The Kline & Culotta book The Postwar Freight Car Fleet contains a few photos of cars that should not be in the Harrisburg area. On pg 158 is CTSE Chicago Milwaukee St. Paul & Pacific hopper, pg 159 shows Central of Georgia 899 hopper, pg 164 has IC hopper 72238 along with NC&StL hopper 48241, and pg 167 shows MP hopper 63295. One might even question the presence of CN hopper 118481 and B&M hopper 8252. The unexpected travel of hopper cars has long been analyzed and discussed...but more often with regard to eastern hoppers being found west of Ft. Worth. Seeing cars such as mentioned above in the East must be refreshing for the Pennsy, C&O, N&W, and B&O modeler since they can occasionally insert a "foreigner" into the endless strings of company and other Appalachian road hoppers. Kinda like a UP, Santa Fe or SP modeler inserting an occasional MDT or BREX car into their strings of PFE or SFRD cars.

I do have to wonder...curiosity being a strong motivator...just what the CG car is doing there.

Mike Brock

On Sun, July 8, 2007 10:56 am, Mike Brock wrote:

Seeing cars such as mentioned above in the
East must be refreshing for the Pennsy, C&O, N&W, and B&O modeler since
they can occasionally insert a "foreigner" into the endless strings of

company

and other Appalachian road hoppers. Kinda like a UP, Santa Fe or SP
modeler inserting an occasional MDT or BREX car into their strings of

PFE or SFRD

cars.

Mike,

A study of PRR yard photos many years ago indicated that at best, the PRR
hopper population was 75% PRR. Thus, as a PRR modeler, I have long known
that I needed some oddballs to break up those gorgeous strings of H21As,
GLAs and GLCs <G>. The discussion has oft centered on what roads these
were, and includes many regional roads such as N&W, B&O, and the
Pittsburgh area roads (upholding the concept that minerals were usually
regional). This has long driven the coal road modelers crazy, since much
like UP and SP with PFE and ATSF with SFRD, they are not used to the idea
of foreign cars on their roads (C&O being a prime example). However, once
again, we need to think of the PRR as serving a huge customer base, and
thus raw materials from many areas were delivered to concerns on the PRR
and their car traffic reflects this.

I do have to wonder...curiosity being a strong motivator...just what the
CG car is doing there.

Loaded with coal, traveling eastbound in Harrisburg... Speculating
wildly, it looks like maybe the car hauled something north and was
reloaded and sent on its way (towards the C of G, sort of) towards Philly
(or maybe Baltimore or New York)

Regards
Bruce

Bruce Smith
Auburn, AL

Bruce Smith wrote:

A study of PRR yard photos many years ago indicated that at best, the PRR hopper population was 75% PRR. Thus, as a PRR modeler, I have long known that I needed some oddballs to break up those gorgeous strings of H21As, GLAs and GLCs <G>.

But let's not find ourselves justifying the common sight on layout visits to various places, the "coal train" with each hopper from a different road--often running behind the hotshot "reefer train" with one billboard reefer from each meat or beer company. Um, <g> . . . I think.

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

Mike

CofG is closely affiliated with the Southern; Southern reached DC and
Manassas VA, both very close to Harrisburg; so a hopper car maybe 100
miles from "home rails"? Doesn't seem so odd to me. Those MP and IC cars
are the bigger mystery as far as I'm concerned. But PRR did directly
interchange with them, and CTSE as well, so occasionally "strays" from
a direct connection can explain a lot of oddities.

