[benjamintickell53]

Continuing with orders received by Extra 1497 South at Donaldson and points south.

[attachment=7:2rx328s2]Donaldson_clearance.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2][attachment=9:2rx328s2]Donaldson_78.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2][attachment=8:2rx328s2]Donaldson_80.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2]
[attachment=5:2rx328s2]ARK_clearance.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2][attachment=6:2rx328s2]ARK_87.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2]
[attachment=0:2rx328s2]Gurdon_clearance.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2][attachment=4:2rx328s2]Gurdon_339.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2][attachment=3:2rx328s2]Gurdon_356.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2][attachment=2:2rx328s2]Gurdon_359.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2][attachment=1:2rx328s2]Gurdon_368.jpg[/attachment:2rx328s2]

[benjamintickell53]

Nice job on the video! Do you have the book on Iron Mountain Arkansas depots that MPHS recently published?

Bill Pollard

[benjamintickell53]

This portion of this thread covers the southbound trip of this crew aboard Extra 1497 South, originating at North Little Rock yard on June 16, 1942, and tying up at Texarkana.

[attachment=8:2toepp60]NLR_clearance.jpg[/attachment:2toepp60][attachment=7:2toepp60]NLR_msg.jpg[/attachment:2toepp60]

A clearance was required for trains departing North Little Rock yard, but note that there were no orders, and the only order handed up at HH Tower (the Rock Island crossing, located just south of Little Rock Union Depot) was an order restricting speed. On this section of the railroad, and the next section which was full CTC, specific running orders were apparently not necessary. From Malvern on south, movement was by timetable and train order authority, so more traditional operating orders were necessary.
[attachment=5:2toepp60]HH-Tower_clearance.jpg[/attachment:2toepp60][attachment=6:2toepp60]HH-Tower_503.jpg[/attachment:2toepp60]
[attachment=0:2toepp60]MVN_clearance.jpg[/attachment:2toepp60][attachment=3:2toepp60]MVN_78.jpg[/attachment:2toepp60][attachment=4:2toepp60]MVN_74.jpg[/attachment:2toepp60][attachment=2:2toepp60]MVN_81.jpg[/attachment:2toepp60][attachment=1:2toepp60]MVN_84.jpg[/attachment:2toepp60]

[benjamintickell53]

Orders for Second 18 at Hope.
[attachment=1:19ijaz8u]HOPE_clearance.jpg[/attachment:19ijaz8u][attachment=0:19ijaz8u]HOPE_425.jpg[/attachment:19ijaz8u]
============================
Message for Second 18 at Prescott.
[attachment=8:19ijaz8u]Prescott-w.jpg[/attachment:19ijaz8u]
============================
Orders for Second 18 at Gurdon. These orders get Second 18 to the point north of Donaldson where CTC was in effect, and thus the Gurdon orders might have been the last ones received for this trip. Note that Second 18 is instructed to clear at the siding north of Gurdon. This was an unusual center siding, located between the two main tracks and accessible from each main at each end (see track diagram in profile page below.) The south end of the siding began within sight of the Gurdon depot, and the north end of the siding was almost 2 miles distant, at Smithton. The siding remained in service into at least the early 1970s. Note that order 126 was issued at 6:23pm giving wait times for Second 18. Order 136 was issued at 8pm, adjusting the wait times for Second 18 by a mere six to ten minutes. Such was the attention to detail during this era of true precision railroading.
[attachment=7:19ijaz8u]Gurdon-1942-6-17_clearance-w.jpg[/attachment:19ijaz8u][attachment=6:19ijaz8u]Gurdon-1942-6-17_126.jpg[/attachment:19ijaz8u]
[attachment=5:19ijaz8u]Gurdon-1942-6-17_134.jpg[/attachment:19ijaz8u][attachment=4:19ijaz8u]Gurdon-1942-6-17_136.jpg[/attachment:19ijaz8u]
[attachment=3:19ijaz8u]Gurdon-1942-6-17_0005.jpg[/attachment:19ijaz8u]

[attachment=2:19ijaz8u]1945-profile-w.jpg[/attachment:19ijaz8u]

[benjamintickell53]

Following up on the earlier discussion about C&EI passenger cars being renumbered into the MP series, the main remaining “mystery” involves the 50-foot express cars that are shown as MP 125-132 in the Missouri Pacific’s 1-1968 equipment summary. Two of these cars were photographed in the trains through Little Rock in October 1967 and early 1968. Stenciling on the upper left roofline is believed to contain the information that these cars were leased from C&EI.

Later photographs show cars in the 255957-255960 series, lettered C&EI and now with a C&EI buzzsaw. C&EI/MP diagrams suggest that these cars came from the C&EI 3900-3929 boxcar series, but that does not explain the passenger paint scheme on these cars. At this point, it appears that the MP 125-132 cars were renumbered when the lease expired. Can anyone provide other photo or paper documentation to explain these cars or verify this speculation?

