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Classic Train Questions Part Deux (50 Years or Older)

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Posted by 16-567D3A on Saturday, July 25, 2015 12:02 AM

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Posted by daveklepper on Sunday, July 26, 2015 7:29 AM

Very interesting question, a good one.  Classroom perhaps?

Rules examinations?

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Posted by rcdrye on Sunday, July 26, 2015 6:49 PM

How about prisoner transport?  The Federal Penitentiary in Atlanta was becoming the eastern alternative to Alcatraz during the period.

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Posted by 16-567D3A on Sunday, July 26, 2015 11:54 PM

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Posted by rcdrye on Monday, July 27, 2015 9:28 AM

To continue with the theme... Al Capone and "Machine Gun" Kelly were later transferred from Atlanta to Alcatraz by special train.  I'll accept any account of their transfer that includes the popular name for the train and a description of the final miles of the train ride in the Bay Area.

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Posted by NP Eddie on Monday, July 27, 2015 8:17 PM

Rob and All:

I remember seeing newsreels of SP coaches with barred windows. If my memory serves me correctly, the coaches were loaded on a car ferry for the ride across the Bay.

Ed Burns

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Monday, July 27, 2015 9:29 PM

16-567D3A

 Its believed that Al Capone arrived in Atlanta on this car in the consist of the Dixie Flyer on May 2 1932 to serve his sentence in the Atlanta pen,but I have been unable to confirm this.News accounts of the day i looked up and found only refer to his arrival from Chicago with US Marshals on a Specially equipped car.  

Actually, Capone was transported to Atlanta in a Drawing Room and shared an upper berth with another prisoner.  The sleeper they were situated in was next to the last car of the Dixie Flyer.  When the train arrived in Atlanta, the car was moved to a siding and Capone was taken off and transported by car to the penitentiary.

The information was derived from "From the Midwest to Florida by Rail, 1875-1979", published by the PRRT&HS.

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Monday, July 27, 2015 9:44 PM

rcdrye

To continue with the theme... Al Capone and "Machine Gun" Kelly were later transferred from Atlanta to Alcatraz by special train.  I'll accept any account of their transfer that includes the popular name for the train and a description of the final miles of the train ride in the Bay Area.

 

The train was dubbed the "Forty Theves Special" and instead of traveling directly to Oakland or San Francisco, the train was routed around the Bay Area via Martinez, Napa Junction, and San Rafael on the Northwestern Pacific, finally stopping in Tiburon, where the prisoners were transported via boat to Alcatraz.

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Posted by daveklepper on Tuesday, July 28, 2015 2:20 AM

I remember reading about this train, if not in Trains or Classic Trains, then in Passenger Trains Journal.   Although a coach brought Al Capone from Chicago to Atlanta, did not the 40 Thieves' Special have Pullman cars for the comfort primarily of the guards?

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Posted by rcdrye on Tuesday, July 28, 2015 6:10 AM

ZO has the correct answer on the train's nickname, and NP Eddie has the end of the trip.  SP provided a pair of coaches for the prisoners, and the train was routed via New Orleans (WPR/L&N), Los Angeles, Oakland and Martinez to Tiburon.  In Tiburon the coaches were placed on a carfloat normally used for NWP to transfer freight cars to San Francisco, to prevent an escape while transferring to the ferry.  Probably one of the most heavily guarded movements ever, with engine changes away from major terminals and Thompson-carrying US Marshalls.  Photos of the train do show Pullman cars in the consist.

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Tuesday, July 28, 2015 10:11 AM

NPEddie - Why don't you go ahead and ask the next question.

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Posted by NP Eddie on Wednesday, July 29, 2015 10:52 AM

ZO and All:

My brain is in neutral, so Zephyr can ask the next question. I see your picture next to a MILW Skytop car. What a nice picture!

Ed Burns

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Wednesday, August 5, 2015 11:59 AM

NP Eddie

ZO and All:

My brain is in neutral, so Zephyr can ask the next question. I see your picture next to a MILW Skytop car. What a nice picture!

Ed Burns

 

 
The Milwaukee Road Skytop is Dell Rapids, which is in the Daytona Museum of Arts and Sciences in Daytona Beach, Florida.  But its time for a new avitar.
 
As for the question:
 
The Dixie Flyer - One of the classics from the golden age of the passenger train.
 
A train with this name was in existence from 1892 through 1969, two years before the coming of Amtrak.  But unlike most other trains, the Dixie Flyer name was applied over time to passenger runs with different endpoints, mostly with operations involving Midwest-Florida traffic.  The challenge here is to supply the endpoints of the various Dixie Flyer trains that existed.  I have seven possibilites, including two which shared the same endpoints but with different routings.
 
