In Memoriam: George Clark

The sad news comes to us tonight of the death of George Clark, longtime volunteer in the Electric Car Department and second in seniority among IRM members, on Friday the 10th. George was heavily involved in IRM in its early years in North Chicago and during the 1990s and early 2000s resumed his activities, heading up the early years of the restoration of Lake Shore Electric 810 among other things. His passing brings to mind a wonderful account written up back in 1993 by Sue Weart for Rail & Wire. The photo above, taken by Harold Krewer, accompanied this article and perfectly captures one of George's specific passions that I recall: to always run the first day of the season. George will be missed.

One of the First - George Clark

by Sue Weart

"Being a dyed in the wool railfan is in George Clark's blood. George has been around street cars and trolleys since he was a child. George's father was a streetcar conductor who worked for the Chicago Surface Lines such as the Ashland Avenue line. His father's favorite story was how he met his wife when she rode the street car each morning that he on which he worked. As a boy, George would meet his father when he was on the Armitage Line and ride the last ride to the barns.

"George joined IRM in May of 1956 but just six months later, he was in the U.S. Army in Germany. While there, he began his military service by working on atomic weapons maintenance and then transferred to the new computer (of the time). He had been in data processing before the army so this transfer was right up his alley and becoming a computer programmer was a natural extension. After the army, George joined Illinois Bell as a computer programmer and stayed for 26 years, retiring from Ameritech Service after 5 more years. George has been married to Lynn for 27 years.

"Although George had been inactive for some years, he has returned with enthusiasm. George trains new operators as well being the weekday crew caller for summer service. However, some Sundays, you may see George running an electric car for the visitors. When not running, you can find George helping out in the electric car department and there is plenty to keep him busy. He is working on the Michigan Electric Freight Trailer #1616, has worked on the Illinois Terminal line car # 1702 and #101 and the Milwaukee Electric L10 Freight Locomotive.

"George is one of the early members of the IRM and a former vice president and president of the Museum when the first office address was Walter Murphy's father's law office on Dearborn Street in Chicago. Ten railfans got together and bought one car from the Cedar Rapids & Iowa City. This car had been built for the Indiana Railroad as their 65. Initially, the museum was named the Illinois Electric Railway Museum but the members decided to become a general railway museum and the Illinois Railway Museum was born. Little did George and the other original members know that this one car would lead to a collection of over 350 pieces of equipment.

"The original acquisitions were located next to the North Shore Line's Pettibone freight yard in North Chicago. George has many interesting stories to tell from the early days at North Chicago. Things were to change however and George was part of the planning and moving of the Museum from the original North Chicago site to Union in 1964. After examining many sites, Walter Murphy obtained quit claim deeds for some of the right of way of the old Elgin and Belvidere Electric Railway. George was involved with moving of over 40 pieces of equipment to the current museum property.

"You can find this white haired, smiling gentleman at the museum's electric car department just about every Wednesday and Sunday. George's choices are still the electric cars and, although restoration has begun on some of George's favorites, much still has to be done. If you would like to help with the restoration, your donations to the electric car department or specifically to the Michigan Electric #1616 or the Milwaukee Electric L10 freight locomotive would be greatly appreciated."

["Michigan Electric 1616" is better known today as Lake Shore Electric 810]

The flip side

Frank writes...

So for a while now I've been meaning to paint the other side of the car orange. It's true that "one-sided cars" are a longtime IRM specialty and that most people probably haven't even noticed that only one side of the car has been cosmetically restored, but the other side of the car really isn't in bad shape and there's no particular reason not to get it painted and looking nice. Even if it's years or even decades before any visitor sees it, it's something that will be good to get done. So when I was out at IRM on Sunday I decided to get started on this.

Here's part of the "other" side of the car before I began.  By the way, did I mention that I was talking about Lake Shore Electric 150? One side of this car got nicely painted back about ten years ago but the "flip side" is still partly in the same paint it wore when it was a flower shop at Station Square in Pittsburgh in the 1990s. While the color scheme is generally similar to LSE colors, the photos here (flower shop colors) and here (post-repainting) show that there are some marked differences. So the first job was to put a coat of white primer over the orange window piers so that the finish cream color will cover better.

There, that's better! Then I started in with brown primer on the window frames, which will get painted tile red. I was using a 1-1/2" brush so the edging wasn't all perfect, but I'l be able to clean that up a bit when I put on the finish paint.

