Classic Railroad Quiz (at least 50 years old).

[henry6]

Wans...they've all been around the freight house several times!  Neat question...didn't think it would be a round this long, though.  If they see any joints they just might get it!

[Texas Zepher]

From a 1936 roster of the Ingersoll-Rand "box cab" type locomotive: 

Central RR. of New Jersey, Bronx Terminal, N. Y., Loco Number 1000, 300HP, 60 tons, Oct. 1925

For some reason it is called a steeple cab. 

Apparently this information is also available in the Train Shed Cylcopedia #43.

[wanswheel]

Johnny, that's right you're up. I think the law was against steam in Manhattan, later amended to include the Bronx and cities that bordered the Bronx. Steam was allowed in the other borroughs, as far as I know. Certainly LIRR ran steam in Queens in the 1940s.

http://members.trainweb.com/bedt/indloco/crrnjbxt.html

http://www.port-kelsey.com/?cat=11

Mike

[henry6]

Steam also at Brooklyn Eastern District Terminal and Brooklyn Dock Ry.  Similar freight terminals along the Harlem were Harlem Transfer for the DL&W plus the Erie and LV's yards.

[Deggesty]

What twelve mile short line in Indiana was built by a sewing machine manufacturer becaue it did not like the rate it was paying one Class I railroad, and what other Class I did it build to? It ran an overnight sleeper in conjunction with its new connection. Tiebreaker: name the manufacturer.

Johnny

[KCSfan]

Johnny,

I believe this would be the New Jersey Indiana & Illinois RR which the Singer Sewing Machine Co. built to access the Wabash from its plant in South Bend, IN. I think the NYC was the road whose freight rates Singer objected to.

Mark

[wanswheel]

Lots of pictures

http://www.monon.monon.org/rr/njii2.html

http://www.monon.monon.org/sobend/singer.html

http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/cph/3c20000/3c23000/3c23500/3c23578v.jpg

http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/ggbain/10600/10624v.jpg

http://memory.loc.gov/pnp/habshaer/ny/ny0400/ny0428/photos/119895pv.jpg

[Deggesty]

KCSfan

Johnny,

I believe this would be the New Jersey Indiana & Illinois RR which the Singer Sewing Machine Co. built to access the Wabash from its plant in South Bend, IN. I think the NYC was the road whose freight rates Singer objected to.

Mark

Mark, you have it! I do not remember just where I learned the details, but I also recall that it was the NYC that irritated the Singer Sewing Machine Company (my mother had one of the foot-powered machines, and I learned to use it. I never did like the electric machines; they went too fast for me). The June, 1916, issue of the Guide shows the line as being 11.6 miles long, and operating two day, daily except Sunday, trains between South Bend and Pine; two connected (from and to) with Wabash #6. The January, 1930 issue shows only full miles, and has only the trains that carried the South Bend-Detroit drawing-room sleeping car.

Mike, again, you have come through with excellent pictures and commentary on the subject of a question. Thanks.

Mark, you should have a question ready by now.

Johnny

[wanswheel]

Johnny, thanks for the question. I never got to see that cool 1908 Singer Building or Hudson Terminal, the first skyscraper train station. Singer's New Jersey plant had a GE 50-ton locomotive, later transferred to their Thurso & Nation Valley logging railroad in Quebec. Evidently nowadays it keeps company with a 1919 Central Vermont crane, which my grandfather must have seen when it was brand new.

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=54892

http://www.railways.incanada.net/thurso/tnvrthurso2.JPG

http://ovgrs.editme.com/OCR2005

http://www.railways.incanada.net/thurso/tnvrhist.htm

Mike

[henry6]

Mike...do you actually own all the neatest pictures in the world?  At least let me nominate you!!

[Deggesty]

wanswheel

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=54892

That's purty; dig those red counterweights!

Why no connecting rod on the front truck?

I agree with Henry6.

Johnny

 

[KCSfan]

OK here's the next question.

At one time the Salzberg family owned and operated a number of shortlines one of which was the WA&G. Most of these have been long abandoned. Which of the former Salzberg roads was the most profitable and continues to operate today in its entirety and under its original name? Name the RR and its end point terminals.

Mark

[henry6]

GOOD SHOW, MARK!

[wanswheel]

Louisiana & North West? Gibsland (Yazoo & Mississippi) to McNeil (Cotton Belt).

http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS185462+10-Jun-2008+BW20080610

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=680468

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=853336

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=853323

Mike

[KCSfan]

wanswheel

Louisiana & North West? Gibsland (Yazoo & Mississippi) to McNeil (Cotton Belt).

http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS185462+10-Jun-2008+BW20080610

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=680468

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=853336

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=853323

Mike

Mike's nailed this one and it's now his turn to ask the next question.

Mark

[henry6]

I was in the WAG shops when those units were being painted and one stenciled!  Good question, Mark, And, Mike, are there pictures you don't have?!!!

[daveklepper]

The New York Central operated steam into The Bronx on the Putnam untilo about 1949-1950.   And the New Haven had two steam 0-6-0T shop switchers in operation at the Van Ness Bronx electricl locomotive and mu shop until 1956.  Revernue steam on the NYNH&H ended in 1952 in the Boston area.

