The 70s

[soumodeler]

If my layout ever gets running, it will be set in the 70s. I know very little about the 70s and mainly chose it because of the equipment the Southern Railway had at this time. So I have a few questions:

1) NJ International Crossing Gates come in four styles: black and white and red and white bar, and b&w and r&w "A". What would be the right kind to get, or am I way off?

2) Signals: what kind would be used in this era?

3) Walthers Medusa Cement Company, Golden Valley Canning, and Dayton Machine Co: are they right for this time?

Thanks for any help.

soumodeler
-----------------
The Southern Serves the South!
www.cgmrc-macon.com

[trainfan1221]

I can only answer one part. Many crossing gates on well used mainlines were switched to red and white by then. I think either would be all right for the 70s. Most red and white gates are the single bar, not the A. You didn't mention scale, but I know NJ international makes appropriate gates in N scale. I don't know about HO.

[ShaunCN]

don't forget about rolling stock changes, from full height ladders and high brake weels, roof walks ect were almost gone by this time.

[Anonymous]

I REALLY hope the '70s weren't that long ago! Unfortunately, I am afraid I'm wrong! This is VERY SAD.
[:O]
Not helpful for you, though!

[soumodeler]

I model in HO scale and a branch line. So black and white and the A gate?

soumodeler
------------------
The Southern Serves the South!
www.cgmrc-macon.com

[MisterBeasley]

Yeah, and Disco. The Summer of Love was over.

[AntonioFP45]

I was a teen then. To me, it was not so long ago.

By the way, those industries you mention fit right in!

I can tell you what I saw and/or photographed:

1. There were still 40ft. box cars running around, though very few by 1978.
2. Railbox cars made their big splash in the mid 70s. A big hit with railfans. (Plus, virtually no graffitti back then either!)
3. Southern 50 ft. Boxcars with "We give a Green LIght to Innovations" seemed to be everywhere!
4. Not sure about Southern, but on the SCL a lot of the traditional "traffic light" style signals were replaced with the single faced "Target signals" as they were cheaper on maintenance. A few semaphores still lingered on active branchlines.
5. Most, but not all roofwalks on boxcars were gone.
6.As late as 1978 there were still some "A style" crossing gate bars in service but were being quickly replaced by the new single blade bars. I remember seeing a big pile of rotting wooden A-bars near a CTC tower. There were black and white as well as red and white bars. (Many of the wooden A bars had been painted over with red stripes before being retired eventually).

One tip about railroads of the U.S south: They tended to "slowly ease into changes" rather than "wham-slam" like some western roads. So don't worry about being too exact.

[orsonroy]

I remember the 1970s, barely (I was born in 1970). Since my dad was a railfan and worked for the N&W before the PC bankruptcy, I got dragged along on lots of railfanning trips, especially around the Chicago rail yards, peeking into what was left of the "glory days" of railroading. Before 1976, I spent more time in commuter coaches and South Shore Battleships than I did in cars.

My take on the '70s: everything was filthy and ready to fall apart. The equipment that WAS newly painted was garish, with really bad graphics. Really destitute roads (Rock, Milwaukee) would add new, sickly-colored paint to ancient engines in a vain attempt to make them look modern (remember the Rock's Bicentennial E unit? I was there for it's unveiling. The blue paint was still wet, and the engine leaked oil). Roads were making due with beat to heck old geeps and F's (C&NW, PC) until they literally fell apart. Alcos and EMDs smoked about the same. The old steam infrastructure was still in place (water towers, coal docks, line shantys), and none of it had been painted in 30 years. 40 foot boxcars WITH running boards were everywhere, and I still remember a few single sheathed cars. The few shiny & new engines and equipment were mostly from the West, and especially the ATSF, BN and UP. Even the E-L's engines got dirty fast. And for some reason, only Amtrak's Turbo Train ever looked new.

To me, the 1970's is a dreary, dirty place. Fascinating to look at, and probably neat to model, but I'll stick with what I didn't see, and what I don't have a bias against.

[soumodeler]

QUOTE: Originally posted by AntonioFP45


2. Railbox cars made their big splash in the mid 70s. A big hit with railfans. (Plus, virtually no graffitti back then either!)

So in 1975 there would probably not be many Railbox cars on a branchline? Maybe 1 or 2 now and then?