Reviewing many company coal reports for a several year period presented many anomalies ( hoppers that ,"shouldn't be there") the "why" is not always easy to explain or comprehend,it just happened.Even in a large sample some cars that shouldn't be there ,ARE.It gives the modeler a reason to justify the presence of some of these cars just as long as it is not overdone, it is plausible..Armand Premo

On Jul 8, 2007, at 8:56 AM, Mike Brock wrote:

The Kline & Culotta book The Postwar Freight Car Fleet contains a few
photos
of cars that should not be in the Harrisburg area. On pg 158 is CTSE
Chicago
Milwaukee St. Paul & Pacific hopper, pg 159 shows Central of Georgia
899
hopper, pg 164 has IC hopper 72238 along with NC&StL hopper 48241,
and pg
167 shows MP hopper 63295. One might even question the presence of CN
hopper
118481 and B&M hopper 8252. The unexpected travel of hopper cars has
long
been analyzed and discussed...but more often with regard to eastern
hoppers
being found west of Ft. Worth. Seeing cars such as mentioned above in
the
East must be refreshing for the Pennsy, C&O, N&W, and B&O modeler
since they
can occasionally insert a "foreigner" into the endless strings of
company
and other Appalachian road hoppers. Kinda like a UP, Santa Fe or SP
modeler
inserting an occasional MDT or BREX car into their strings of PFE or
SFRD
cars.

Mike, as you are aware, I know little and care less about coal hopper
traffic on eastern railroads. However, I can speak with some authority
on western reefer traffic in the steam era, and though off-line reefers
were not numerous on the Pacific Coast, the photographic evidence
assures us that they weren't unusual either. That was especially true
during WW II when the feds mandated that reefers be loaded regardless
of ownership. But even after that mandate was lifted, ART reefers were
common on the Western Pacific, which got westbound ART traffic from the
Rio Grande at Salt Lake City; URTX, WFEX/BREX/FGEX, and NP reefers
brought apples, potatoes, fish, and other perishables from the Pacific
Northwest; and in addition to PFE and SFRD backhauls, there was
considerable westbound perishable traffic in URTX, NWX, MDT, IC, FGEX,
and GARX cars, as well as meat traffic in cars owned by or leased to
Armour, Swift, Cudahy, and the other large packing houses. The same
was also true before the war; the reefer photos from the Urac
collection, which will be featured in a forthcoming volume in the Focus
on Freight Cars series, included a wide variety of foreign road reefers
in the Los Angeles area in the mid-1930s, as well as the predictable
PFE and SFRD cars. Obviously, as Tony Thompson points out, realism
militates against trains composed of one each of every reefer model
ever offered in HO scale. But a sprinkling of other reefers mixed in
among the PFE and SFRD cars is both realistic and more visually
interesting than solid blocks of cars belonging to a single owner.

Richard Hendrickson

Bruce,
I didn't express myself well. What I meant to say was that Appalachian RRs including Pennsy, C&O, B&O, and N&W would commonly have hoppers of these same RRs in their consists....although perhaps C&O and N&W might not have many of their own in the other's trains. It would vary, of course, on the part of these relatively large RRs one is talking about. Thus, Pennsy tracks north of Columbus would be home to entire trains of N&W hoppers completing their run from their origins on N&W, then to Columbus on N&W and then on Pennsy to the Great Lakes. The same also occurred with N&W hopper trains traveling on NYC tracks...hence the photo of 3 NYC F units pulling a long train of N&W hoppers across the huge bridge south of Cleveland on its way to the lake [ incidentally, I've ridden over that bridge...great view of Cleveland and the steel mills at night ]. By the same token, it was not uncommon to find strings of L&N hoppers on both the C&O and N&W. Add to that, Clinchfield hoppers on the N&W and WM hoppers probably on all 4 major Appalachian roads. The issue was dependent, no doubt, on the proximity of a given RR to the source of coal AND its destination. Thus, while B&O, C&O and Pennsy had access to both, B&O and C&O probably served more of the source mines [ Pennsy historians help here ]. Other RRs like N&W, WM, Clinchfield, and L&N might have to travel on other's tracks to reach their destinations. The unexpected cars I pointed out would, I think, be rather rare.

Mike Brock

Richard Hendrickson wrote:

But a sprinkling of other reefers mixed in among the PFE and SFRD cars is both realistic and more visually interesting than solid blocks of cars belonging to a single owner.

