Starting on the 460

 As promised, the next big project will be replacing the roof on CA&E 460 (not to be confused with CSL 460!)  It's now in the roof booth, as shown recently by Frank.  And this gives us a good opportunity to start with a visual inspection of the status of the roof.  From the ground it may not be obvious that anything is wrong.  We'll start at the #1 end, which is east.

Aha, I see that vandals have already been at work, ripping back parts of the canvas.  Well, I guess that fixes it -- now I have no choice but to go ahead and rip it all off.  Shucks.

 There are two layers of canvas on this car, and I'll talk more about that later.  Anyway, this is the #1 end, and it is relatively good.  There are occasional places where patching has taken place.

But at the #2 end, the trolley pole was removed at Cleveland, and a pantograph installed so the 460 could run on the Greater Cleveland RTA.  That didn't work very well, and when the car arrived at IRM in 2010, new trolley boards were installed in a hurry so the car could be operated.  You can see that they have warped, and need to be replaced.  You can also see some of the little wooden supports for the pantograph.  

This is also the end where there was hole punched in the roof at Trolleyville.  I patched this hole up back in 2016, but I will want to recheck it now that we're replacing all the canvas.

And here are the fuse box and lightning arrestor, both rather worn.

Underneath the canvas, the roof structure looks quite good... so far.

So I started removing all the apparatus from the roof.  Pete helped me lock down the bases, so I could remove the poles.  They were then carefully stored in the scaffolding.

After a couple of hours of work, I had removed the poles, the bases, the horns, the fuse box and arrestor.

Here we see a view of the trolley boards with everything removed.   Fritz and Lorne later helped me carefully lift the bases down off the roof, onto the platform.

For most of the day, Pete and Fritz were working on painting various parts of the 160.  And Lorne was working on the PCC truck in the Lean-3.

After a couple more hours, the trolley boards are gone at the west end of the car, along with the annoying little wedges for the pantograph support.  There are two ventilators at this end because there's a washroom, which the 451 and 453 lacked.

By the way, at the other end there's now a gap, and we may notice that the 714 is over the pit for inspection.

Then I continued by removing the horn guards and baffles.

Then we can remove some more canvas.  Tearing it off is pretty easy, getting rid of it all is the hard part.  The lower (original) layer is pretty brittle and rips apart easily, but in many places it's either tacked down or melted onto the wood, so that makes it harder to remove.  The outer layer is not fastened down except at the tack moldings, but it's much harder to rip apart.  Anyway, this is a good outlet for one's anger and frustration, for a limited time only.

I think the tack molding will be in good enough condition to be fortified with epoxy and reused, but we'll see as we go along.  For the first day's work, this went pretty well.

Finally, I noticed that there were a couple of contractors working on the roof of the North Western building, so progress has evidently resumed.

And of course there were several other things going on at IRM.  There always are!

Sterling Dixon & Eastern

Sterling Dixon & Eastern

by Stephen M. Scalzo

Headline image: SD&E interurban car 22 is depicted in this photo, probably taken when it was new around 1904. The line's interurban cars bore a striking resemblance to the 300- and 400-series cars being built at the same time for the Milwaukee streetcar system, which shared a president with the SD&E. The sign on the car's dash reads "[illegible] car for Dixon" so this location may be in Sterling. All photos from the Stephen M. Scalzo Collection of the Illinois Railway Museum.

Sterling and Dixon are located in the northwestern part of Illinois, along the Rock River. Dixon lies 13 miles east of Sterling, and each town had a population of 10,000 in 1900. Both cities are located in the heart of the "corn belt" and have a rich surrounding farming district. Both cities had many large manufacturing establishments. Good water power was furnished in both cities from dams on the river.

The Rock River Street Railway was established in 1884, and in August 1886 received a franchise for a 3.75-mile route; however, nothing was ever built and the franchise was cancelled in 1892. The Sterling, Rock River & Mineral Spring Railway was incorporated on May 1, 1888, but never built anything.

The Sterling Gas & Electric Company was incorporated early in 1889, but the franchise it received was transferred to the Street Railway of Sterling & Rock Falls, which was incorporated on September 27, 1889 with $35,000 in capital (later increased to $125,000). The company constructed trackage as far east as the city limits and constructed a frame car barn. The company contracted the Sprague Electric Railway and Motor Company to supply the electrical equipment, and four streetcars ordered from the Pullman Palace Car Company. In June 1890, the company was ordered to remove the trackage from the streets after it lost its franchise. During the later part of 1894, the company was sold at a sheriff's sale to satisfy a $2,000 judgment.