[wanswheel]

Taps

http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/ppmsca/19200/19278v.jpg

http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/ppmsca/13300/13355v.jpg

http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/cph/3c30000/3c32000/3c32700/3c32799v.jpg

http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/ppmsca/13300/13352v.jpg

http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/cph/3g00000/3g06000/3g06200/3g06266v.jpg

A short line in Arkansas and three in Florida are owned by a company whose president is Harry E. Salzberg's great-grandson. What was the first railroad this company owned, nicknamed the Hoot, Toot & Whistle?

Mike

[Deggesty]

wanswheel

A short line in Arkansas and three in Florida are owned by a company whose president is Harry E. Salzberg's great-grandson. What was the first railroad this company owned, nicknamed the Hoot, Toot & Whistle?

Mike

Everybody should know of the Hoosac Tunnel and Wilmington. It ran north from a junction with the B&M.

Johnny

[henry6]

Just discussing this same family and empire over dinner this evening (obvious with railfan friend)...and it being so easy with Mark's clues...lets add another question mark if only for extra credit:  What NYC enterprise did they also own?

[wanswheel]

Johnny, that's right, your turn. I'm guessing H. E. Salzberg regarded HT&W as scrap metal before he sold it to his son-in-law Samuel M. Pinsly. Readsboro, Vermont was the first terminal before the Wilmington extension opened in 1892, and as far north as the tracks went on the 1948 map.

http://middarchive.middlebury.edu/u?/vtpostcards,728

Sam & Company

http://www.pinsly.com/page1127.html

Henry, I think you're referring to former electric transit, the remnants of New York & Queens County Railway and the Steinway Railway that became bus lines.

[henry6]

Ahhh  yes...knew you'd know...I did get to ride the remnant Queensboro Bridge car not too long before its demise.  BTW, the conversation I referred to was in conjunction with the release of an upcoming book on the Unadilla Valley RR.

[Deggesty]

wanswheel

Johnny, that's right, your turn.

This question is about a one-of-a-kind shortline. This road was named for its endpoints--it actually ran between them (it has, comparatively recently, been extended beyond one of them, and now passes through the town in which I grew up). Among other Vice-Presidents, such as "in Charge of White Horse Supply" (W. F. Halsey), "in Charge of the Internal Audit" (Lucius Beebe), it had a "Vice-President in Charge of Unveiling."

Name the railroad, the Vice-President in Charge of Unveiling, and the object unveiled.

I could not tell you how many times I passed by the object.

Johnny

[al-in-chgo]

That Lucius Beebe, he could sure turn a phrase.  But some of his paragraphs were godawful. 

 

[wanswheel]

Vice President Gypsy Rose Lee unveiled the Lancaster & Chester miniature railway?

http://blog.modernmechanix.com/mags/qf/c/MechanixIllustrated/2-1952/baby_railroad/xlg_baby_railroad_0.jpg

http://blog.modernmechanix.com/mags/qf/c/MechanixIllustrated/2-1952/baby_railroad/xlg_baby_railroad_1.jpg

http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=717

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1494295

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1531648

[Deggesty]

wanswheel

Vice President Gypsy Rose Lee unveiled the Lancaster & Chester miniature railway?

http://blog.modernmechanix.com/mags/qf/c/MechanixIllustrated/2-1952/baby_railroad/xlg_baby_railroad_0.jpg

http://blog.modernmechanix.com/mags/qf/c/MechanixIllustrated/2-1952/baby_railroad/xlg_baby_railroad_1.jpg

http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=717

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1494295

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1531648

Well, Mike, you got two out of three. If you look at your fourth link, you will see, in the background the object that was publically unveiled--the headquarters building of the L&C. The locomotive in the picture is fouling Lancaster's Main Street; the Southern's Kingville-Rock Hill-Marion line crossed Main Street a little bit north. A few years ago, the L&C bought what was left of this Southern line that was south of Lancaster, adding not quite two-thirds to its length. Thus, the railroad now serves another of the Springs mills, in Kershaw.

As to Springs Park, it was really a nice place in the mid to late forties. I do not remember just what year it was, but our Sunday School teacher took us up there twice. For its size, the railroad gave a nice ride. There were two WWII fighter planes and one WWII bomber there; I do not remember just what they were; we could get into the cockpits and pretend that we were flying them. Another attraction that I remember was a duckpin alley.

I regret that I never did get a copy of the L&C timetable or of the L&C diner menu (if so desired, you could order filet of flounder or floundering filly, along with many other interesting items).

W. F. (Bull) Halsey was in charge of obtaining Emperor Hirohito's white horse to satisfy General Jonathan Wainwright's desire to own it.

Now, how will you amuse us today?

Johnny

[wanswheel]

http://memory.loc.gov/service/pnp/cph/3c10000/3c16000/3c16400/3c16412v.jpg

Five months after Andrew Jackson's ride on the B&O in 1833, who was the second President to ride a train and on what railroad?

Mike

[Texas Zepher]

wanswheel

Five months after Andrew Jackson's ride on the B&O in 1833, who was the second President to ride a train and on what railroad?

Do you mean who was the person that road a railroad five months after Andrew Jackson....who later became president?   Jackson's term didn't end until 1837, so another president could not have ridden the railroad five months after that be it in 1833 or 1834.....

Van Buren hated railroads and is the one who at one time tried to get them outlawed.  Probably mostly because he was invested in canal companies, but it could have been because he road on one.

My guess would be Polk, he seems a progressive kind of guy.
 

[wanswheel]

Actually former President and incumbent Congressman in 1833.

[daveklepper]

Andrew Jackson?