And unless you're modeling a main line with a route which is appropriate, truly big cuts of reefers may not be realistic anyway. Yeah, I know, the bozos love to run a "reefer train" but so often, it makes no sense.
That said, I'd comment that both PFE and SFRD tended strongly to use their own cars WHEN they had them. In the peak harvest season was when they were using foreign cars out of necessity. So for those who actually model a specific month or season, consider what pattern would be going on. Even those solid reefer blocks on the Erie would have some foreigns in peak season.

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

On Jul 8, 2007, at 2:31 PM, Anthony Thompson wrote:

Richard Hendrickson wrote:
> But a sprinkling of other reefers mixed in among the PFE and SFRD
cars
> is both realistic and more visually interesting than solid blocks of
> cars belonging to a single owner.

And unless you're modeling a main line with a route which is
appropriate, truly big cuts of reefers may not be realistic anyway.
Yeah, I know, the bozos love to run a "reefer train" but so often, it
makes no sense.

A point well taken. Over Cajon Pass and the Santa Fe's Coast Line main
across Arizona and New Mexico? Absolutely (though NOT over Glorietta
and Raton Passes; Santa Fe GFX trains were almost always routed via
Belen and Amarillo). Over Donner Pass, Northern Nevada, and the Lucin
cutoff? Sure. Over the UP main from Ogden to Council Bluffs? Of
course. The Erie's Chicago-to-New York main line? Mais oui. But
certainly not on the secondary and branch lines that modelers tend to
favor because they're less overwhelming and fit better in attics and
basements.

That said, I'd comment that both PFE and SFRD tended strongly
to use their own cars WHEN they had them. In the peak harvest season
was when they were using foreign cars out of necessity.

And, it may be added, shippers often complained bitterly when they got
off-line reefers for loading. Those cars tended to be much worse
maintained than PFE and SFRD cars, and in addition their interior
dimensions were enough different to create cooperage problems when
securing the load; shippers often had cribbing and bracing pre-cut to
fit the cars they were used to. In addition, shippers served by the
Santa Fe much preferred the SFRD cars with 5' wide doors and many of
them had a fit if the local switching crew gave them an off-line reefer
with 4' door openings.

Richard Hendrickson

SGL: That train fits the definition of Main Line in Tony's email.
Brian J Carlson P.E.
Cheektowaga NY

In a video I have of the Reading RR, there is a segment with a hopper train near Mt. Carmel, Pa. Standing out in a train of mostly black, well used eastern road hoppers is a relatively clean freight car red IC 50T hopper.

Dave Pfeiffer

Point taken, Brian

SGL
La vita e breve, mangiate prima il dolce!

Richard Hendrickson wrote:

However, I can speak with some
authority on western reefer traffic in the steam era, and though
off-line reefers were not numerous on the Pacific Coast, the
photographic evidence assures us that they weren't unusual either.

I have often wondered if west coast military bases would have been magnets
for distant-from-home eastern reefers. Consider the biggest one the west
coast -- the Naval Supply Center in Oakland -- provided fresh, canned, and
frozen food, to all of the US naval bases in the Pacific. Surely, given the
volume, many perishible items may have originated well outside of central
California and the shipper used whatever reefers could be found to carry the
goods instead of the expected back haul of PFE cars.

As for Mike's question about those hoppers he noticed in the photos... Yeah,
probably coal, but might other mineral commodities have been loaded in those
cars? Things that are harder to come by and therefore may travel farther.
Which reminds me to ask... is it safe to assume that eastern roads used
hoppers to move limestone to steel mills?

Dave Nelson

Mike;



I like how you presented the bait! "Cars that shouldn't be...", indeed.



While not on the scale of the widespread ramblings of the boxcar fleet, I
too, have often wondered how very foreign hoppers ended up on the PRR (and
B&O and P&LE, too). So, I tried to do some research that would lead me to a
better understanding of what loads might be generated in far-off lands that
was needed by a customer on the PRR, particularly my area.



All the key points being made are very valid, and in what I have found, there
seems to be a lot more specificity in the use of open hoppers, covered
hoppers, gons and flats than the more general service nature, and
representation thereof, in the steam era box car fleet.