The Sterling Dixon & Eastern Railway was incorporated with $300,000 of capital on August 17, 1902. The company was backed by John I. Beggs, president of the Milwaukee transport company, and Henry C. Higgins, an experienced electric railway promoter. Both men were impressed with the rapid growth of the Sterling-Dixon area, and they felt that a railway could be built and operated profitably. The company intended to operate an interurban between Sterling and Dixon, and local streetcar service in both cities. Although Mr. Higgins was the company's first president, Mr. Beggs soon replaced him and served until 1911.

Surveying of the proposed route proceeded quickly, with a route through Prairieville and Gap Grove being chosen. Construction work on the 19-mile interurban began in 1902 by the Columbia Construction Company. After obtaining franchises from Sterling and Dixon, construction crews began laying interurban rails from Sterling in August 1903, and on November 4, the last spike was driven near Prairieville. A secondhand C&NW steam locomotive was used to construct the line. The winter of 1903-04 held up completion of the remaining ballast and adjustment work until spring. On May 10, an inspection interurban was operated over the line for dignitaries, and on May 26, 1904, regular interurban service began from the Chicago & North Western station in Dixon to the west end of 4th Street in Sterling (which was later cut back to the depot). Four interurbans and four trailers were used, with hourly service on 18 daily round trips that required a complete trip in 90 minutes. The interurban fare was 25 cents. Plans called for extension of interurban service from Dixon to Rock Island and several other cities.

Just west of Dixon, the interurban crossed a 70-foot through girder bridge; an additional two small creeks were crossed on 16-foot spans. The right-of-way paralleled a public highway for the entire distance. The interurban trackage consisted of 70-pound rail laid on cedar ties with stone ballast. For the city trackage, 60-pound T-rail was used in residential areas and 70-pound T-rail downtown. The franchises also required the company to pave its tracks in Sterling and Dixon when the city paved its streets. Girder rail was required on the Rock River Bridge at Sterling. Thirty-five-foot cedar poles were used to carry the trolley spans in the city and the brackets on the interurban; in Dixon, steel poles were used. The overhead in Sterling was from the Ohio Brass Company. In Dixon and on the interurban, the Milwaukee Electric Railway & Light Company's standard trolley fittings were used.

The Sterling brick powerhouse/car barn was located on 15th Avenue at the end of a spur from 4th Street. The powerhouse contained two 300 HP boilers, with water for boiler feed and condensing obtained from the Rock River. A Reynolds-Corliss engine then drove a 500 KW General Electric generator which supplied electricity over the distribution system. A Stanley Electric Manufacturing rotary converter, originally at the Sterling powerhouse, supplied electricity at the Dixon substation. The brick car barn contained one pit and two storage tracks, with the shop and offices located in the rear of the building.

Construction work began on the streetcar system in Sterling in November 1902. Trackage was constructed on 15th Avenue to the car barn, and on 4th Street before winter halted all work. In March, work resumed, with trackage being constructed on East 3rd Street. The first streetcar operated on May 4, 1904, and because of the large crowds attracted, one streetcar and one interurban were operated. Regular service began the following day, with two streetcars operating on a 15-minute schedule. Later a spur track was constructed on 19th Street to Mineral Springs Park, where the fairgrounds and a racetrack were located.

SD&E interurban car 21 is shown in what appears to be a builder's photo taken at the St. Louis Car Company plant.

After the SD&E received a 20-year franchise on February 13, 1903, construction began in Dixon in June, and by the end of September nearly all the trackage had been constructed. An interurban was the first equipment operated into the city on an inspection trip on May 9, 1904. On May 12, two interurbans began operating, and after a few days, streetcars took over. On May 15, the crowd of curious people required the operation of three streetcars, requiring two-man operation. However, on August 12, one-man operation became standard, with passengers dropping the five-cent fare in a farebox on the front platform. Streetcars operated every 15 minutes between 6:00 AM and 11:00 PM. The Dixon car barn was located on Madison Street next to the interurban depot, and it was originally a secondary structure containing two tracks. On April 10, 1912, the franchise was extended for 48 years.