Now it's starting to look more like a proper Lake Shore Electric car. As mentioned before, it's unlikely any visitor will see this work anytime in the foreseeable future but it's still good to get it done. Dan Mulvihill helped out some with this painting work and within a couple of hours it was all ready. Next I'll need to clean up the belt rail a bit and prime the bare spots there before starting in with finish paint.

There was plenty happening out at the museum on Sunday. The big draw was that it was the 50th anniversary, to the day, of the first "real" train operation at IRM! Our first-ever trip with a piece of revenue equipment was July 17, 1966 at exactly 11:27am and the car to make that trip was the old reliable IT 415. There were three motormen on that first trip in 1966: Roger Smessaert, Bob Kutella and the late Dave Shore. Bob has been in poor health recently but Roger was at IRM and ran the 415 on a commemoration trip that left the depot at the same time as the original trip. Unfortunately I didn't arrive until a couple of hours later but they did have the 415 out all day in honor of the occasion.

And there was plenty happening in the electric car shop. Norm and Jeff were hard at work on cutting and drilling new pieces of structural steel for Michigan Electric 28. Across the aisle from them, I noticed that John Faulhaber has been painting the trucks on Lake Shore Electric 810 green, as shown above. This freight trailer is getting very close to completion.

And here's Tim Peters, wasting away in the car shop. He's actually working in winding and tying new bundles of waste for the axle cap bearings on the truck for the 24; it's a laborious job but somebody's got to do it. Below, one of the new waste bundles goes into the axle cap to test the fit. These need to be packed tightly into the axle cap housing so that constant and relatively even contact is made with the axle surface to keep it oiled.

And then a small crew headed by Richard Schauer and Greg Kepka were working on the Metra (ex-Illinois Central) "Highliner" MU cars, which had been brought over to the pit lead. We acquired four of these cars with the idea of keeping two and scrapping the other two for parts, but the decision of which to keep and which to scrap won't be made until we have a better idea of the condition of each car. To do that, we need to get them up and going, and Saturday and Sunday were spent doing just that. This weekend focused on the westernmost car, 1534, and after quite a bit of fiddling and some fighting with the motor-alternator set, they eventually got the car to run. Behold: the first "Highliner" to run in a museum!

That maniacal laughter is courtesy of Diesel Department volunteer Jeron, who took a break from preparing for "Diesel Days" next weekend to come over and check out the MU cars. The 1534 isn't quite ready for prime time, as it needs a little bit of work with finicky air valves and the MA set, but given that virtually no changes were made to adapt it to 600-volts, it seems to be doing admirably so far. Work will continue on inspecting and testing these cars to make sure that the museum ends up with the pair in the best shape.

History of LSE 150

LAKE SHORE ELECTRIC CAR 150
AN ILLUSTRATED HISTORY

Pictures from the IRM Collection unless otherwise noted. Not for reuse without permission.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Foreword
The Niles Cars
Modifications During Service
Conditions in Service
Adaptive Reuse
Appendix A
Preserved LSE Equipment

FOREWORD

The Lake Shore Electric was the earliest big interurban system. Created in 1901 by combining and connecting several smaller electric lines in the area between Toledo and Cleveland, it set a pattern for Midwestern interurban development. The system's initial earnings reports were very favorable, and these reports helped fuel a rapid investment boom in interurban lines across the country, which continued until the Panic of 1907.

In 1906 the railroad began ordering a series of cars from the Niles Car & Manufacturing Co. in Niles, Ohio, and these became the best known of the line's wooden cars. They were rebuilt over the years, as detailed below, and several continued to provide service over all parts of the system until the end of passenger service in 1938.

When service ended, there were few remaining electric lines interested in used interurban cars, and only three found continued use with other railways. But most of the remaining cars were sold for adaptive reuse as diners, houses, cottages, and sheds of various sorts all across northern Ohio. Dennis Lamont says that they still contained the seats, water heating system, bathrooms and baggage racks along with match strikers, ticket holders and miscellaneous little parts when they were sold off. At least 77 cars are known to have been disposed of in this fashion. As a result, for a long time there was a large number of carbodies still in existence. Sixteen of these have been acquired by various museum groups and individuals, among them car 150. None of them are operational, and most are in various states of disrepair. I do not expect any of them to be restored to operable condition in the foreseeable future, apart from freight trailer 810. Most of the other carbodies have by now been dismantled.

