The Museum has taken delivery on a wooden reefer, as seen here. Frank's detective work suggests that this is FGEX (Fruit Grower's Express) #55407, renumbered from (perhaps) 356932, built in 1924. Here is a link to pictures of an identical car which has been beautifully restored and put on display at the California State Railroad Museum. As you will note, our car badly needs paint, but it appears to be in fairly good condition for a wooden car of this vintage.
The "Silver Dome" adds a nice touch, you must admit, something the CSRM car is missing.
Remember, you read it here first!
No poling pockets. Kind of interesting for a car of that vintage.
ReplyDeleteThat's a good point. I hadn't noticed that. The CSRM car is the same, though, so it's probably correct. Maybe the idea is that these reefers were typically kept in fairly long blocks, and you wouldn't try poling a long set of cars. Wouldn't they generally be poling just a single car at a time?
ReplyDeleteOh, please tell, where did the reefer last come from?
ReplyDeleteThanks...
It came from the Mad River and NKP museum in Bellevue, Ohio, which had it listed as #35932. It appears it was later rebuilt and renumbered #55407, which is consistent with the info on the modeler's website. But our investigation is continuing, I guess.
ReplyDelete