The upper scene in this Dixon postcard shows one of the ex-Milwaukee single-truck cars turning from 1st Street onto Galena.

Freight service on the interurban began operating in June of 1904, which consisted mainly of local merchandise and milk. Platforms were constructed along the line for farmers to load and unload milk bound for the Borden plant at the northwest edge of Dixon. Mail pouches were also handled between the interurban terminals. A spur was constructed to a gravel pit near Central Park, about a mile east of Prairieville; trains operated on the line mainly to obtain ballast for the system.

In 1907, the company's office was moved to Dixon. In 1908, the Depot Avenue trackage in Dixon was extended 450 feet south to the C&NW depot. During 1909, four new streetcars were purchased to replace the older equipment. In 1911, the railway and its affiliated power companies were sold to Samuel Insull of Chicago. The interurban became an operating division of the Illinois Northern Utilities Company (INU), formed out of the merger of the Lee County Lighting Company, the Sterling Gas and Electric Company, and a number of other northwest Illinois electric companies.

Single-truck car 26 was one of four purchased in 1908 from St. Louis Car Company.

The affiliated power companies were successful, but the railway was not; the railway limped along even during its better days, making interest and small profits but not enough to cover normal depreciation. The railway barely made the principal, and made only $7,923 in its best year. In 1912, a new streetcar was purchased. By 1913, the running time of the interurban was reduced to 45 minutes between the two terminals [sic]. In 1915, the parent company built a line on Crawford Avenue from East Fellows Street to the Epileptic Colony located two miles north of Dixon, with hourly service commencing on July 10 (service was later reduced to three daily trips).

Interurban car 22 is turning from 1st Street onto Galena in Dixon in this photo taken between 1904 and 1914. Car 22 was sold to Freeport in 1914.

Revenues began to fall in 1917. In 1918, the company petitioned the Public Utility Commission for a six-cent fare in Dixon and Sterling, a 10-cent fare between Dixon and the State Epileptic Colony, and a 30-cent fare between Dixon and Sterling. By 1920, the interurban travel time became one hour. After completion of concrete work on Lincoln Highway in 1920 and the increased use of the private automobile, revenue plunged rapidly. Local streetcar fares were increased to eight cents on August 13, 1920.

Interurban car 104 was unique on the SD&E. It was also nearly identical to Fox & Illinois Union cars 100 and 102, built at the same time, and may have been intended for that line, which would explain why its number fell outside any SD&E number series when it was delivered.

In an attempt to improve service, the interurban tracks were rehabilitated and the Sterling city trackage was reconstructed during 1922. Two single-truck Birney streetcars were purchased in 1922 in an attempt to improve service and pacify the city council in Sterling. In 1924, the company built a new office building and depot on the old Dixon car barn site, and constructed a new car barn nearby. That car barn was used only one year before it became the major repair facility for the railway in 1925.

This view, looking north on Galena Avenue in Dixon from 1st Street, shows an interurban car bound for Sterling about to proceed across the Rock River Bridge in the left background.

Earnings of the company declined from a 1920 peak of $73,633 to $43,054 (negative $21,921) in 1924, with ridership dropping from a 1911 peak of 865,408 to 23,196 (34% from Dixon, 42% from Sterling, and 23% from the interurban) in 1924. By 1924, operating costs were twice those of 1912, with a third as many passengers. Service in Dixon was reduced to 20 minutes. The company applied to the Illinois Commerce Commission to abandon all service in July of 1925. After a hearing in Dixon, permission was granted on September 17 for the company to end service. All interurban and streetcar service stopped on October 5, with buses of the Northern Illinois Service Corporation taking over between Sterling and Dixon. All trackage and overhead was soon dismantled for scrap, and the equipment scrapped, with the INU retaining the interurban right-of-way for its transmission line to Sterling. The two Birney streetcars were transferred to Freeport for further use.

This article was edited and laid out by Frank Hicks. Thanks to Ray and Julie Piesciuk and to Richard Schauer for making available the materials from the Stephen Scalzo Collection that were used to publish this history.