In 1938 there was no organized railway preservation movement. In contrast, 25 years later when the North Shore and CA&E cars became available, there were many active groups interested in electric railway preservation, and so a large number of cars were preserved with their equipment intact, from Iowa to Maine. Many of these have been restored and continue to operate. On the other hand, by that time nobody was any longer interested in using old trolley cars as diners or chicken coops, so there was no adaptive reuse. But I digress.

Acknowledgements

Dennis Lamont supplied us with several pictures, and made many valuable comments and corrections to the material.

THE NILES CARS

(Dave Mewhinney collection)

In December 1905, the LSE ordered ten new coaches from Niles, numbered 150-159. These were single-ended cars seating 52, with a separate smoking compartment. They were furnished with a combination of hot-water and electric heat. As built, they had Van Dorn couplers and MU and bus connections, so a two-car train could be operated with one pole. Several cars were destroyed in wrecks or fires, and some were rebuilt into freight motors. A second order of similar cars, ten coaches (numbered 141-149, plus a second 152) and five combines (160-164), were built in 1907. Of these, three coaches and two freight motor bodies still survive.

Similar car 143 in service. Cars had only one trolley base, but carried two spare poles for emergencies.

Identical cars 158 and 155 meet in Norwalk, showing a comparison of the two ends of the car.

Interior of car 155.











MODIFICATIONS DURING SERVICE

One of the Niles cars as built. Van Dorn couplers, no MU jumpers, headlight in the up position.

Photos from the Dennis Lamont collection.

Cars 155 and 152 meet at Norwalk station in 1909. Again, we have the drop platforms, Van Dorn couplers, and MU jumpers below the floor.

Two Niles cars trained together, in original configuration.

155 and 152 in Fremont, 1910. By now the couplers have been changed to knuckles, the MU jumpers are mounted in the dash. Note the lower left lantern bracket and the one on the left side window post; this was to comply with Michigan regulations.

Modifications during service included:

1. The couplers were changed to Tomlinson M.C.B. type with regular knuckles (c1910?), later (by 1925) to the larger knuckles.
2. Angled "dasher" panels over the bumpers were eliminated (c1910?).
3. Anti-climbers were added (c1910?).
4. The arched end windows were squared off.
5. Addition of sign boxes.
6. Addition of right side mirror.
7. Addition of exterior under-floor platform lights ("ditch lights"), c.1937.
8. At some point, on this car the original Niles pocket doors were replaced with ordinary hinged doors or removed, but this probably happened after service ended. The 151 still has one of its pocket doors in place.

The motorman's position at the center window, looking through the open bulkhead door.

The following pictures were provided by Dennis Lamont and may not be reproduced without permission.
This is car 159 looking towards the front. You can see the controller at the front. The smoking compartment is not very big, so its bulkhead is near the front. To the left is the open door to the heater compartment, which was lined with sheet metal. Although these were single-ended cars, they had walkover seats.

This is a view of car 151, looking towards the rear. Nice closeup of the seats! The body of this car is still in existence; it was used as a workshop and storeroom for many years on Paul Eckler's farm, and was well maintained.




This is car 149 looking towards the rear. At the back, we can see the toilet compartment on the right side. At the top of the wall is a screened opening for ventilation. This car was lengthened by the LSE in 1923, and its body also still survives.




This inventory sheet from the LSE gives details on the car's equipment: WH-121A motors, GE C36A controllers, D2-EG compressor, etc.



Dennis Lamont collection

This is Paul Eckler, who after the end of service acquired the 151 and had it on his farm as a workshop for many years.

A nice drawing of this series of cars, probably prepared for modeling use, drawn in 1961 by Fritz Hardendorf.

IRM collection

151 at Beach Park shops.

CONDITIONS IN SERVICE

The Lake Shore Electric was fairly typical of interurban lines in the Midwest. In contrast with the lines radiating out of Chicago, which adapted over time to become primarily commuter carriers, the LSE always subsisted on intercity passenger traffic. The main line ran from Cleveland to Toledo, with through service continuing over the Detroit United to Detroit. Much of the passenger traffic carried by the railroad was local traffic to towns along the line: Lorain, Elyria, Vermilion, Norwalk, Bellevue, Fremont, and Sandusky, where the railroad's main shops were.

