Montrealer aka Bootlegger

[rcdrye]

Pine Grove (Joseph V. McDonald) survived at least until 2003 in private ownership.  Pine Beach (Beatrice McDonald) was likely scrapped.

[samfp1943]

[quote user="rcdrye"]

Amtrak named a couple of ex-UP 10-6 sleepers after Joseph MacDonald and his wife.  They were used up to the end of Montrealer service in 1995.

 

[/quote] Not wxactly'new' but very interested and getting started following CLASSIC TRAINS....Was reading back some stuff on the Internet, tr: AMTRAK and some of the " New regeime's[make that CEO. Richard Armstrong's 'stiring the pot' and remaking our Nat'l Rail Service into a financial success(!) ]    

I ain't holding my breath!     While surfing around I found some interesting quotes, other things I had not known and having a general 'immersion'    Found a piece in a Battle Creek, Mi. newspaper that was sort of interesting, and I dug it out because it shows a certain amount of claivoyance on the part of one individual[IMHO]; he happened to be a Consumer Advocate, nominated to the AMTRAK, after having languished while Pres. Nixon, was 'frying HIS other fish', before his last presiential junket back to California.    Liked below[in part]  @ https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/204266912/

FTA:"...WASHINGTON - An Amtrak director says he fears the national passenger train sys-' tem could go broke in the next two or three years simply trying to maintain the expenses of its Boston-to-Washing-tonruns. Joseph V. MacDonald, one of 13 Amtrak directors, said the serious problems will arise as a result of the ConRail plan for restructuring freight lines in the Northwest and Midwest. He pointed out that the U S. Railway Association, which created CVONRail, provides that freight systems shouldn't have to bear the tremendous cost of upgrading the rail lines on the Boston-to-Washington runcommonly called the Northeast Corridor. That leaves Am track to pick up the bill, McDonald said. He also questions the need to set up a parallel line along the corridor, to be used exclusively by freight trains. In a letter to the editor of the Burlington (Vt.) Free Press, in which he laid out his misgivings, he said, "The cost of the upgrading of the parallel lines is to be borne by Amtrak. US-RA offered no estimate of the cost I suspected it should be in the billions."

Article FRM:"Battle Creek Enquirer from Battle Creek, Michigan · Page 22

Publication:Battle Creek Enquirer   Issue Date: Sunday, October 26, 1975 (P.22)

And then there was this piece,linked from AMTRAK's site @ https://history.amtrak.com/archives/heritage-sleeping-car-i-joseph-v.-macdonald-i-1984

 And further from that article:"...n October, 1978, at a ceremony held at the St. Albans, Vt. station, Amtrak renamed the car the Joseph V. MacDonald in honor of a former board member who had died earlier that year. MacDonald, once a locomotive engineer, served on the board from 1974 to 1978. He had been influential in the campaign to establish the Montrealer (Montreal-Washington) in the early 1970s. Car No. 2991 was named in honor of his wife, Beatrice..."

A tip of the Kromer Cap to Wanswheel[Mike] and his folks! 

The cars were apparently dropped out of the AMTRAK fleet in the 1990's... Anyone here have any idea about where they wound up?

[rcdrye]

True enough - We also saw occasional ex-NYC "Valley" and occasional ACL/SAL equipement.  On the other hand I always rode coach on the Montrealer in 1978...  One of the photos in the archives shows the baggage-dorm conversion of one of the 1953 ACF US Army hospital cars.  The other conversion used on the Montrealer was the far more famous "Le Pub".  Even after the HEP conversion, when a lot of weird and wonderful equipment was retired, the Montrealer was still a great way to get from the "Upper Valley" to New York, Washington or even Texas.

[wanswheel]

rcdrye

 

 

wanswheel

The Santa Fe cars were seldom if ever part of the Montrealer. 

Well they definitely were at least once in October 1978. 

https://history.amtrak.com/archives/i-amtrak-news-i-november-1978

[rcdrye]

wanswheel

Thanks Rob. They were Santa Fe though. Pine Grove and Pine Beach.

I went back and looked them up later.  The Montrealer's regular 10-6 cars before then were UP "Pacific" series, with an occasional SP Sunset Limited car showing up, which is why I pegged them as ex-UP.  The Santa Fe cars were seldom if ever part of the Montrealer.  I rode both of the "Pine" cars in the 1970s on other trains.  Except for the letterboard treatment and the pre-HEP A/C, all three series were nearly identical (UP and SP had Electromechanical, "Pine" cars originally had steam ejector).