Equipment Roster

Cars 11-15 - single-truck deck-roof city cars, built 1893 by Pullman (ord#768), Brill 21 truck, 2 x Edison 14 motors, K-control, hand brakes, 24 seats, purchased 1904 secondhand from Milwaukee, scrapped c1910

Car 16 - single-truck deck-roof city car, identical to cars 11-15, purchased 1906 secondhand from Milwaukee, scrapped c1910

Car 17 - single-truck deck-roof city car, identical to cars 11-16, purchased c1906 secondhand from Milwaukee, renumbered 29 c1909

Cars 21-24 - double-truck deck-roof interurban cars, built 1903 by St. Louis Car Company (ord#418), STL 23AE trucks, 4 x GE 70 motors, K-6 control, Christiansen air brakes, 44 seats - car 22 sold to Freeport in 1914; cars 21 and 23-24 renumbered in 1917 to 101-103; car 102 sold to Freeport in 1922 and renumbered 27

Cars 25-28 - single-truck deck-roof city cars, built 1908 by St. Louis Car Company (ord#799), St. Louis 46 truck, 2 x GE 78A motors, K-10 control, 30 seats

(Car 29 - see Car 17)

Car 30 - double-truck arch-roof combination freight motor and snow sweeper, built 1912 by McGuire-Cummings, McG-C 10A trucks, 4 x GE 70 motors, K-6 control

Cars 31-32 - single-truck open streetcar trailers, purchased 1904, likely secondhand, likely retired by c1910

Cars 33-36 - double-truck open suburban/interurban trailers, built by St. Louis Car Company, purchased 1904, likely secondhand, likely retired by c1910

Car 31 - single-truck arch-roof city car, built 1912 by McGuire-Cummings, McG-C A1 truck, 2 x GE 78A motors, K-10 control, 30 seats

Cars 32-33 - single-truck arch-roof Birney cars, built 1921 by Cincinnati Car Company (ord#2480), Cincinnati 139 truck, 2 x GE 264 motors, K-63BR control, 32 seats - sold to Freeport in 1925 and renumbered 28-29

Car 94 - double-truck freight/utility car, built 1896 by St. Louis Car Company, purchased secondhand in 1904, StL trucks, 4 x WH 38B motors, K-10 control, retired c1912

Car 104 - double-truck arch-roof interurban combine, built 1912 by McGuire-Cummings, McG-C 20A trucks, 4 x GE 70 motors, K-34 control, 44 seats

Route Map

Click here for a route map of the SD&E

Note that the exact alignment and termini of some local car lines is not absolutely certain

1910 Sanborn Fire Insurance map of the SD&E car barn, repair shop, waiting room, and office building at the north/northeast corner of Madison and 1st in Dixon.

1910 Sanborn Fire Insurance map of the SD&E car barn and powerhouse/substation (separate buildings) along the river in Sterling between 14th and 15th Avenues.

Click here to return to the Scalzo Historical Collection index

Signs of Mystery

Recently we posted a picture of a Rapid Transit sign, which we thought might have been at Marshall Field's in the Loop, but now we're not sure.  Bill Wulfert sends along the following images, with his comments:

I found this - not our sign - on the WTTW site. Looks like the NSL tubes are gone, but the clothing looks pre-1963 to me. Looked up CTA fares:  20 cents in 1952, increased to 25 cents in 1957.

Here is the Carson's connection.  The Smithsonian got the platform sign for Carson's.

I think this might be State-Van Buren.  Both Goldblatt's and Sears had connections.  This CERTAINLY is NOT Marshall Field's.  It looks dumpy, with a "Clearance" sign - how low class!

So we're still wondering where this sign, now at IRM, came from:

Spring Forward

Frank writes...

Sunday was a beautiful early spring day, sunny and with a high around 50 degrees. The car shop was pretty busy. When I first arrived, I was greeted by a hole in the middle of Barn 4 where until recently our CTA steeplecab had lived.

The gap on track 42 allowed this nice view of the end of the 460, now in the "roof booth." Shortly after I snapped this, Joel and a pair of new volunteers reassembled the scaffold at this end of the 460 so that roof work can commence. Some track work at this end of Barn 4 is planned for later in 2022, so at some point the scaffold will need to be re-disassembled so that Michigan Electric 28 can be extracted from the east end of the barn, but for now the roof booth is back in business.

