Simms Collection -- Iowa Miscellany

 CHARLES CITY WESTERN

Charles City Western #50

CLINTON DAVENPORT & MUSCATINE

CD&M  34

DES MOINES & CENTRAL IOWA

DM & CI RR
#1807 Elec. locomotive
At Des Moines, Ia.
Taken Sept. 1937
PRINT FROM Edward Frank, Jr.

DM&CI 1708
McGuire-Cummings
Spring 1935
x "Ohm" or "Ampere" from
Gary South Bend & Chicago RR

DM&CI 1705
Snow Storm
February 1938

DM&CI #1712
ex-LSE 179    (1917 Jewett)

DM&CI #1714    ex-LSE 180

DM&CI #1714

Des Moines & Central Iowa  #1714-10-12
June 30, 1940
[RH:  All three of the LSE Jewetts]

Des Moines & Central Iowa
No. 1719 at Des Moines, Iowa

FORT DODGE DES MOINES & SOUTHERN

FD&DM 72

Friday Factory Report

I wanted to continue making new third-rail beams for the 319 in our well-equipped factory.  So the first thing to do was to go over to 8 and get exact measurements of the two beams on the south side that we need to replace.  And on the way:

Contractors are continuing to work on Barn 7, and it looks like replacement of the south wall is almost complete.  I hope they don't scare the horses. 

I really think these beams need to be made before the car is used in service again.  I purchased the wood last time, and mortised out the slots and glued the four halves together.  Here's what they look like after removing the clamps.

I then used the measurements I'd taken to mark everything on the beams that needs to be done.  I cut them to length, cut out the diagonal notches, marked all the holes, and then drilled them.  After you do this often enough it's like clockwork, and mistakes are a thing of the past.

Tim was the only other person there today, and he was working out in the barn on the 268.  He's accomplishing a lot, but I didn't want to spend any time getting in his way.  But the vestibules of the car are lighted, and they look a lot better than when I saw them last, I think:

This is the west vestibule.  With nice mood lighting, it looks quite sophisticated.

And here's the east end.  In any case, this car is going to be the envy of the rest of us when it gets done.

Meanwhile, by early afternoon all of the woodwork on the two beams was finished, and I was able to put a first coat of primer on eight of the nine sides of each beam.  (Each beam is an irregular nonahedron with several holes.  Not up to Euclidean standards, but historically accurate.)

Once the beams currently mounted on the 319 are brought over to 4, I will be able to reassemble the parts on the new ones, and we'll be ready for service.

Simms Collection -- Waterloo Cedar Falls & Northern

WATERLOO CEDAR FALLS & NORTHERN

The captions are usually taken verbatim from the prints.

Waterloo Cedar Falls & Northern #32,
on Waterloo turn table, 1912

WCF&N #33

(RH: McGuire-Cummings builder's photo
WCF&N #80)

Waterloo Cedar Falls & Northern
#100 Heavy Int. on street at Cedar
Rapids, Iowa    7/22/39

Single end
Two Man
Color: Red & Yellow

WCF&N #101

WCF&N #101

WCF&N #102

WCF&N #142

Simms Collection -- Crandic

The Simms Iowa collection covers most of the Iowa interurbans.  We'll start with the Crandic.

All captions are taken from the prints unless otherwise noted.  Most of them are from a fan trip in 1939 using car 109.  

Iowa City    May 29 1939     WCJ

Regular Pass. meets the
109 we didn't have the face
scorching meets we had on the
Indiana RR.  These boys really do
a good job of railroading

[RH: Regular car is 117]

[Also, I am guessing that "face scorching meets" means that on the Indiana RR the extra would pull into the siding, and the regular car would fly by at full speed.  On the Crandic they evidently had time to stop and say hello!]

This was taken on our fan trip on
the Crandic.  I don't know the name
of the station.

