Progress on the Lake Shore car

Many thanks to Bob Harris, who has sent along some more photos of restoration progress on Chicago Lake Shore & South Bend 73. The car is being worked on in Murphysboro, Illinois and work is progressing at a steady pace.

The latest progress is that the copper sheathing is going onto the roof. The what? It turns out that the CLS&LS cars had wooden roofs sheathed with copper instead of covered with canvas. This seems improbable on an electric car but there were evidently a few lines that did this and of course electric cars with steel or, later, aluminum roofs weren't at all uncommon. Evidence suggests that the CLS&SB left the roofs unpainted so that the finish would end up with an oxidized copper look. It should be quite striking when done. Above and below, Glenn is working on installing the copper sheets on the end of the car.

UPDATE: Bob has sent along two more photos, including one showing one end of car 73's roof already clad in copper sheets. Pretty sharp!