For many years the LSE ran through trains in cooperation with other interurban lines, mainly to Detroit via the Detroit United, and to Lima via the Western Ohio. Many of these trains would use one car from each line, so the LSE car would be MU'd with a DUR car, for instance. Another unusual aspect is that there were two routes between Ceylon Junction and Fremont, as you can see from the map. So a westbound two-car train would be split at Ceylon Jct., and the two would take different routes to Fremont, where they were joined together again.

One of the earlier interurban systems, the LSE was not a very high-speed operation. The interurban cars were not geared for high speeds such as those seen on the CA&E. Car 150 would have seen extensive low-speed operation down city streets, including access to the city centers of Cleveland, Toledo and Detroit, as those cities lacked a rapid transit network that could be used by the interurban lines. The limited trains between Toledo and Cleveland generally took a little over four hours. (You can now drive this on the interstate in less than two hours.) Times varied over the years; the fastest schedule ever attempted took 3 hours and 45 minutes, but that didn't last long. A limited from Cleveland to Detroit was carded for six hours.

Much of the LSE's business came from local traffic. There were over 310 designated stops on the main line, about three per mile. Most of these were little-used flag stops, but a local car was required to stop at any of them.

By the late 1920's automobile competition was increasingly affecting the business of interurban lines like the LSE, and the railroad saw freight traffic as one way to offset these losses. Freight business was emphasized and more freight motors and freight trailers (like LSE 810, now preserved at IRM) were acquired. Some coaches like car 150 were even rebuilt as freight motors, and two of these have been preserved. The limits of the railroad's infrastructure, though, severely limited the effectiveness of these efforts. Tight-radius curves on city streets precluded the haulage of railroad freight cars and circuitous routes slowed down service. As passenger traffic continued to fall during the Depression, the victim of a poor economy combined with better roads and more automobiles, the LSE could not compete. In May 1938 service was abandoned.

ADAPTIVE REUSE

As mentioned before, when the Lake Shore Electric abandoned passenger service in 1938, many of the carbodies were sold for adaptive reuse. The body of car 150 became a house in Milan, Ohio, from 1938 to 1964. It was then moved to Fostoria and used as a house there by James Jencks from 1964 to 1977.

Photo by Tom Hunter

In May 1977 it was moved to the Station Square complex in downtown Pittsburgh, and modified for use as a flower shop. There it was placed on trucks from Chicago 4000's purchased from IRM.




In 2000 when the station complex was being redeveloped, the 150 was sold to the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum which immediately resold the body to IRM. It was then moved to Union in October 2000, placed on another set of CTA 4000 trucks, and put on indoor display.

(Photos by Scott Becker)

In 2005-2006 it was partially repainted in LSE colors, some window repair work was done, and an anchor casting was fabricated and installed under the rear platform. Other than this, no significant restoration work has been performed. For current pictures of the car's interior, go here.

Click here for an illustrated history of car 150's time on the Lake Shore Electric by Art Peterson.

APPENDIX A
PRESERVED L.S.E.Ry. EQUIPMENT

All equipment listed is missing its original trucks and electric control equipment.

• #7 - wood coach, built 1900 by Barney & Smith, sold for use as a backyard storage shed after abandonment, now at Buckeye Lake.
• 
  
• #38 - steel freight motor, built 1920 by L.S.E., made into a hunting cabin after abandonment, most recently put on display at a shopping center in Avon Lake, OH

• #39 - steel freight motor, built 1920 by L.S.E., adapted for unknown use (likely storage shed) after abandonment, in private ownership.

• #42 - wood freight motor, built 1907 by Niles as coach 141 (identical to 150) and rebuilt by the L.S.E. for freight service in 1929, used as a storage shed east of Sandusky after abandonment, preserved at the Northern Ohio Railway Museum (NORM). Picture here.

• #46 - wood freight motor, built 1906 by Niles as coach 152 (identical to 150) and rebuilt by the L.S.E. for freight service in 1929, adapted for unknown reuse (likely storage or dwelling) after abandonment, preserved at the Mad River & NKP Railroad Museum in Belleview.

