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Here are top-of-the-head answers to some of your questions. I believe that the dates when the repainting and renumbering started is well documented, but approximately May 1961. Renumbering of locomotives took perhaps three months to finish. The use of solid blue (Jenks blue, although he didn’t call it that) began at very close to the same time, perhaps a few weeks earlier than the beginning of renumbering. So there were a small number of locomotives that were repainted first, while still carrying their old numbers. Several of those have been documented. The opposite case, where almost the entire locomotive fleet was renumbered but many or most locomotives still carried their old paint, went on from 1961 until 1965 with a dwindling number of, probably ratty-looking, engines toward the end of that period. I do not know if it has been documented for sure which were the last engines not to have been repainted. It’s entirely possible that some of the switch engines, which were solid black, could have been among the last ones still working in old paint.
Bear in mind that starting around 1957, after the consolidation of major subsidiaries, a number of older F units were repainted in basically the Eagle scheme but with only the words MISSOURI PACIFIC, without LINES, on the sides. These units also received a smaller nose herald and a few other changes. I am not aware of any early Geeps being repainted in this manner, but new Geeps after this period (the GP18s) were lettered without the word LINES. This was also true of at least one group of passenger cars, the ten economy baggage cars as well as the one Slumbercoach leased to MP.
There are preserved company documents for the renumbering of locomotives, for passenger cars, and for freight cars. The passenger car renumbering was carried out on roughly the same timeframe as the locomotive renumbering. The freight car renumbering did not begin until 1965, although several series of new freight cars were delivered earlier with numbering in the new scheme.
As for the bell locations, the bell isn’t shown on most locomotive diagrams but I believe all the GP7 and GP9 locomotives had the bell in the normal manufacturer’s standard position, which was under the frame just behind the front truck, on the left side (fireman’s side) I believe. Some GP18s had this also, but the 400 series and many of the 500s had the bell on top of the hood, on the left side behind the cab.
Hope this helps.
RG7