After a little bit of Bondo application on the 18 over in Barn 7 (not very photogenic) I got back to work on sanding windows on the 415. I've got a few more left to do but this little part of the project is nearly complete. Nick, who has likely put more time into the 415 repainting project than anyone else, was working on patching some wood in the end of the car prior to reaffixing the angled dasher.

After that, and a trip over to the bus garage to pick up another Scalzo history file (stay tuned!), it was back to work on Shaker Heights windows. One of the windows I removed last week needed some extra epoxy application, so those windows will wait a week before getting primed. But two other windows, shown here, received a coat of Bankers Cream and are now ready to go back into the car. Once the four windows currently in the shop are reinstalled, there will only be one "standard" window on the door side (plus the stationary window between the doors) left to repaint.

And at the end of the day I attacked the 36's air compressor cradle with a paint brush, so the cradle is now all in black paint and ready to be reunited with the compressor itself. Note to self: some of the bolts on this cradle need to be tightened.

So what else is happening? Well first, Zach took the 714 out for a test trip around the streetcar line. I grabbed the above photo of him in the cab of the car in Yard 6, and the below photos he took during the trip. The car really does look RIGHT with its lobster traps back in place. Below photos by Zach Ehlers.

And here's an in-service shot of the 714 in 1950 at Harrison Shops, courtesy of Scott Greig:

And what else was going on? Joel was sorting parts, and I briefly helped him take some stuff over to one of our storage areas. Later in the day, Greg and Nick worked on repairing one of the air hoses connecting two of the cars on the Electroliner. These units consist of two air hoses flanking a short U-shaped air pipe that hangs between the adjoining cars. In the tableau below, we have (L-R) Greg, Gregg, Bob, Nick, and Joel, as Greg and Nick run the hose clamp machine under the watchful eye of the boss. The other two guys (and yours truly) are on a Union break.

And as for this, Nathan and Mikey were working for part of the day to salvage a recent purchase from everyone's favorite purveyor of used cars. Don't worry - against all odds, by the end of the day it drove itself off the lot.

Saturday switch move

Our intrepid freelance photographer, Joel Ahrendt, has sent along some photos of today's switch move. Enjoy!

I'm not sure what all was being switched or why, but at least part of the plan was to pull all of the cars out of the middle track in Barn 4, in part to put the next project into the "roof booth." And, of course, the 714 with its fresh new lobster traps was extracted so that it can go back into one of the operating barns.

AE&C 309

Frank writes...

I recently came across this image online here - it's an Electric Railway Journal cover from 1914, and the car it shows is, of all things, the 309! Obviously the existence of this image isn't exactly a secret, but neither my father nor I can recall having seen it. Come to think of it, maybe the bound volumes of ERJ's that tend to float around don't have these covers. Either way, it's an interesting image and there are plenty of odd little observations we can make about the car:

• Best guess is that the photo probably does date to around 1914. It can't be older than 1909 because the two cars behind the 309 are both Kuhlmans. The train in the distance has a flat roof line at the end, so it's probably either a Met train or a box motor.
• Obviously this was when the 309 still had its arched "streamer sash" but it's also early enough that the car still had its brass tube window guards.
• The car also still has coupling chains; these went away pretty early. The second-from-bottom bar on the pilot is still full-width; these weren't narrowed until about 1940. For some reason, the 303 seems to have been about the only car in the entire fleet not to have its pilot narrowed in this fashion, and its pilot remains complete in its original form.
• The car still doesn't have an anti-climber, of course. The Jewetts were delivered with anti-climbers, but all of the older cars (including the Kuhlmans) just had flat bumpers as shown here until anti-climbers homemade out of C-channel were installed around 1940.
• You'll note that the car has not yet acquired a windshield wiper.
• This is still the pre-retriever era, and the trolley rope is just tied off to a grab-iron. This image makes it look like there may have been some kind of rope guard that was only as wide as the train door. Also, the railroad didn't change from trolley wheels to trolley shoes until the late 1930s.
• That nifty pointed toilet vent later gave way to a more normal design.
• In the early years, as shown here, the headlight hanging hooks were screwed directly into the door rather into a metal plate. I think the metal plates came about somewhat early, maybe in the 1920s.

I'm not sure where this picture was taken, but it was somewhere alongside the CGW (judging from that boxcar in the left background) so my best guess is maybe Elmhurst or Berkeley.

Remember: Grip nuts make friends of high speed and safety!