Philadelphia Car Heading West

Thanks to Bill Wulfert, who has passed along the news that Philadelphia Rapid Transit 2282 has been acquired by the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum from the Electric City Trolley Museum.

Car 2282 is in rough shape but it's extremely historic. It's the oldest double-truck streetcar, and the second-oldest streetcar (after this one, which is in imminent danger of demolition), from Philadelphia in existence. It was built by Brill in 1906 and when retired in 1928 it went to the Shamokin & Edgewood Electric, where it finished out its career 10 years later. The car has been through a few owners in the preservation era: it was at Magee until Hurricane Agnes did in that organization, then it was owned by Ed Blossom for a few decades before his collection went to ECTM in Scranton around 2000. In recent years, it's been stored in ECTM's barn in Moosic. I haven't updated the car's PNAERC record yet - I always do that when the car physically moves, and as far as I know, it's still in Scranton for the moment. But it's good to see that the car is going to another good home at PTM and that ECTM will have a spot open up for something else to be stored inside.

As for the museums involved, PTM has been on a bit of an acquisition spree lately in the wake of acquiring a new storage building along their line. This will be their third acquisition in the last couple of years, after Shamokin & Mt. Carmel 33 and Port Authority Transit 1713. For ECTM, this is their second deaccession in the last few years, after Chicago Aurora & Elgin 453. The museum doesn't really have any space to expand, nor anywhere to store cars outdoors, so if they want to acquire a new piece of equipment they need to get rid of something they have.

Another Postcard from Kennebunkport

Bill Wulfert has sent more photos from Winterfest, held this past weekend at the Seashore Trolley Museum, with this batch including many of Seashore's more commonly photographed pieces. Enjoy!

One of the denizens of Town House Shop at Seashore is Bay State Street Railway 4175, an attractive semiconvertible built in 1914 by Laconia that later ran in Rhode Island and New Jersey. This car was the prototype for the replica that operates today in Lowell, Mass.

One of the cars in operation over the weekend was Claremont Railway 4, the museum's diminutive line car.

One of three North Shore Line interurban cars at Seashore, car 420 was built in 1928 as an open-platform observation car and later converted to a double-ended coach. It is currently out of service with a failed traction motor.

Fellow Highwood alum NSL 755 is a 1930 Standard product, shown here in both an exterior and an interior view.

Connecticut Company open car 303 was built by Brill in 1901 for the Winchester Avenue Railway. It's shown in Seashore's brand-new South Boston carbarn, a beautiful three-track, nine-berth structure that was just completed within the past few months.

One of Seashore's regular service stalwarts is ConnCo 1160, shown here, a 1906 Stephenson suburban car that was completely restored by the museum. It's one of only nine Stephenson cars preserved and one of just four in operation.

The next two images show Cleveland Railway 1227, which was one of the most recently completed of Seashore's famous frame-up restorations. Not only was this car received as a basket case, but it had been rebuilt by Shaker Heights Rapid Transit. Seashore did a lot of work to backdate it to its condition in the late 1910s.

There are three Chicago "Big Pullmans" preserved, and the only one not at IRM is CSL 225. It's currently out of service with a failed motor.

Chicago Transit Authority 1 was used as a propulsion equipment test car by General Electric after it was retired by the CTA. It's currently available.

DC Transit 1304 is a beautifully restored prewar PCC from the nation's capital. It's shown in the new South Boston carbarn. Unfortunately, at the moment it is out of service with a bad MG set.

Eastern Mass Street Railway 4387 is one of that system's distinctive suburban semi-convertible cars. It's been fully restored by Seashore but is currently out of service with a blown motor, I believe.

The most modern rapid transit cars at Seashore are MBTA 0622-0623, shown here on display, built in 1979 by Hawker-Siddeley. They were operational until recently but I'm not certain of their current status. I believe that due to track conditions, Seashore isn't running heavy interurbans or rapid transit cars on their main line.

MBTA 5159 is one of several snow plows at Seashore that were converted from Type 3 semi-convertibles built in 1908.

Bill snapped this photo of a distinctive Boston third rail beam, shown on one of the Cambridge-Dorchester subway cars.

The "City of Manchester" and Atlantic Shore Line 100 are certainly among the prides of the fleet at Seashore, both the result of major multi-year restoration efforts. ASL 100 has the added distinction of having run over the museum's right-of-way during its service career.

The centerpiece of Town House Shop at the moment is Portland-Lewiston 14, the "Narcissus," a 1912 Laconia-built interurban car that is the subject of a lengthy and involved restoration.

Don't get used to seeing SEPTA 618 at Seashore - it's heading to a new home at the Trolley Museum of New York sometime soon.

SEPTA 2278, aka "New Hampshire" since it was painted in Bicentennial colors in the 1970s, began life as Kansas City Public Service 781. It came to Seashore in 2012.

Twin City Rapid Transit 1267 is a beautifully restored standard car from Minnesota. Seashore restored it to its original "gate car" configuration, with an open rear platform and no passenger entry at the front. I'm not sure whether it's currently operational.

One of the photo lineups the museum set up was in front of the new South Boston barn with DC Transit 1304, featured earlier, and Toronto 2890, a 1923 Ottawa-built Peter Witt acquired in 2000 from Halton County. The Witt has been the subject of recent work but is not currently operational.