[Coralville, Ia.  --  see first comment below]

We stopped at this substation
so that the M. M. could cut
it in.  A storm from the night
before had knocked it out.

extra 109 goes in the hole
for a freight.  The crandic has
some cabooses but they never use
them.  I don't blame them either they
sure are off the list.  They use
a three man crew, so they really
don't need 'em.

Crandic #51
Cedar Rapids    July 1939

Cedar Rapids   May '43   (GK)

Tuesday Report

Tuesday was another busy day in the car shop, and I have a few pictures.  

As mentioned last time, two of the third rail beams on the 319 need to be replaced.  If one of them were to break in half in service, it could be disastrous.  I went to Owl and got the wood for two more beams this morning, and brought them out to the Museum for cutting, planing, and gluing. 

 Here we see the two halves of a beam being notched for the sleet scraper.

And by the way, Steve Keller joins the illustrious ranks of our photography pool:

Finally, they were glued and clamped.

Meanwhile, several of the guys continued work on the 306.  I believe we have here Gerry and Steve installing piping and the gong.

Tim and Frank K. were working on L car parts, and Jack on the 109, but I don't have any pictures.  Just too busy.

Work is progressing on Barn 7.  Name those cars!

Finally, Ron Seavers was running the 431 as a one-man car all day.  That's not ideal; it would be good to have a two-man crew for an interurban car like this.  We always need people to sign up for weekday service.

The Horn Blows at Midnight

Frank writes...

To echo what my father wrote, Sunday of Memorial Day Weekend was a terrific day on the railroad, and a good time was had by all.

But the festivities didn't end when the CA&E train went back to the barn! The aptly named "second shift" crew was just getting started. First off was a cookout. Many thanks to Joel, the founder of the feast, and Richard, who did the grilling; below is a shot of some of the gang gathered around the grill in the car shop parking lot.

While this was happening, a car that hasn't been seen out and about much recently was doing test trips on the streetcar line. Sand Springs 68, which has been out of revenue service due to air leaks and a few minor miscellaneous issues, was being worked on by Brian and some of the other guys during the day. The below photo was taken by Zach of one of the test trips.

It's good to see the 68 out again! It will need more work before it's ready for prime time, but the guys are on it, and we fully intend to have it back in revenue operation once volunteer time and resources permit. I snapped the below photo after dinner of another "only at IRM" scene, with our 1918 lightweight interurban car in the foreground and our SD70MAC in the background.

Several of the guys spent the evening working on the CTA 2600s, but for a bunch of us, the priority was Shaker Heights 18. You may recall that the last time the car was in service, in September 2024, a problem cropped up: the car was climbing the frog at the South Junction switch. This issue kept the car out of service all through 2025. Fortunately, though, our friends in the Track Department had a few ideas for possible fixes.

The first idea, trying to tighten the guardrail on the inside rail, was taken care of by Mark and the track guys last week. Thank you!! So, Zach took the lead on bringing the 18 out of the barn after dinner for a test trip, as shown above.

Good news, the car is no longer climbing the frog. However, the wheels are just far enough to the outside of the curve that the flanges are striking the point of the frog and being "kicked" over slightly. That's not ideal. So, the next suggestion of the track guys was to put grease cookies in the car's center bearings to help the trucks swing more freely. This was done alongside Barn 2, so we could place the jacks at tie level (the jacks themselves are too tall to lift the car from railhead height). A huge thank you goes out to Zach, Brian, Steven, Scott, Ashtin, Will, Joel, and everyone who helped with this!

Here's Zach using one of the motor inspection hatches to insert grease cookies into the center bearings...

...and yours truly, in a photo taken by Zach. This job went on past the fall of night, and when complete we took the car out for another test trip or two. We may need to make some further adjustments, but we are hopeful that the 18 will be back carrying passengers - on occasion, at least - at IRM before too long.

Mikey helped put the car back in the barn with me; I snapped the above photo of the 18 on the tail track before it went to bed. Thanks again to everyone who helped, especially Zach, who kept things moving forward late into the evening! It was really nice to see the 18 back out on the car line for the first time in a while.