Arizona Transportation Museum

On my latest vacation, I had the opportunity to stop in at the Arizona Transportation Museum in downtown Tucson.  This is a volunteer organization that also runs the Old Pueblo Trolley site, but that wasn't open when we were there.  The mainline railroad part is located in what used to be a storage facility next door to the main SP depot in Tucson.  The main depot (not shown) is still in use by Amtrak.

Inside is a large collection of various artifacts, mostly concentrating on the SP, naturally enough.

A model of what the station complex used to look like:

But outside is the main thing, an SP 2-6-0 stored under this excellent roof structure:

The locomotive was built by Schenectady in 1900, just before the formation of Alco.  In later years, it was used as a yard switcher at Tucson, and was then a park engine for several years.  But it is still in good condition, and they have hopes of making it operational eventually.  They plan to UT the boiler, for instance.  Luckily it doesn't have a jacket.

I thought this was pretty amusing: there's a G gauge layout that runs all the way around the locomotive on the ground.  In Arizona you can get away with things like this.

The cab is open for display.  There's a volunteer on duty to keep on eye on things and answer questions.  The man I happened to talk to was from Elgin originally, before moving to Tucson, so he was familiar with IRM.  It's a small world.

This light string goes into the boiler over the firebox, and you can peer inside and see the staybolts, to a limited extent.  

Also outside is the control stand from a Geep.

So that was interesting.  But as usual, there's no place like home.

Sunday Report

Frank writes...

It was another beautiful Sunday at the museum, with a high of about 50. I split my time roughly evenly between the two Shaker Heights cars, the 63 and the 18.

I took our sample battery box cover back over to the paint store in Huntley because we hadn't been thrilled with the initial paint match. After some deft mixing work by the store manager, we ended up with a match that I think is much closer. After that, it was time to trace the lettering off the car, as shown above.

There's not a ton of lettering on the 63. The center doors have "Westbound Entrance" next to them (above) and the front doors have "Eastbound Entrance" next to them. There's an RTA emblem, a number in one typeface on the front of the car, and four instances of the car number in an odd squashed typeface at the corners. But that's about it.

WE NEED YOUR HELP: Anyone a font expert? The "Westbound Entrance" and "Eastbound Entrance" will need to be recreated for the late-1970s era, and this looks like some kind of standard font. If we can figure out what font it is, it should be easy to recreate the lettering using vinyl decals, which is what the car actually used in this era.

There's also this RTA emblem. In the late-1970s vermilion livery, the RTA was in red and it was set against a white square.

So, that was about it for the 63. On the 18, when I first arrived I sprayed the chains, links, and springs that will hold up the Eclipse fender with primer, as shown above. At the end of the day, they all got sprayed black, as you can see below. With luck, next week I can hang the fender permanently. Well, more or less; it is intended to be removable.

I also removed the next four windows, L11 through L14, and brought L13 and L14 into the shop. These did not go as smoothly as the previous four. L13 is in rough shape and one corner came apart when I removed it from the car; then, because the glass had been glued in with caulk, I managed to break the glass while taking the window apart. Hmm. I got both frames stripped of paint, so next week I'll see if I can cut a new piece of glass and/or repair the corner of the window frame.

There was plenty of activity, of course, as usual. The Veracruz open car was on the pit for its annual inspection; Greg and Norm were working on chasing down electrical gremlins; Nick, Zach, Jeff and newer volunteer Joseph K were working on electric parts; Matthew was working on the forklift; Jimmy was doing air brake work on the CSL cars; and there were several other people hard at work on various projects.

Hey, if you haven't heard, it's just a few weeks until the 2024 Snowflake Special and tickets are mostly sold out. Reserve yours today while you still can!

Doodlebug Update

 Gregg continues his work on the UP M-35.  I was out of town so these pictures were somewhat delayed in getting onto the blog.  Better late than never...

The outer wall got painted recently in the women's room.

The aisle side was stripped of paint and old varnish.

Then a coat of primer was applied.

Another baggage rack was stripped and painted pictured here in the steam shop. It's now ready for installation

The outer wall on the aisle side getting a coat of tan on the top half. Later, the lower part will get the brown.

The wooden toilet seat is being refurbished outside while the weather is cooperating.

The door for the water cooler by the Men's room is getting painted too. The lower tips are brown with the rest in tan. 

I should point out again that Gregg doesn't have to do anything special to get his project featured on our blog.  He just sends us a few pictures with clear, concise captions every so often.  And we're glad to publicize anything constructive that's going on at IRM.

