C&NW also used wooden cars (with open platforms at the ends IIRC) on Chicagoland commuter trains into the 1950's I believe.
I think the last hurrah for wooden passenger cars on class one railroads was during WWII when older cars were pressed in service. However, I think I've seen photos of wooden head-end cars on smaller class ones like the Rutland, B&A and B&M taken in the early 50s. The B&M was still using wooden cars in commuter service in the late 40s I think.
SP typically got about 80 years of service out of its wooden fleet with frequent rebuildings well after adoption of steel cars, cascaded down into MW service after WWII with disposal occuring in the late 50's as they were too worn out even for this assignment, but not all suffered this fate as SP was not to retire its final example until 1962 from revenue service.
Dave
Wooden (or at least partially wooden) passenger cars lasted much longer in the old South than in other parts of the country, because old hand-me-down equipment was often used for "Jim Crow" cars; that is, cars for black passengers who by law had to be segregated from white passengers. It's unlikely a top-of-the-line train in the 1950's would have a wooden car, but it wouldn't be that unusual for a lesser train to have all heavyweight or mixed heavyweight and streamlined cars with a wood "Jim Crow" coach in the mix.
Otherwise, wood cars lasted a long time in Maintenance of Way service. I remember seeing (but unfortunately didn't have a camera with me to photograph) some woodsided passenger cars being used in MofW service on Burlington Northern in 1984, with the cars still wearing the "Empire Builder" green-and-orange paint scheme.
The watershed event for US passenger eqipment was the opening of New York's Pennsylvania Station in 1910. Because the PRR crossed the Hudson in underwater tunnels, there was a safety issue that surfaced in a Paris Metro disaster, wherein a fire used up all the air in the subway tunnel and asphyxiated many passengers. The fire was fed by wood cars. As a result, the PRR, which was the 500 pound gorilla of railroading up to the 1940s, declared that only all steel equipment would be allowed into Penn Station. This hit Pullman very hard, and they quickly had to replace much of their fleet. (Pullman wood cars were then used only in secondary service.) The Southern was also affected. They had recently received hybrid steel-wood cars that were the prototype for the Rivarossi heavyweight coach of the 1960s, but they had to be rebuilt as all steel, so even the Rivarossis didn't last long in that configuration. But also, the Southern acquired streamlined equipment before WWII on trains like the Crescent, so wood equipment would have been at least two generations back by 1950. You might find a wood coach or combine on a branch train, but not on any mainline train.
"One difference between pessimists and optimists is that while pessimists are more often right, optimists have far more fun."
DemoRunner ......I've yet to join the Historical Societies because I can't build a model railroad just yet.
Cheers, the Bear.
Don't know about exact dates but a wooden car would probably have not survived the 1920's in a premier train. It might have made it into the 1950's on some backwoods branchline or in work train service . My guess is they would have been removed prior to 1930.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
Hello, I have a question about around what times wooden passenger cars were retired, specifically on the Southern Railroad. I bought two cars that turned out to be wooden which were on sale, and now I'm a little anxious. I don't think wooden cars were used very late after steel was introduced, so if anyone knows if these cars were retired completely from the Southern Crescent by the early '50s, and maybe a little more background info, I'd really appreciate it. I may have to ship them back and exchange for something else, as much as it is a pain the butt to find Southern passenger cars :(. Oh well, it's up to me to try and research these things beforehand. It seems real tough to find specific things like this with just a google search, and I've yet to join the Historical Societies because I can't build a model railroad just yet.