• #149 - wood coach, built 1907 by Niles as coach 141 (identical to 150), body lengthened by L.S.E. in 1923, adapted for unknown use (likely storage or dwelling) after abandonment, purchased for preservation in 1965, now at NORM. Picture here.

• #151 - wood coach, built 1906 by Niles (identical to 150), sold for use as a backyard storage shed after abandonment, now at NORM. Picture here.

• #167 - steel coach, built 1915 by Jewett, adapted for use as a summer cottage near Vermilion after abandonment, purchased for preservation in 1962, now in private ownership in fair condition. Picture here.

• #174 - steel coach, built 1918 by Jewett, sold for use as a dwelling south of Vermilion after abandonment, acquired 1996 by The Works in Newark, O. and cosmetically restored. Picture here.

• #181 - steel coach, built 1918 by Jewett, adapted for use as a cottage west of Vermilion following abandonment, acquired 1985 by NORM. Picture here.

• #464 - wood freight trailer, built 1919 by L.S.E., adapted for use as a pig pen after abandonment, acquired 1979 by NORM. Picture here.

• #810 - wood freight trailer, built 1924 by Kuhlman, purchased from Michigan Electric 1630 in 1929, used as an agricultural shed following abandonment, acquired 1984 by IRM and completely restored. Pictures here.

• #C - wood snow sweeper, built 1910 by McGuire-Cummings, adapted for unknown use (likely storage shed) after abandonment, currently in private ownership. Picture here.

Niles's Finest

Niles's Finest: Lake Shore Electric 150

by Art Peterson

All photos are from the Krambles-Peterson Archive and may not be reproduced without permission

Headline image: Cars 150 and 155 sit on the siding at the LSE Cleveland station in this undated view.  Car 150 is signed for Beach Park, about 20 miles west of Cleveland.  This had been a major attraction for LSE riders in pre-auto days.  As a reflection of its importance to the railway, a two-track storage barn, along with a single-track inspection barn was located here.  The car also has its storm windows fitted, as well as a “rear view mirror” visible on the nearest corner post.  The metal fender was a Detroit requirement, dating from the through-operation of these cars to/from the Motor City.

The Lake Shore Electric (LSE) was the creation of Cleveland’s Everett-Moore financial syndicate, a consolidation of four companies dating to August 29, 1901.  LSE served the populous Cleveland-Toledo area of Ohio, with significant access to the Lake Erie beaches and other recreational havens.  The original alignment hugged the lake shore for 45 miles from Cleveland west to Ceylon Junction and then dipped inland to serve Norwalk, Bellevue, Fremont, and Woodville on its way to Toledo.  On July 21,1907, LSE opened the Sandusky-Fremont direct line, which not only increased the miles of line along the lake front, but also shortened the Cleveland-Toledo mileage by about five miles while shaving 30 minutes off the end-to-end running time.

With an expanding traffic base, as well as more miles of line to run, LSE turned to the Niles Car & Manufacturing Company for a batch of 10 straight coaches numbered between 150 and 159.  The order was placed in December 1905 and the first of these cars arrived on the property on May 28, 1906, with all 10 received by mid-June of that year.  These cars had classic wood car architecture, with arched end windows, curved upper sash windows, and a railroad roof.  The cars were also equipped for multiple-unit (MU) operation, which was not the norm for interurbans of the day.  As it happened, LSE was prohibited from running multiple-car trains within the Cleveland and Toledo city limits at the time.

This unidentified LSE Niles coach will have to stand in for the as-built appearance of IRM’s car 150.  In 1910, LSE had grown to 145.5 first track miles, along with 19.4 miles of second track.  A total of 534 employees worked for LSE, with 278 of these engaged in providing transportation.  The Niles cars were equipped with GE Type M MU control and used C36 master controllers.  Four Westinghouse No. 121 motors, each producing 85 HP, were used on the 150-series cars.  LSE would begin MU service with the Niles cars during 1910, outside the limits of Cleveland and Toledo.  This photo shows the original Van Dorn couplers, which were later superseded by heavier-duty MCB couplers.

Niles had a reputation for turning out fine-looking wood cars, including their “Electric Pullmans” for Oregon Electric and the Washington Baltimore & Annapolis (among others), as well as multiple orders for the Chicago Aurora & Elgin.  Like the CA&E, LSE must have liked what Niles produced, for in 1907 they went back for another 15 cars, this time including five combines and 10 coaches.  With the second order on the property, LSE now had 19 straight coaches (car 152 was an early casualty) and the five combines.