The interurban Dixie Flyer, which ran between Indianapolis and Louisville, is not included in the answer set.
 
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Posted by Wizlish on Wednesday, August 5, 2015 2:27 PM

ZephyrOverland
The challenge here is to supply the endpoints of the various Dixie Flyer trains that existed. I have seven possibilites, including two which shared the same endpoints but with different routings.

Does this include all the 'permutations' from Jacksonville south to the various east and west coast destinations as separate endpoints?  They were in the timetable under the train name...

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Wednesday, August 5, 2015 3:18 PM

Wizlish

 Does this include all the 'permutations' from Jacksonville south to the various east and west coast destinations as separate endpoints?  They were in the timetable under the train name...

 

 
No it would not.  Those endpoints (save one) you mention refer to through car lines the Dixie Flyer handled.  What I'm focusing on are the endpoints the train actually operated between, not the through car lines.
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Posted by Wizlish on Wednesday, August 5, 2015 3:57 PM

I know the easy parts

Originally Nashville to Atlanta

Then IC from Chicago and from St. Louis

Then C&EI from Chicago to Evansville & L&N; St.Louis to Evansville taken over by L&N in the early '40s;

From Atlanta south to JAX, initially on a road controlled by the Southern, later on C of G to Albany and then ACL.

According to the NC&StL preservation society, the FEC segment from JAX to Miami (from about 1904, anyway) counted as being the 'Dixie Flyer' up to some point, and not just cars handed over.  But I don't know any better, and it certainly wasn't the case by 1953.  Someone with the right range of OGs will know for sure.

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Wednesday, August 5, 2015 9:44 PM

Wizlish

I know the easy parts

Originally Nashville to Atlanta

Then IC from Chicago and from St. Louis

Then C&EI from Chicago to Evansville & L&N; St.Louis to Evansville taken over by L&N in the early '40s;

From Atlanta south to JAX, initially on a road controlled by the Southern, later on C of G to Albany and then ACL.

According to the NC&StL preservation society, the FEC segment from JAX to Miami (from about 1904, anyway) counted as being the 'Dixie Flyer' up to some point, and not just cars handed over.  But I don't know any better, and it certainly wasn't the case by 1953.  Someone with the right range of OGs will know for sure.

Nashville-Atlanta is one of the city pairs.  This was the original route of the Dixie Flyer in 1892.

Atlanta-Jacksonville is another city pair and was served by two different routes, one early in the train's history and the other one late in the train's career.  Still need the routes.

You have pieces of other answers.  As for the NC&StL information, in the early days of the Dixie Flyer, the railroad, in its advertising and through car descriptions, gave the impression that the train operated beyond Nashville and Atlanta.  It can be said that the Dixie Route was an early marketing example of "branding" a through car service, a practice that was somewhat common up to WW1.

 

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Posted by Deggesty on Wednesday, August 5, 2015 11:10 PM

The Dixie Flyer used four different routes Atlanta-Jacksonville that I know of:

Atlanta-Macon via CG; Macon-to a junction with what became SAL's Jacksonville-River Junction line via GS&F; thence into Jacksonville (1893).

Atlanta-Macon via CG; Macon-Tifton via GS&F; Tifton-Jacksonville via ACL (1917?).

After the Southern absorbed the GS&F, the CG carried the train to Albany, whence the ACL carried it to Jacksonville.

The last route was essentially a single road route--AB&C to Waycross and ACL to Jacksonville (mid-fifties).

For a short time after the GS&F went into the Southern System, the train still traveled over it; it was shown in the public timetable--with numbers only and no description.

I am currenly in a hospital, and have no access to most of my information.

I was unaware that it ever rode over the IC out of Chicago; I knew that the through service from St. Louis was at one time over the IC to a point in Tennessee where it connected with the NC&SL.

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Thursday, August 6, 2015 9:25 AM

Deggesty

The Dixie Flyer used four different routes Atlanta-Jacksonville that I know of:

Atlanta-Macon via CG; Macon-to a junction with what became SAL's Jacksonville-River Junction line via GS&F; thence into Jacksonville (1893).

Atlanta-Macon via CG; Macon-Tifton via GS&F; Tifton-Jacksonville via ACL (1917?).

After the Southern absorbed the GS&F, the CG carried the train to Albany, whence the ACL carried it to Jacksonville.

