27) were headed for North Platte, NE, but there were a variety of other destinations as well. Most of these 43 cars (34) were UP cars, but other roads were represented. The contents were RM (30), MR (4), slack (4), SPL (3), or empty (2). I confess that I don't know what any of these things are! (Except for "empty".)

Could "C" be "Coal"?. "MR" could then be "Mine Run". "Slack" means bituminous coal smaller than 1/2". No idea on "RM", but "SPL" usually means "Special".

Tom Madden

Hi Everyone

This is a summary report for a Union Pacific Freight Conductors' Train Book compiled by a conductor named J.A. Traud from October 26, 1951, to December 6, 1951. During this period, Conductor Traud road 36 trains on the U.P. mainline between Laramie and Rawlins, Wyoming. For 33 of the trains he lists the car initial, number, contents, destination, and other information for every car.

Traud's train book is among 128 such books that I happened upon in the attic of the Laramie Depot earlier this year. Most of these books date from 1937 to 1939, but Traud's is an exception. In previous posts I summarized three books dating from 1938.

In the 33 trains for which Traud lists the car data, there were 2,389 cars, with 1,705 loads and 684 empties weighing an aggregate of 107,732 tons (car + contents). Motive power was provided by 4-6-6-4 Challengers, 4-8-8-4 Big Boys, and 1400 series F3 lashups.

About 85% of the eastbound cars had loads, while less than 57% of the westbound cars were loaded. 71% of all cars, regardless of destination, were loaded. Five of the westbound trains, with an aggregate of 454 cars, consisted entirely of empties. The majority of these empties (by far!) were PFE reefers.

Ownership of the cars was distributed as follows, by direction:

Ownership: Eastbound; Westbound; Total cars
PFE: 479; 327; 806
UP: 149; 95; 244
PRR: 52; 71; 123
NYC: 39; 45; 84
SP: 42; 34; 76
CNW: 47; 22; 69 (23 of the eastbound cars were empty stock cars headed for Council Bluffs and all in the same train, Nov. 17, 1951)
ATSF: 26; 34; 60
MILW: 14; 46; 60
WABASH: 16; 25; 41
IC: 17; 20; 37
CB&Q: 20; 14; 34
GATX: 16; 18; 34
B&O: 15; 18; 33
SOUTHERN: 14; 18; 32
NP: 16; 15; 31
GN: 8; 20; 28
RI: 15; 13; 28
MP: 12; 15; 27
DL&W: 8; 12; 20
GTW: 9; 10; 19
RDG: 10; 9; 19
ACL: 4; 14; 18
ART: 16; 1; 17
C&O: 6; 11; 17
L&N: 9; 8; 17
SLSF: 8; 9; 17
N&W: 8; 8; 16
NKP: 6; 10; 16
SEABOARD: 8; 8; 16
SOO: 6; 8; 14
ERIE: 7; 6; 13
P&LE: 7; 5; 12
PM: 6; 6; 12
T&NO: 6; 6; 12
CN: 3; 8; 11
MDT: 9; 2; 11
CP: 7; 2; 9
C&EI: 3; 5; 8
D&H: 3; 5; 8
D&RGW: 6; 2; 8
NWX: 5; 3; 8
SHPX: 1; 7; 8
SSW: ; 8; 8
ARLX: 2; 5; 7
CDLX: 3; 4; 7
LV: 2; 5; 7
M-K-T: 5; 2; 7
T&P: 1; 6; 7
UTLX: 1; 6; 7
CG: 3; 3; 6
DT&I: 1; 5; 6
I-GN: 2; 4; 6
SLRX: ; 6; 6
FGEX: 3; 2; 5
GM&O: 2; 3; 5
NH: 1; 4; 5
NRC: 5; ; 5
SB&M: 3; 2; 5
Others: 53; 64; 117
Grand Total: 1,245; 1,144; 2,389

Conductor Traud recorded the kind of car for nearly all cars. Here is the distribution of ownership for the box and auto cars, by direction:

Ownership: Eastbound; Westbound; Total box and auto cars
PRR: 44; 59; 103
UP: 32; 65; 97
NYC: 34; 43; 77
SP: 40; 32; 72
MILW: 13; 42; 55
ATSF: 21; 32; 53
CNW: 22; 18; 40
WABASH: 12; 24; 36
IC: 16; 17; 33
SOUTHERN: 13; 18; 31
NP: 14; 12; 26
GN: 6; 19; 25
RI: 12; 13; 25
B&O: 8; 16; 24
MP: 6; 14; 20
GTW: 9; 10; 19
ACL: 4; 14; 18
C&O: 6; 11; 17
DL&W: 6; 11; 17
CB&Q: 4; 12; 16
N&W: 8; 8; 16
SEABOARD: 8; 8; 16
NKP: 4; 10; 14
RDG: 7; 7; 14
SLSF: 6; 8; 14
SOO: 5; 8; 13
ERIE: 6; 6; 12
L&N: 4; 8; 12
PM: 6; 6; 12
CN: 3; 8; 11
T&NO: 6; 5; 11
CP: 7; 2; 9
D&RGW: 6; 2; 8
SSW: 0; 8; 8
C&EI: 3; 4; 7
P&LE: 4; 3; 7
T&P: 1; 6; 7
D&H: 2; 4; 6
DT&I: 1; 5; 6
LV: 1; 5; 6
CG: 2; 3; 5
GM&O: 2; 3; 5
NH: 1; 4; 5
SB&M: 3; 2; 5
Others: 29; 40; 69
Grand Total: 447; 655; 1,102

Here is the distribution of the kinds of cars, by direction:

Kind of car: Eastbound; Westbound; Total cars
Box/Auto: 447; 660; 1,107
C: 48; 0; 48
Coach: 1; 0; 1
Cov Hop: 1; 4; 5
Flat: 12; 8; 20
Gon: 45; 33; 78
Hopper: 41; 14; 55
Reefer: 533; 363; 896
Stock: 90; 18; 108
Tank: 27; 43; 70
Unknown: 0; 1; 1
Grand Total: 1,245; 1,144; 2,389

I don't know exactly what the "C" kind of car is – a spot check of some of the car numbers in the January 1953 ORER showed a mixture of gons and hoppers. Forty-three of the 48 cars were in the same train on October 31, 1951. Most of these 43 cars (27) were headed for North Platte, NE, but there were a variety of other destinations as well. Most of these 43 cars (34) were UP cars, but other roads were represented. The contents were RM (30), MR (4), slack (4), SPL (3), or empty (2). I confess that I don't know what any of these things are! (Except for "empty".)

The next two tables show the distribution of kind of car, by direction, for loads and empties:

Kind of car: Eastbound loads; Westbound loads; Total loaded cars
Box/Auto: 391; 522; 913
C: 46; 0; 46
Coach: 1; 0; 1
Cov Hop: 0; 2; 2
Flat: 8; 4; 12
Gon: 25; 25; 50
Hopper: 34; 1; 35
Reefer: 522; 58; 580
Stock: 22; 17; 39
Tank: 20; 7; 27
(blank): ; 1; 1
Grand Total: 1069; 637; 1706


Kind of car: Eastbound empties; Westbound empties; Total empty cars
Box/Auto: 56; 138; 194
C: 2; 0; 2
Cov Hop: 1; 2; 3
Flat: 4; 4; 8
Gon: 20; 8; 28
Hopper: 7; 13; 20
Reefer: 11; 305; 316
Stock: 68; 1; 69
Tank: 7; 36; 43
Grand Total: 176; 507; 683

Best wishes,
Larry Ostresh
Laramie, Wyoming