Chicago & Southern Traction

There were five interurban lines that ran into Chicago: the three Insull lines that ran into the Loop; the Chicago & Joliet Electric, which ran to Archer and Cicero on the southwest side; and Chicago & Southern Traction (later Chicago & Interurban Traction), which ran to 63rd Street on the south side.

Many thanks to Art Peterson, who has sent a terrific collection of photos of C&ST from the Krambles-Peterson Archive. Caption information mostly comes from the Stephen Scalzo history of the line.

Chicago Electric Traction, or CET, was a predecessor of C&ST. Here we see CET open car 63, a 1900-vintage American Car Company product, at the CET terminal at 63rd and South Park (today Martin Luther King Jr Drive). This terminal was no longer used after 1912. The car in the foreground is Calumet Electric Street Railway 124, built in 1904 by Kuhlman and later to become Chicago Surface Lines 2829. Note the stairs up to the South Side Rapid Transit elevated line to Jackson Park.

CET 66 was built in 1900 as part of the same order as car 63 shown above. It's signed for Blue Island and includes a board advertising Calumet Grove, an "electric park" amusement park owned by CET and located in Blue Island.

Car 73 was also part of that same 1900 American Car Company order. It's pictured in 1907, location uncertain but possibly 63rd Street judging from what appears to be an elevated railway in the background.

When CET started operations, it wasn't a traditional electric railway, it was a storage battery line. Car 4 was one of the original storage battery cars built in 1896 by Pullman. By the time this photo was taken, sometime after 1901, it had been converted to 600V overhead wire operation. Surviving rosters suggest this car also got a Brill 21E truck, but here it still has the DuPont truck from its storage battery car days.

From 1907 to 1913, a common sight on short-turn runs from Chicago to intermediate points on the C&ST like Blue Island, Harvey, Chicago Heights, and Crete were the cars of the 126-140 series. They were built in 1907 by Kuhlman and had an odd roof with a faired-in "railroad roof" monitor at the front that was chopped off "deck roof style" at the back. The location is uncertain.

This photo is at 79th and Halsted; the building on the right is still there. In the distance on the southbound track is Chicago City Railway 5187, a "Little Brill" built in 1905, while on the northbound track can be seen what appears to be a sprinkler car.

This builder's photo of C&ST 134 clearly shows the odd roof arrangement. These cars were conveyed to Chicago City Railway in 1913 and rebuilt for double-end operation with pay-as-you-enter (PAYE) fare collection and normal deck roofs. They became Chicago Surface Lines 5651-5665 and were nicknamed "Crete suburban cars" in recognition of their C&ST heritage.

This builder's photo shows the interior of car 134 in 1907. Features like the separate smoking compartment and coal-fired hot-water heat were removed during the CCR rebuilding.

It's 1910 and car 134, plastered with advertisements for the Kankakee Fair, is on the bridge at Matteson that took the Joliet & Southern directly over the diamonds where the Illinois Central and Michigan Central crossed. It's likely that car 134 was on the J&S for advertising purposes.

Through service from Chicago to Kankakee was mostly held down by the big 200-series heavy interurban cars. Handsome car 206 was built by St. Louis in 1907 and is shown here at 79th and Halsted.

This rare image, though heavily retouched, shows one of the 301-304 series interurban trailers. These cars were built in 1909 by Niles, but only lasted about a year in this configuration before they were motorized. The Baldwin trailer trucks shown were replaced by Brill MCB2X trucks when they were motorized.

This line car was built in 1911 by C&ST as 500 and was renumbered two years later to 50. It was destroyed in a fire in 1924. It's pictured at the company's carbarn at 88th and Vincennes.

The two photos above were taken on July 8, 1921, the day a portable substation parked on a siding at an unknown location caught fire and burned. Judging from the surroundings, this is closer to the south end of the line than the north end. Line car 50 appears to be in the background of the second photo.

The barn at 88th and Vincennes dated to the line's storage battery days and included both indoor and covered outdoor storage. This photo, taken on July 12, 1923, is looking north toward 88th. The car on the left may be part of the 35-37 (originally 215-217) series built by Jewett in 1911.

This photo was taken the same day but is looking southwest from the corner of 88th and Vincennes. In the foreground is the office, with storage and machine shop facilities also located at the east end of the building; behind it are several indoor storage tracks in the shop, and the covered car storage shed west of that. This complex was owned by Chicago City Railway or Chicago Surface Lines after 1912 and leased to the C&ST until it quit in the late 1920s, after which CSL used it for a while for car storage.