The last route was essentially a single road route--AB&C to Waycross and ACL to Jacksonville (mid-fifties).

For a short time after the GS&F went into the Southern System, the train still traveled over it; it was shown in the public timetable--with numbers only and no description.

I am currenly in a hospital, and have no access to most of my information.

I was unaware that it ever rode over the IC out of Chicago; I knew that the through service from St. Louis was at one time over the IC to a point in Tennessee where it connected with the NC&SL.

 
More pieces of the puzzle are coming together...
 
For the Atlanta-Jacksonville routings:
 
Atlanta-Macon via CG; Macon-to a junction with what became SAL's Jacksonville-River Junction line via GS&F; thence into Jacksonville (1893).  = This is actually part of a through Nashville-Tampa sleeping car line that the Nashville-Atlanta Dixie Flyer handled.  The G&SF handed off the car to the Florida Central & Peninsular (later part of SAL) at Lake City, Fl for Jacksonville and eventually Tampa.
 
Atlanta-Macon via CG; Macon-Tifton via GS&F; Tifton-Jacksonville via ACL. = This is correct.  In 1906, CofG, GS&F and ACL introduced the Atlanta-Jacksonville Dixie Flyer, which connected to the Nashville-Atlanta Dixie Flyer.  This particular version of the Flyer handled a through Nashville-Jacksonville coach and Chicago and St. Louis to Jacksonville through sleepers.
 
After the Southern absorbed the GS&F, the CG carried the train to Albany, whence the ACL carried it to Jacksonville. = True, but part of a longer Dixie Flyer that traveled beyond Atlanta, so this answer is incorrect in this context.
 
The last route was essentially a single road route--AB&C to Waycross and ACL to Jacksonville (mid-fifties). = This is correct.  In 1952 CofG petitioned to discontinue its portion of the Dixie Flyer and was quickly given permission to do so because ACL was going to reroute the Flyer via the former AB&C and Fitzgerald.  In 1966, L&N was allowed to drop its portion of the Flyer, leaving ACL's Atlanta-Fitzgerald-Jacksonville segment as the only portion of the Dixie Flyer still running at the time.
 
I knew that the through service from St. Louis was at one time over the IC to a point in Tennessee where it connected with the NC&SL. = This is correct.  In 1899, IC and NC&StL established the St. Louis-Nashville Dixie Flyer, which connected to the Nashville-Atlanta Dixie Flyer, and handled a through St. Louis-Jacksonville sleeper line. The IC connected with the NC&StL at Martin, Tn, but I think the latter handled the Flyer to and from Fulton via trackage rights. This train operated until 1918; afterwards, IC St. Louis-Florida sleepers were handled to its own Florida trains, The Seminole Limited and later, The Floridan.
 
I was unaware that it ever rode over the IC out of Chicago; = For the winter seasons of 1901-1904, IC handled a Chicago-Jacksonville sleeper that was handled on one of its New Orleans trains from Chicago and was switched to the St. Louis-Nashville Dixie Flyer at Fulton.  In the 1904 winter season, the car line was cut back to Chicago-Nashville, forcing passengers to change to one of the Florida sleepers that the NC&StL Dixie Flyer handled south of Nashville.
 
So far we have the following answers: Nashville-Atlanta; Atlanta-Jacksonville via Fitzgerald; Atlanta-Jacksonville via Albany; St. Louis-Nashville
 
Looking for three more answers.
    
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Posted by NP Eddie on Thursday, August 6, 2015 8:15 PM

ZO:

Thanks for all the information about Chicago-Florida service. Did Amtrak consider such service? I suspect not because of the small number of riders from Chicago to Florida and the many roads involved in taking the train from Chicago to Florida (maybe Jacksonville).

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Posted by Deggesty on Thursday, August 6, 2015 9:29 PM

NP Eddie

ZO:

Thanks for all the information about Chicago-Florida service. Did Amtrak consider such service? I suspect not because of the small number of riders from Chicago to Florida and the many roads involved in taking the train from Chicago to Florida (maybe Jacksonville).

Ed Burns

 

Yes, Eddie, Amtrak included the South Wind in its original routes, running approximately on the same schedule as the previous train--but by way of Kankakee. 

By the following spring, the schedule was changed to two nights out, renamed Floridian, and operated over the route of the former South Wind. This train had many vicissitudes as the track of this host road and that host road deteriorated and the train had to be rerouted. The last time I rode it, in 1978, it took the former Monon between some point near Chicago and Louisville (I do not recall how it got out of Chicago). I think it was put to death in 1989.