Hoppers seem to be found in strong representation of what specific industries
are on-line, and more importantly, what specific industries might need from
far away.



While Bruce's comment that at most 75% of open hoppers might be home road,
one would also expect to find that it might also vary upward or downward
depending on who is generating or receiving what, and where, on your road, or
the segment you are modeling.



Each "for instance" seems to be different. On the Mon Branch of the PRR,
there was a strong representation of the P&LE, in large blocks, simply
because the Monongahela Rwy, which was jointly owned by the PRR and P&LE, had
no hoppers of its own, and both roads fed blocks of their own onto the MRy to
feed the almost solely coal trade hosted by that road's feeding everything it
had onto these two larger roads. Thus, you saw big blocks of P&LE hoppers,
sometimes with NYC cars mixed in (it WAS a System, after all), interspersed
with all the PRR hoppers.



But, you also saw individual or small strings of other roads' hoppers, that
represented the flow in, of other commodities like limestone, dolomite,
cobalt, chromium, iron ore, manganese, and other additives for the steel
industry. You also, as Bruce and others have mentioned, saw a lot of other
local roads' hoppers, which just seemed to be grabbed as needed, to serve
either of these functions, that included B&O, C&O, N&W, Montour, P&WV, RDG,
P&S, C&I, and others, because they were handy.



But, we also see in photos, cars that traveled a long way to get there, which
must've ended up there because they either carried a load that was only
available (or most cheaply available) from some very distant producer, or
because they did something like this, and then got grabbed before they could
be expeditiously routed back, and used locally for some other commodity. I
randomly saw SP hoppers in Conway Yard that appeared to have partial loads,
that then ended up in local yards. I never found out exactly what the load
was (but I have strong suspicions; see below), but I have been told it was
everything from "it was from the Eagle Mine", or any host of others, from
SoCal. Similarly, we know that SoCal soda ash was also something received by
glass works in SP covered hoppers, in w.Pa.



I have lots more research to do before I can be anywhere close to certain
what all the details are for my specific area, but here are a couple notes,
for things that were used in the steel industry, at almost every integrated
facility, nationwide (yes, that includes Provo, Utah; Fontana, CA, and any
number of other locations which you guys focus on):



Chromium (only 20% from US in 1953): US: Montana, CA, OR, AL ., with
remainder via ports of entry from Turkey, S. Africa, S. Egypt, Cuba (eastern
ports)

Cobalt (only 23% domestic as of 1953): US: Missouri, ID, PA., with remainder
via ports of entry from Congo (don't know which port was port of entry)

Iron (ore) (<80% domestic by 1953): 80% from Great Lakes; MN, etc., with
remainder via ports of entry from Canada, Cuba, Venezuela (USSteel was
heavily invested here, and had a port of entry in Phila, via the PRR),
Sweden, Brazil, Liberia, and Sierra Leone

Manganese (US produced only 162,000 tons of 3.5 million tons used): US: MN,
AK, SD, AZ, NV, MN; Foreign remainder via ports of entry from India, S.
Africa, Gold Coast, Cuba, Belgian Congo, Brazil

Molybdenum: most of 15,500 tons used was from Climax, Colorado

Nickle: 80-90% of that used originated in Canada...

Tungsten (very small volume, but >90% foreign) from Korea, Bolivia, Spain,
Portugal, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, with small remainder from ID, and NV



BTW, I did not make this info up; some of it is from a speech given by one of
the materials guys at Bethlehem Steel in 1953, to a group of U.S. govt folks
concerned with availability of strategic materials in the event of war.
Remember those "strategic materials stockpiles" found all over the U.S back
in the 50's and 60's? There were some on the Mon Branch.... This is where
they came from!



Anyway, as one can see, anywhere there was an iron or steel maker, there were
additives needed, and an awful lot of them came from ports via the RRs, or
from far-flung states. Now, if we could figure out exactly who was supplying
the industry, and what RRs were used to ship where....



And, is it any wonder that we see CN and CP hoppers?



BTW, I have a small spreadsheet illustrating some of what I found out on this
subject, if you are interested.