A true masterpiece of restoration, Wheeling Street Railway 639 is one of only two Cincinnati curve-siders in operation. It was restored - practically replicated - from the shell of a body and is one of the regular service cars at Seashore.

And to finish off, we'll add some property shots. Bill sent an exterior and an interior photo of Seashore's newest focus, the model railroad building. This was built by a sizable grant from one or two wealthy donors.

Here we are in the new South Boston carbarn, showing off features like the insulated walls, steel framing, wall-to-wall concrete and between-rails inspection pit. This replaces the older, smaller, and decidedly ramshackle South Boston barn, which was demolished a year or two ago.

And we'll finish with a couple of night photo shoots. First, the two operating ConnCo cars.

And here are 639, 1304, and 2890 in front of the new South Boston barn.

ConnCo 1414 Returns Home

Thanks to Bill Wall for sending the above photo and the news that Connecticut Company 1414 has returned home from its 27-year stint at the Lake Compounce Amuseument Park. It was trucked back to East Haven today and will be unloaded at Branford in the morning. UPDATE: Video here

Car 1414 is a big 15-bench deck-roof open car built by Osgood-Bradley for ConnCo in 1911. Part of the Branford fleet from the earliest days in 1948, in 1997 it was loaned to an historic amusement park at Lake Compounce, where it ran back and forth on an 1800' route with a small shed at one end to protect the car. This fairly unique operation seems to have been quite successful for quite a long time, but the amusement park is redeveloping that area and so the car's time there is through. It's operational, so I would guess that it will be making regular appearances in service at Branford. It's one of three cars of this series preserved: sister car 1425 is currently under restoration at Branford, and may join its twin in operation one of these days, while car 1468 is stored in rough but complete condition at Seashore.

Postcard from Kennebunkport

Many thanks to Bill Wulfert, who participated in this past weekend's Winterfest event at the Seashore Trolley Museum. It sounds like the event was well attended, with some 180 or so people from various museums. There were quite a few seminars and discussions that were scheduled in advance; the museum's new model railroad was up and running; some cars were staged for nighttime photo shows; and there were operations, of course, provided by two electric cars (ConnCo 1160 and Claremont 4), a diesel, and a speeder. Fortunately for roster aficionados like myself, though, Bill mostly pointed his camera toward the less often photographed cars in the Seashore collection. Enjoy!

First, a few photos of South Shore 32, which is on the deaccession list for obvious reasons.

Next up is CTA 6600, part of the furthest-east pair of "spam cans" in preservation.

Dallas Railway & Terminal 608 is a standard Dallas double-end PCC, but it has the distinction of being the only one of its type that has been backdated to original appearance. This was done by Seashore some years ago and the car still looks quite nice, though the inside seems to be suffering a bit.

The two below photos show Boston 3019, built in 1941, one of the oldest PCC cars from the Hub City. It's stored in an open-ended barn, hence the protective tarp over its front end. This car never had a low monitor roof like most of the city's PCCs had.

Another "flat top" PCC from Boston is MBTA 3037, shown here, a 1944 "wartime" car which is also on the deaccession list.

MBTA 3069 is from the same 1944 order as 3037. It's been displayed mounted on the "highway monster," Seashore's infamous car-moving trailer, for at least 25 years. In recent years, though, it's been tarped. Like 3037, it's on the deaccession list.

MBTA 3083 is another wartime car, though from a different order than the previous two cars.

One thing I really appreciate is that in at least some cases, Seashore labels their tarps. MBTA 3327 is a Dallas double-ender that was heavily rebuilt for work car service, including a big baggage door in the middle of the car side. It's on the deaccession list.

MBTA 3332, another ex-Dallas car, was also in work service late in its career. It, too, is on the deaccession list.

In addition to backdated Dallas car 608, shown earlier, double-end car 3340 is the other car of this type Seashore has restored. This one is in Boston MTA colors to represent this type's early years after arriving in the northeast. For a while in the 2010s, I believe this car was the "gate guardian," but if I'm not mistaken that role is currently filled by an MBTA dump motor.

Bill wasn't certain which car this was, but was pretty sure it was a Montreal car. So, I'm guessing this is the interior of Montreal Tramways 2052, a 1927 Wason product originally built for Springfield, MA.

Pittsburgh Railways 1440 represents that city in Seashore's collection. It's a 1942 prewar car. Bill points out that in the second photo, you can see the unusual (unique?) slotted step treads.

Philadelphia PCC 2289 is an ex-Kansas City car that had an unusual preservation career. It entered preservation early, in 1967, when it went to Trolley Valhalla. Sometime after that group gave way to the Buckingham Valley group, 2289 was sold to a private owner, who stored it outside for 30 or 35 years. It came to Seashore in 2012 with the unique distinction, I believe, of being the only Philadelphia PCC in preservation that never ran for SEPTA.

A far more typical Philadelphia PCC is this car, SEPTA 2709, a run-of-the-mill GOH car.

Tired of PCCs? Cleanse your pallet with this shot of York Utilities 82, a 1919 American-built Birney that comprised one half of the Denver & South Platte roster before being sold for service in Maine in 1927. It and its fellow D&SP car came to Seashore in 1946.