Unseasonable Warmth

Frank writes...

Sunday was a gorgeous day at the museum, sunny and with a high of around 70 degrees, though with strong winds all day.

When I arrived, the two cars east of the 18 were out of the barn because the 4391 was in the finishing stages of its annual inspection over in Barn 4. Joel thoughtfully delayed moving anything back into the barn until I had a chance to get a good look at the Eclipse fender on the 18 from more than two feet away. Thanks to Zach, Joel, and Will, all of whom helped with giving it a good look, taking some measurements, and comparing railhead clearance with other streetcars to come to a conclusion on the fender arrangement.

What we decided was that the fender basket is nice and level; it's the fence that's a little cockeyed, but that's almost impossible to fix because it's a factor of castings that can't be adjusted. Looking at in-service photos, it does seem that some of the fenders on these cars were a little wonky, so we'll chalk this up to being authentically imperfect. We also tested things like clearance when folded up and clearance to the headlight, as shown above. Thanks to Will, with whose help - and that of a track bar - I was finally able to get the front coupler centered instead of all the way out at the end of the circle iron.

After that, given the warm weather, it was time to paint! I spent a while atop a ladder scraping more loose paint off the 63, this time above the windows, and then spent considerably more time atop said ladder applying primer where needed. The car looks a bit unhealthy at the moment, but as the weather warms up (or stays warm!), orange paint will cover this all up.

After that, I brought the four repainted windows from the shop back to the 18 and reinstalled them. They're the last four on the left side, and you can contrast them with the rather shoddy-looking un-redone window on the left. There are only about six more to do, and I'll take the next batch out when I have some time. It was pointed out, though, that when I leave the wood shop benches strewn with freshly painted windows on Sunday nights, it prevents the weekday guys from getting anything done. I need to find an out-of-the-way space somewhere in the heated shop I can put windows to dry.

After dinner, Nick and Greg helped with rigging up the chains that will support the Eclipse fender permanently. These will use all-new hardware, including new split links, springs and new-old-stock heavy-duty sash chain, since it would really be a bother if the fender fell onto the tracks when the car was moving. I got everything cut to length and ready to prime and paint at a later date.

There was a lot of other work going on - the place was a beehive of activity again. For most of the day, the 4391 was on the pit, but late in the afternoon it was switched back over to Barn 7 and the 306 was put on the pit in its place. I don't think those door leaves were there the last time I looked...

"The great blood-and-custard fleet," or something: three Chicago streetcars and a roughly matching Veracruz car (albeit in Columbia Park & Southwestern colors!) sit outside Barn 7 while the indefatigable Joel oils main journals and axle caps. Opening day is in just two weeks!

I also managed to snap this photo of the "mother car," Indiana Railroad 65, which thanks to Jon F has recently had the bars restored to its rear-end windows. This was the car's baggage compartment, but when it left IRR it lost the bars on these windows so it's been nearly 85 years since anyone has seen this. Very cool! In other news, besides the inspection work getting done, Tim was working on the 1808, Bob and others were working on contactors, a few people were over in Barn 2 working on the 415, Richard and the bus guys were working on the Milwaukee Marmon-Herrington trolley bus, and the Electroliner people were working on that car.

The Museum of Root Beer

A few months ago, we posted a List of Oddball Museums. While we are not looking to post a tour of each of these, we couldn't turn down this trip report from Will Knogle. After all, root beer is the official beverage of Hicks Car Works. Thanks, Will!

While I was in Wisconsin Dells, I was able to make it to the Museum of Root Beer. I was hoping to also make it to the Museum of Torture, which is also in Wisconsin Dells, but it was closed for the winter season.  

The Museum of Root Beer is a quaint, small museum dedicated to the history of root beer. There were several informative displays on the origins of root beer.  Other exhibits focused on the drive-in aspect of various brands of root beer.   

By far the largest and most noticeable exhibit at the museum is the large collection of root beer bottles. From what I understand, their goal is to collect at least one bottle from every manufacturer of root beer.  They even had a small theater where you can watch vintage root beer advertisements, which you could rate with a QR code provided.  

The museums gift shop is your typical small soda shop with various brands of soda and root beer available for purchase.

All in all, the museum was well worth the price of entry $5.50, and I would recommend it to anyone who loves root beer.

And really, who doesn't?