Bill Pollard

[attachment=3:3is02gt2]CEI-130a.jpg[/attachment:3is02gt2]

[attachment=4:3is02gt2]CEI-128.jpg[/attachment:3is02gt2]

[attachment=0:3is02gt2]CEI-255960-10-1974-Egan-w.jpg[/attachment:3is02gt2]

[attachment=2:3is02gt2]255959-Ron-Merrick-Wichita-Aug-71.jpg[/attachment:3is02gt2]

[attachment=1:3is02gt2]CEI express car 255958.jpg[/attachment:3is02gt2]

[benjamintickell53]

Your model work and model photography is amazing. Really nice layout! Jenks blue on a GP-12 never looked so good.

[benjamintickell53]

For those who are into the details… here is a list of the Pullman routes operated over the Missouri Pacific in the five years before service ended on New Year’s day 1969. A word about numbers…. there were car numbers (on the side of the car, along with the car name), loading numbers (the illuminated number in the car window which also appeared on your ticket), and line numbers. The “line number” as cited below was assigned by Pullman, usually blocks of numbers for each railroad. The line number was more of an accounting tool to identify specific routes, or specific car lines when multiple cars operated over the same route. A few railroads listed the line number in the public timetable, but MP was not one of them. This information was gathered from “History of Lines” volumes, and yearly financial statements 1-14B, all preserved for research at the Newberry Library in Chicago.

MP and TP Pullman lines operating from January 1, 1964 through December 31, 1968

LINE

---

Endpoints

---

Date Discontinued
3300 St Louis-Laredo-Mexico City– 12-31-1968
3306 St Louis-Fort Worth– 12-31-1968
3314 St Louis-Kansas City– 12-12-1966
3333 St Louis-Denver– 1-31-1964, operated St Louis-Kansas City, sleeper as parlor until 2-6-1964
3334 St Louis-Denver– 1-31-1964, operated St Louis-Kansas City, sleeper as parlor until 2-29-1964
3353 Chicago-Hot Springs (via GM&O)– 1-21-1964, operated St Louis-Little Rock until 1-26-1964
3385 New Orleans-Houston– 2-1-1964
3641 Houston-Brownsville– 2-1-1964
3703 St Louis-Houston– 12-31-1968
3704 St Louis-San Antonio– 11-10-1968
3710 St Louis-Hot Springs– 1-21-1964, operated St Louis-Little Rock until 1-23-1964
3710 St Louis-Little Rock– started 11-17-1967, discontinued 2-12-1968 90-day experimental service after line 3731 discontinued
3731 St Louis-Lake Charles– shortened to St Louis-Alexandria 1-8-1964; discontinued 11-16-1967
4085 St Louis-Fort Worth– 10-17-1966
4430 St Louis-Denver– 1-7-1964
4442 Baltimore-San Antonio– 5-19-1964, Slumbercoach in conjunction with B&O

[benjamintickell53]

Nice photo. That was a classic depot.

Bill Pollard

[benjamintickell53]

These fake 1944 calendars continue to appear on ebay, often selling for more than $100. “Mermaidtreasure” currently has one on sale, buy it now, for a mere $149.74. For anyone who harbors some hope that these just MIGHT be true Missouri Pacific artifacts, compare the erroneous “1944” calendar on the metal fake calendar with a true 1944 calendar… note the day of the week that starts each month – the fake calendar is not even 1944.

As stated previously, buying one of these for $10-15, just to have the Eagle artwork, is a legitimate purchase. Selling one as a “rare railroad artifact” to some new or unsuspecting collector at a bloated price is not acceptable.

Bill Pollard

[attachment=0:9evavzor]fake-calendar-1944-w.jpg[/attachment:9evavzor]

[attachment=2:9evavzor]1944-close-up-fake-w.jpg[/attachment:9evavzor]

[attachment=1:9evavzor]1944-w.jpg[/attachment:9evavzor]

[benjamintickell53]

Its not directly related to the ART book, but everyone needs to read – and then read again – Jerry’s last paragraph above. We all could probably do a better job of making sure the material we have collected over a lifetime continues to survive after we are gone. Its not a particularly uplifting topic to contemplate, but take the time to at least give your family some written direction – its a gift to them that they will appreciate during a very stressful time. If your collection is massive, give some general guidance about what is really important to transfer to MPHS, what might best be given to a local historical repository, and what should be auctioned, sold, put on ebay, etc. In the meantime, participate in getting some of your “one of a kind” files scanned by MPHS, its truly a win-win arrangement.

Bill Pollard

[benjamintickell53]

The Canadian domes, which are the ones actually modeled by Rapido, did (do) operate long end/vestibule forward, and interior seating is arranged accordingly. Rapido’s MP painted passenger cars are not known for absolute fidelity to MP practice — again, the cars are Canadian cars with US paint to sell a few more cars. That was less of an issue with some of their other cars, but with the dome, it does result in an undesirable compromise with either all of the seats facing backward or the car itself running backwards when operated per MP or other US railroad practice.