Oh, and who is it that served Climax, Colorado?



Take care,



Elden Gatwood



________________________________

From: STMFC@yahoogroups.com [mailto:STMFC@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Mike
Brock
Sent: Sunday, July 08, 2007 11:57 AM
To: STMFC@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [STMFC] Cars that shouldn't be in Kline & Culotta's book



The Kline & Culotta book The Postwar Freight Car Fleet contains a few photos
of cars that should not be in the Harrisburg area. On pg 158 is CTSE Chicago
Milwaukee St. Paul & Pacific hopper, pg 159 shows Central of Georgia 899
hopper, pg 164 has IC hopper 72238 along with NC&StL hopper 48241, and pg
167 shows MP hopper 63295. One might even question the presence of CN hopper
118481 and B&M hopper 8252. The unexpected travel of hopper cars has long
been analyzed and discussed...but more often with regard to eastern hoppers
being found west of Ft. Worth. Seeing cars such as mentioned above in the
East must be refreshing for the Pennsy, C&O, N&W, and B&O modeler since they
can occasionally insert a "foreigner" into the endless strings of company
and other Appalachian road hoppers. Kinda like a UP, Santa Fe or SP modeler
inserting an occasional MDT or BREX car into their strings of PFE or SFRD
cars.

I do have to wonder...curiosity being a strong motivator...just what the CG
car is doing there.

Mike Brock

Gatwood, Elden wrote:

Oh, and who is it that served Climax, Colorado?

D&RGW in the time we're interested in.

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 always thought that was a Colorado & Southern operation.

--- In STMFC@yahoogroups.com, timboconnor@... wrote:

I always thought that was a Colorado & Southern operation.

Yep, the isolated standard gauge C&S Climax branch from Leadville,
last bastion of steam on the C&S. Isolated, in this case, means
isolated from the rest of the C&S system.

Tom Madden

-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: Anthony Thompson <thompson@...>

Gatwood, Elden wrote:

Oh, and who is it that served Climax, Colorado?

D&RGW in the time we're interested in.

Tony Thompson

Berwind hoppers appeared ,out of proportion,on the Rutland for interchange with the CV.Was there anything special about the coal that they carried?.Does anyone know where they went on the CV? Armand Premo

Posted by: "Mike Brock" Bruce,
I didn't express myself well. What I meant to say was that Appalachian RRs
including Pennsy, C&O, B&O, and N&W would commonly have hoppers of these
same RRs in their consists.... although perhaps C&O and N&W might not have
many of their own in the other's trains.
===========

A few points that come to mind beyond what Mike has said.

The situation was different in loading areas on C&O, N&W and a few other railroads covered by C411. That was a car service directive that prohibited other railroads from loading cars of specified marks. These were railroads that by the Car Service Division's formula owned a number of cars adequate to completely protect their on-line loading. You would never see a foreign hopper being loaded on the C&O or N&W. In contrast to the usual situation, this was an AAR order that was well observed. I recall from NYC car distribution experience that we absolutely would not send those marks to our mines for loading. I don't recall what iother roads were covered by C411.

Remember that any coal shipper could ship to any destination on any railroad. As an example of what could happen, coal from mines along the west end of the C&O and N&W, also NYC, IC and SOU in southern IN and IL, also western PA, would take care of consumption needs in Michigan and northern Ohio and Indiana. This would have caused you to see coal hoppers of NYC, IC, N&W, L&N, C&O, CC&O, PRR, B&O and P&LE anywhere in those destination areas on WAB, NKP, AA, PM, GTW, NYC, DT&I, PRR, B&O, etc. etc. etc. So you really can't say that any mark of hopper doesn't belong on any railroad going to coal dealers and power plants several hundred miles from the mining areas.

Same is true of construction aggregates, which typically traveled a few hundred miles and had origins in every state. I'd guess that half were two line hauls.


Malcolm Laughlin, Editor 617-489-4383
New England Rail Shipper Directories
19 Holden Road, Belmont, MA 02478