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Posted by Wizlish on Thursday, August 6, 2015 11:07 PM

ZephyrOverland
Looking for three more answers.

What happened to Chicago via C&EI to Evansville, then L&N to Nashville?

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Posted by daveklepper on Friday, August 7, 2015 5:52 AM

Did not, on start-up, Amtrak have a Florida - Chicago service, dropped later?

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Posted by rcdrye on Friday, August 7, 2015 8:53 AM

Amtrak's startup was the South Wind, replacing the former PRR leg Chicago-Logansport-Louisville with a hybrid NYC(B4)/PRR routing via Indianapolis, at the same time restoring through operation, from Central Station in Chicago instead of Union Station.  With the deterioration of PC's track it got rerouted a bunch of times before being discontinued in 1979.  Some of the routings used included L&N's ex-Monon route of today's Cardinal/Hoosier state and the old Dixie Flyer C&EI/L&N routing, by then all L&N.

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Friday, August 7, 2015 9:12 AM

Wizlish

 ZephyrOverland

Looking for three more answers.
 

The jist of this question is to flush out the various runs (endpoint to endpoint) the Dixie Flyer name was applied to.  

At one time, there was a train called the Dixie Flyer that operated Nashville-Atlanta only.  

At one time, there were two trains called the Dixie Flyer that operated Atlanta-Jacksonville only utlizing two different routes; one handled by three railroads and the other one handled by one railroad.

And at one time there was a train called the Dixie Flyer that operated St. Louis-Nashville only.

As for your answer, there was no Dixie Flyer that operated Chicago-Nashville only.

You're dancing with the answers....

 

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Posted by Wizlish on Friday, August 7, 2015 11:53 AM

Was not the original 'extension' via IC a train that ran Chicago to Atlanta under the one name?  The only map of East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia I can find predates the train by two years, and it shows the line running south of Atlanta to Jesup, where it connects with Savannah, Florida & Western (Plant System), presumably SW to Waycross then down to Jacksonville.  I think onlt the interchange sleepers followed this route, though, from 1899.

The C&EI - L&N - NCStL train definitely ran under 'the' name from Chicago to Atlanta.  Now you have me looking to see just what connection (from 1908) the train had south of Atlanta, to Macon/Albany and Jacksonville.  Will check and report what I find on this.

In 1925 during the land boom, the 'first section' of the Dixie Flyer (all Pullmans) ran straight through from Chicago/St.Louis to "Florida" (which I presume means Jacksonville).  This would be via the C of G Macon/Albany then ACL route.

I had been proceeding on the assumption that the St. Louis service acted like the Boston section of the NYC Chicago trains; it operated between StL and Evansville where it was incorporated into the train coming from Chicago.  Is that not what happened?

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Friday, August 7, 2015 5:43 PM

Wizlish

Was not the original 'extension' via IC a train that ran Chicago to Atlanta under the one name?  The only map of East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia I can find predates the train by two years, and it shows the line running south of Atlanta to Jesup, where it connects with Savannah, Florida & Western (Plant System), presumably SW to Waycross then down to Jacksonville.  I think onlt the interchange sleepers followed this route, though, from 1899.

The C&EI - L&N - NCStL train definitely ran under 'the' name from Chicago to Atlanta.  Now you have me looking to see just what connection (from 1908) the train had south of Atlanta, to Macon/Albany and Jacksonville.  Will check and report what I find on this.

In 1925 during the land boom, the 'first section' of the Dixie Flyer (all Pullmans) ran straight through from Chicago/St.Louis to "Florida" (which I presume means Jacksonville).  This would be via the C of G Macon/Albany then ACL route.

I had been proceeding on the assumption that the St. Louis service acted like the Boston section of the NYC Chicago trains; it operated between StL and Evansville where it was incorporated into the train coming from Chicago.  Is that not what happened?

 

The only involvement IC had with the Dixie Flyer was the St. Louis-Nashville connecting train (1899-1918) which transported a St. Louis-Jacksonville sleeper and the through Chicago-Jacksonville sleeper (1901-1904) that was handled by one of its New Orleans trains and was switched to the St. Louis-Nashville Dixie Flyer at Fulton.  South of Atlanta, the though sleepers ran via Tifton, Valdosta or Lake City.

Your post gives one of the answers: Chicago-Jacksonville, established in 1908.  And you are right about the St. Louis sleepers in that they were incorporated with the main Dixie Flyer at Evansville.  There were no pure St. Louis-Florida Dixie Route through trains.