From 1912, having resolved their multiple-car train issues with Cleveland and Toledo, LSE and Detroit United (DUR) were now running multiple-car Cleveland-Detroit trains, using cars from both lines in-train.  DUR had also turned to Niles for cars and, in four orders between 1912 and 1915, amassed a fleet of 24 coaches.  By 1915, LSE was carrying 5.2 million passengers annually.  A 1927 survey of the property found that LSE rostered 187 cars, with an average age of 10 years.  LSE had turned to Jewett for its steel-bodied (but still truss-rod-equipped) cars, buying three each in 1915 and 1917, followed by a nine-car order in 1918.  The steel cars took over the premiere runs on the system, though there were still plenty of assignments for the older cars to handle.  This survey was done around the time that Cities Service purchased control of the LSE from the Everett-Moore Syndicate on March 23, 1927.

Coincidentally, 1927 was the first year that the LSE interurban operations posted a deficit.  Sadly, this situation would not change through the end of interurban operations in 1938.  During both 1932 and 1933, LSE’s deficits reached $500,000.  In 1932, LSE defaulted on its interest payments and was forced into bankruptcy.  Frederick Coen, the long-serving Vice President and General Manager of the railway, was appointed as receiver. 

LSE car 150 presented this appearance later in its life.  Most of the older LSE cars maintained a respectable look up to the end of service.  End windows had been squared, the electric markers above the front-end windows had been removed, and Tomlinson MCB knuckle-type couplers were installed on these cars.  The electric coupler was a model DA-82-B for the control circuits and a model DA-35-E for the bus line.  This shot manages to capture the glow of the 23-watt interior lights in the clerestory windows.  We are indebted to the LSE’s “Car Inventory Record” sheets for recording the interior light bulb wattage.

The interior of car 149 from the 1907 order will have to suffice for the appearance of the 150-series of cars.  Coaches from both Niles orders seated 52 and were finished in cherry wood with inlaid white holly borders.  Black leather-covered seats from Hale & Kilburn were provided.  Also evident is the partial Empire ceiling used on the Niles cars, where the carlines are arched, but the alcoves for the clerestory windows are simply squared off.  A car with a full Empire ceiling would have had arched clerestory window alcoves following the curve of those windows.

Car 150 is facing west on State Street near Arch Street in Fremont on August 16, 1936.  Fremont was 84 miles from Cleveland and was west of Sandusky Junction where the original line and the direct line re-joined to run on to Toledo.  Behind the car is the Hotel Fremont.  The earliest parts of this hotel dated to the Croghan House of the 1840s.  Sadly, the Hotel Fremont was destroyed by fire in March 1981.  The town of Fremont dates to the 1849 renaming of Lower Sandusky in honor of the man who secured California for the US. Credit Ralph Perkin for this atmospheric shot.

Throughout the early 30s, as its connecting traction lines succumbed, LSE was steadily declining in terms of both freight and passenger traffic.  As recently as 1929, freight traffic on the LSE had accounted for 48% of the line’s gross revenue.  LSE freight handlers went on strike on May 15, 1937.  Management responded by immediately ending all LSE freight service.  All of LSE’s physical property was sold to Toledo Edison in March of 1938.  The cars were never relettered to reflect the new owner, running with the LSE name on them until the last day on May 15, 1938.

Ralph Perkin also took this shot of one of the 1915 Jewett steel cars working a direct line Express trip connecting with the 150, ready to head to Norwalk on the old line.  This photo was taken on April 17, 1937.  An express could get you to Ceylon Junction in 1 hour, 35 minutes.  LSE’s Limiteds were three minutes faster than the expresses, equating to an average speed of 29.1 mph.  A local on the mainline required 1 hour, 50 minutes for the 45.1-mile trip.  Through trips were still being run on the old line.  From November 15, 1937, service on the original line would be interrupted at Bellevue (west of Norwalk).