Bill Pollard

[benjamintickell53]

Norbert Shacklette was working the agent’s job at Washington MO when the caboose came in, and might have more details. The land owner apparently had some connection with an upper level MP official or member of the board of directors.

Bill Pollard

[benjamintickell53]

Gene and Jerry, sorry that you two could not make Austin, it was a very enjoyable convention and a good chance to renew acquaintances with friends. I did not make it to Austin in time to observe the board of directors meeting, so will leave that part of your question for others to comment. However, I have been part of the digital archives team for a few years, and can offer my own thoughts from that perspective.

There are logistical IT-type challenges to putting material behind a “member only” wall, as well as questions about what material should be member only, what should be accessible to the general public (to hopefully encourage MPHS membership), what postings would be of interest or benefit to most members, etc. Should the member only section be simply password protected web pages, or should it be some arrangement to allow on-demand downloads, such as is offered by some of the more advanced rail historical society archives? My sense is that MPHS continues to overcome those challenges and hopefully this coming year will see the beginning of a member only section. In the meantime, material continues to become available for scanning, often with a definite timeline before it is to be returned to the owner. With a limited number of volunteers, a lot of effort is put into getting new source material scanned, getting the resulting digital files named so they can be retrieved, etc.

While wrestling with the details of how the “member only” section should be developed, it was the consensus of the digital team (and endorsed by the board) that a number of CDs should be produced using MPHS archive material that has been digitized. The CD option makes a large volume of archival material on a specialized topic available to members relatively quickly, thus hopefully demonstrating the benefit and value of the MPHS Archives. Recent CD topics include (1)Terminals 1928-1959, (2) Accidents 1931-1960, (3) Illinois Coal Mines, (4) Passenger car Diagrams-1963-1978, and (5) Passenger car diagrams – heavyweight cars & wood cars. (The latter just became available at Austin, and will soon be added to the on-line company store.) Each of these CDs required many hours of volunteer labor to properly orient, crop and edit hundreds of images in each CD for optimum viewing.

As Jerry noted, there are always more projects available than there are volunteers.

Bill Pollard

[benjamintickell53]

@[email protected] wrote:

Was there only one “Hot Springs Special” (#17) that ran between LR and HS daily? Based on the schedule that I have, I see two arrivals into HS and two departures. The No. 219 left LR at 11:25 AM and arrived in HS at 12:45, and the #17 left at 8:25 AM and arrived in HS at 10:20. Is this information accurate?

Yes, that information is accurate. The #17 was the Hot Springs Special, with connecting service from Kansas City, etc. #219 was a Memphis-Hot Springs train.

Bill Pollard

[benjamintickell53]

In the midst of the Depression, amenities were a bit sparse. No. 117 (The Rainbow Special) carried an observation-cafe-parlor car between KC and Coffeyville, so that car would have already been removed by the time a passenger boarded at Claremore. Also carried was the KC-Hot Springs sleeper, a 12-section, 1 drawing room car — pretty standard for Pullman accommodations of that era. It also picked up another 12-1 sleeper at Fort Smith for Little Rock, but that would not have affected the Claremore passenger other than perhaps being awakened slightly when the car was switched into the train. There was no food service into Little Rock on No. 117 at this time, again thanks to the economy cutbacks of the Depression.

Once the KC-Hot Springs sleeper had been added to #17, there was a dining-lounge car in the train which operated all the way to Hot Springs, so breakfast or brunch was possible leaving Little Rock. With a 10:20am scheduled arrival in Hot Springs, I doubt that there was any early lunch service, probably just extended breakfast.

Train 17 was a train of many names and many purposes. Between St. Louis and Knobel, it was also known as the Tennessean. At Knobel, a St. Louis-Memphis sleeper, cafe-lounge and coaches were removed to continue to Memphis via Wynne. A few miles down the railroad, a Newport-Hot Springs dining lounge was added, so passengers on No. 17 could have breakfast into Little Rock, with the car continuing to Hot Springs as noted above. At Benton, all of the Hot Springs cars were removed from No. 17 to continue to the Spa city. No. 17 continued to Texarkana, and at Gurdon a Little Rock-El Dorado dining-parlor was remove for movement on train No. 847 to El Dorado. The remainder of No. 17 (now coaches and head end cars only) continued to Texarkana where it terminated. All that is of no consequence to your passenger traveling Claremore to Hot Springs, LOL, but its interesting to see how the railroad back in the day was capable of having one train serve multiple functions efficiently and in a timely manner, day after day, with multiple episodes of switching en route. Most of the time, it all worked like clockwork. Those of us dealing with today’s railroading and Amtrak can only shake our heads in amazement.

Bill

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