The Dixie Flyer was unique in that what became the Chicago-Florida train was mostly cobbled together from separately running segments.  The C&EI-L&N Chicago-Nashville portion was newly created when the Chicago-Jacksonville Dixie Flyer was established.  The challenge is determining the through sleeping car routes handled by the Nashville-Atlanta Dixie Flyer vs. the actual train operating portions.  The operators of the through sleepers utilizing the NC&StL Dixie Flyer gave the impression that the Flyer was a through Chicago-Florida train when it was not (at least until 1908).  The Monon was also guilty of promoting through Chicago-Florida services as if they were through trains when in fact they were only through sleepers.

Your research of the Dixie Flyer during the Florida land boom should give you another answer and the last outstanding answer is from the Flyer's declining years.

 

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Posted by Wizlish on Saturday, August 8, 2015 2:44 AM

ZephyrOverland
Your research of the Dixie Flyer during the Florida land boom should give you another answer

The only thing I can come up with is that the 'block' in a timetable shows a continuous route (on ACL) to Sebring via Orlando.  (A number of other routes deviate from Orlando as separate services).  There is still what appears to be a substantial layover in Jacksonville, so I wouldn't consider this a continuation of the Flyer itself except for the layout of the timetable.

Your 'declining years' would probably be the C&EI schedule change of August 3rd, 1965, when the Flyer became in essence an Evansville-Jacksonville train (connecting with an almost incredibly inconvenient Danville-Evansville service 'set up to fail'.

(BTW, The Yellowstone sleeper from 1925 HAS to rank as one of the greatest runthrough 'stretches' of a service.

Prince's book on the NCStL (1967, I believe) has some very interesting details on the Dixie Flyer.

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Posted by ZephyrOverland on Saturday, August 8, 2015 8:54 AM

Wizlish

 

ZephyrOverland
Your research of the Dixie Flyer during the Florida land boom should give you another answer

The only thing I can come up with is that the 'block' in a timetable shows a continuous route (on ACL) to Sebring via Orlando.  (A number of other routes deviate from Orlando as separate services).  There is still what appears to be a substantial layover in Jacksonville, so I wouldn't consider this a continuation of the Flyer itself except for the layout of the timetable.

Your 'declining years' would probably be the C&EI schedule change of August 3rd, 1965, when the Flyer became in essence an Evansville-Jacksonville train (connecting with an almost incredibly inconvenient Danville-Evansville service 'set up to fail'.

(BTW, The Yellowstone sleeper from 1925 HAS to rank as one of the greatest runthrough 'stretches' of a service.

Prince's book on the NCStL (1967, I believe) has some very interesting details on the Dixie Flyer.

 
You brought another answer to the table: Evansville-Jacksonville.  
 
At one time the Dixie Route carried the majority of Chicago-Florida traffic, but due to competition and dwindling fortunes of C&EI, the mid-1940's saw the beginning of a relatively rapid decline of the line.  Its Chicago-Miami train, the Dixie Flagler (later Dixieland) was discontinued in 1957, leaving the Dixie Flyer as the sole Chicago-Florida train on the Dixie Route, by this time it was nothing more than a mail and express train.  As you mentioned, the C&EI gave up the Flyer in 1965, instead offering a Danville-Evansville connecting train.  The remaining Evansville-Jacksonville operation lasted less than a year, when L&N was allowed to discontinue its Evansville-Atlanta portion.  The remaining ACL (and SCL) Atlanta-Jacksonville segment limped along until 1969. 
 
The final answer I was looking for was Chicago-Miami, which the Flyer briefly operated for a few winter seasons in the mid-1920's.    
 
So, over its lifetime, the Dixie Flyer operated with these endpoints:
 
Nashville-Atlanta
St. Louis-Nashville
Atlanta-Jacksonville via Albany
Chicago-Jacksonville
Chicago-Miami
Evansville-Jacksonville
Atlanta-Jacksonville via Fitzgerald
 
Deggesty provided some of the answers, but because of your tenacity and getting some more of the answers, the next question is yours, Wizlish.
 
But the way, you mentioned about the Jacksonville-West Yellowsone sleeper.  Other really long distance sleeping car lines during this same time period include Jacksonville-Los Angeles and Birmingham-Los Angeles. 
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Posted by Wizlish on Saturday, August 8, 2015 11:48 PM

ZephyrOverland
Deggesty provided some of the answers, but because of your tenacity and getting some more of the answers, the next question is yours, Wizlish.

I wouldn't dream of it, although I respect your opinion.  Either you or Mr. Degges ask the next one...

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