I am posting this here since I am looking for Prototype information. I am at the point of filling out Waybills to use with Car Cards on my model railroad. I am modelling 1984. Where can I find lists of industries to supply the businesses on my layout? By scouring photos and videos of the prototype I know many of the cars types and owners used to supply them. I also want to figure out the connections to list. For instance, how did those Southern Pacific double door boxcars of lumber get to Conrail in Pennsylvania? I suppose I could make it all up, but I would like to try to keep it somewhat prototypical. The shortline I model is defunct and actual records are not available. Any ideas?
Thank in advance for serious replies.
Maurice
This can indeed be very challenging information to track down. Sometimes one is lucky enough to run into a railroader or retiree who happens to know or remember. Every now and then even a local newspaper might have printed something about a local industry and where it got its raw materials from, or where they shipped stuff to.
I go to railroadiana collectible shows and am always on the lookout for waybills and switchlists because sometimes one can glean information in surprising places. For example I found a waybill for a shipper in Peoria that happened to be for a shipment that was going to a town on my layout. It wasn't my era but suggested a possibility for my era.
Some of the Morning Sun freight car books have hints of information in the captions as to loads and where they came from and where they are headed.
The Op Sig group years ago started to create a database of rail shipping industries. http://www.shenware.com/indman.html
http://www.opsig.org/reso/inddb/
A modeler and book dealer named Ted Schnepf has published shipper's guides for various large railroads - that list all on line customers by product type and often by town or city, then divided by product type.
http://railsunlimited.ribbonrail.com/Books/shippers.html
As far as routings go, there a good railroad Atlas (or the Steam Powered Video series of books) can help trace probably routings. The Official Guide of the Railways for your general year might show interchanges for your modeled short line, which in turn you could look up and find interchanges. Often everything seems to go through Chicago!
You mention that the shortline you model is defunct. That does not mean there are not others who are interested in it and perhaps stuff is online somewhere. What railroad are we talking about?
Dave Nelson
MauriceI am posting this here since I am looking for Prototype information. I am at the point of filling out Waybills to use with Car Cards on my model railroad. I am modelling 1984. Where can I find lists of industries to supply the businesses on my layout?
Research, reaserch, research.
The Operations Special Interest Group has several large tables of industries that can be used as a source.
If you search for "shippers guides", there are companies that sell books/lists of railroad customers.
1984 isn't that horribly far back, you could always Google "Plywood mills" or "plywood production" and find companies that produce plywood (or whatever) and find ones near the SP.
For the routes, an ORER or a railroad map would show routes of railroads. Generally railroads want to maximize their haul, so the SP would try to haul it the furthest they could. The SP might load the car in Oregon, haul it to Los Angeles, then to Texas, then on the SSW to St Louis where they would give it to CR.
Or....
The might give it to the BN or UP in the north west and they would carry it to Chicago (UP to Fremont, then CNW) and give it to Conrail there.
They might haul it to northern California, give it to the UP who would carry it to Fremont, give it to the CNW who would take it to Chicago for the CR.
Since the shipper or the consignee can specify the route, there isn't necessarily one and only one route for cross country shipments.
You don't say where your shortline is in the route, it really doesn't matter that much it the shortline is on either end, you are going to be giving everything to the SP if its in the west or getting everything from CR if its in the east. If its in the middle of the route, it probably wouldn't be in the route at all since the SP and CR interchange directly or through other long haul carriers, they wouldn't involve a short line in the middle.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
dehusmanThe Operations Special Interest Group has several large tables of industries that can be used as a source.
Here's that link: http://www.opsig.org/reso/inddb/
Tens of thousands of industries organized by region.
Layout Design GalleryLayout Design Special Interest Group
try this
https://www.google.com/search?sa=X&q=train+manifest+example&tbm=isch&source=univ&ved=2ahUKEwj-n_nh7LvgAhWLLXwKHe0lCYUQsAR6BAgDEAE&biw=1920&bih=963
Thank you for your replies. There were not many in quanity but they definitely were high in quality. I think the OPSIG database holds the most hope for me. That and the 1984 ORER I managed to pick up. My version of the Pocono Northeast R.R. (PNER) will operate a little bit more prototypically now, I hope.
Thanks again for the replies.
I have a very large list of real industries that I am working on . It includes the industry name, city, state, country, originating railroad, commidites received and shipped. I will be glad to send you what I have so far if you would like.
caldreamer