After LSE (TE) disposed of the rolling stock during 1938, car 150 became a house in Milan, OH.  It remained there until 1964, when it was moved to Fostoria, OH.  It continued in use as a dwelling until 1977, when it was bought and moved to Station Square in Pittsburgh.  In this guise, it sat on a pair of CTA 4000-series Baldwin trucks acquired from IRM.  At Station Square, LSE 150 was displayed along with an ex-Brooklyn semi-convertible car shell.  For a while, car 150 was used as a flower shop.  In 2000, the former P&LE station was redeveloped, at which time car 150 was sold to the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum.  They resold the body to IRM and ended up trading the 4000-series trucks to a museum near Rochester.  Car 150 has been on display at IRM since its arrival in Union in late 2000 and was repainted in LSE colors during 2005-06.

We'd like to extend our sincere thanks to Art Peterson for writing this article and sourcing these wonderful images of car 150 in service. For more information on car 150, read our 2012 write-up about the car here. Frank Hicks helped with editing for this article.

The Wolfersheim Photo Collection

 Gregg Wolfersheim has allowed us to post these pictures from a trip which he took in 1971. We'll visit the Ohio Railway Museum at Worthington, the Indiana Railway Museum at Westport, and the Brookins collection at North Olmsted.

 These pictures are copyrighted by the photographer and may not be reproduced without permission.

Ohio Railway Museum

At that time the museum had an operating steam locomotive and several restored electric cars which were operated regularly.  

 

(L) Norfolk & Western 578 is a beautiful Pacific, and was pulling a good-sized heavyweight train.  (R) IT double-end PCC 450.

Views of the steam train.  At least one of these cars was occasionally used in RPO service, picking up and dropping mail bags.

(R) North Shore Brill 154.

(L) This cab-on-flat locomotive from Columbus is now at Arden.  (R) This interurban parlor car from the Columbus, Delaware and Marion had just been restored from chicken-coop status.   It has since deteriorated.

(L) Toledo Port Clinton and Lakeside #21 was a 1904 Niles combine, an excellent example of Midwest interurban design.  It was probably also the first interurban car to be selected for preservation, back in 1939.

(R) For many years there was an open-sided homemade shed, as seen here, but it deteriorated and was removed several years ago.

(L) This home-built steeplecab from Columbus is the last operating piece of electric equipment, we believe.  (R) The IT PCC passes the Detroit Peter Witt, 3876, which is now at Seashore.  IRM has an identical unit.

(L) The C&LE Red Devil was nicely restored and operated for several years.

We're not sure what happened to these streamlined cars.  They're certainly long gone.

Indiana Railway Museum at Westport

This museum later moved to French Lick, Indiana.

While at Westport, passenger service was provided by a saddle-tanker pulling this car, CA&E 318.

 (R) This appears to be the top level of the Westport interlocking tower.

(L) And this is the locomotive that pulled the 318.  It's now on display at French Lick.

 North Olmsted

In the early days of the Brookins collection at the trailer park in North Olmsted, there were several pieces of equipment lying around that were not part of the permanent collection.  Gerry later decided to clean the site up and these were either moved, mostly to Ronnie Jedlicka's farm at Buckeye Lake, or scrapped.

Lake Shore Electric snow sweeper "C", a 1910 McGuire-Cummings originally built for Michigan Railways which is now at Buckeye Lake.  It's the only "preserved" piece of non-revenue equipment from the LSE.

I believe this is the body of Lake Shore Electric #7, a 1900 Barney and Smith interurban, and the oldest preserved LSE body.  What's left of it is now at Buckeye Lake.

A couple of buses.  Behind the one on the left is Cleveland Southwestern & Columbus #121, an interurban body now at Buckeye Lake.

The body of NOT&L 1510 was acquired by NORM and is now at the Chippewa Lake site, if it hasn't already been scrapped.

 This is one of the Fox River cars; I'm going to guess that it's the 302, which was scrapped at North Olmsted about 1985.

The two Centerville, Albia and Southern box motors, 100 and 101.  These were part of the Trolleyville collection; the 100 was scrapped and the 101 went to Warehouse Point in 2009.

 

The one in the foreground is 101 and the 100 is in the background.  By the 1990s the 100, which was stored outside, had deteriorated considerably.

This Cleveland center-entrance trailer went to Seashore.

This car from the Fostoria and Fremont was also part of Ron Jedlicka's collection.  A more recent view can be seen here. 

And this is the brand-new station building at the west loop.  It may still be standing; does anybody know?  Since the trailer park is now a gated community, you can't just wander around as in the old days.