If anybody could point me in the direction of some photos from this period it would be very helpful. I can't seem to find anything other than locomotives.

soumodeler
-----------------
The Southern Serves the South!
www.cgmrc-macon.com

[MidlandPacific]

I generally agree with orsonroy - is there anything uglier than Rock Island "bankruptcy blue?" - but I submit to you that to anyone growing up in the South in the 1970s, the Southern Railway was a notable corrective to the age of Carter and malaise. The Southern didn't just remind us of a better age in railroading: its determination to persist in healthy practices was a hint that the practices themselves might bring the good times back again. Anyone who bought Southern stock in the 1970s and held on to it will no doubt agree with me that it was right.

I spent as much of the 1970s as I could manage trackside on the Southern, most of it in or around Fairfax station in VA, so here's what I remember:

The Geeps and SDs were generally well-maintained and clean (and run long-hood forward, a Southern-specific tic); the rust-brown boxcars Antonio mentions were common, new, and generally clean: in addition to the motto Antonio mentions, a lot of cars still had the traditional "Southern Serves the South" motto, too.

There were a lot of interchange cars from the roads you would expect: N&W, SCL, and a lot of southern shortlines and shippers (Georgia-Pacific was particularly common). I can remember seeing Railbox cars in all states of repair, as well as cars from shortlines like the Ma & Pa that had got into the boxcar supply business. The Southern's facilities were either well-maintained or demolished, although there were some obsolete wooden structures that were slowly decaying, usually depots. It was an up-to-date railroad in every respect, and it was well-managed, too: Graham Claytor, who was the president at the time, was a tremendous guy. As a corporate lawyer, he argued the case before the Supreme Court that eventually allowed more competitive pricing on unit trains, and he was the driving force behind the steam excursion program - a lot of Saturdays you'd see him out on the platform at Front Royal or Charlottesville, walking around in a suit, but as approachable as any other employee of the railroad.

Signals were the 3-color light type, I think.

The "Southern Crescent" was still a Southern-run train, and it was well-maintained - pulled by E units in the green, cream and gold scheme. The steam excursions were going full blast, and the 4501 was out every summer, usually on the point of a string of well-maintained heavyweight coaches. I think 722 had gone out of service by the mid-1970s, but the Southern took its steam program seriously, and imported a T&P 2-10-4 (painted in Southern colors) and a Royal Hudson in the late 70s and the early 80s.

[soumodeler]

Ok, so the three-color signals were still in on branches. Here are two very rough drawings of my layout:





To have an accurate signal system, should I put three color signals at 2, 3, 5 (nonworking, as it is facing the wrong way), 6, and 7? 1 and 4 should be ??? dwarf-type? Should they be 2 or 3 light?

Also: ballast? Appalachain branchline railroad. What should I use?

soumodeler
-----------------
The Southern Serves the South!
www.cgmrc-macon.com

[West Coast S]

I spent the 70s in the west... It was fantastic train watching in California.. The East and midwest were burdened with decayed railroads that should have been abandoned and consigned to the dustbin of history when Henry Ford unvailed the Model A.

SP,UP,WP,SF,BN were at their zenith, and all independent, new power was replacing the old, but these 1st gen. units were still a common sight, open trainorder offices and paper orders ruled the day..

The SD40-2 was introduced, TOFC proved the salvation of many a road.. We had the Bicentenial which added considerable color to the rails. trainmasters on the SFcommute route, N&W steam excursions.. What's not to like?

Dave

[Anonymous]

"Roof walks" (correctly called running boards) were illegal in interchange after 1977. The flashing beacons on top of loco cabs became common. A few roads (SP and D&RG) used other "safety" devices like oscillating lights on the front end of locomotives.
I don't remember the midwest being burdened with dying railroads other than the Rock and the Milwaukee. ATSF, BN, SP via subsidiary Cotton Belt were all "midwestern" railroads to us. The Missouri Pacific, which had not yet been swallowed up by UP was in good shape, as well. Back east was another story. Penn Central (Conrail after 1976) and neighboring roads were declining. Conrail came back strong in the 80s, however. Norfolk and Western, which was "back east" for sure, was solid and as in the black as it's paint scheme indicated. Intermodal was growing quite a bit in the 1970s.
Hope this helps.

Cheers,

[orsonroy]

QUOTE: Originally posted by ebriley

"Roof walks" (correctly called running boards) were illegal in interchange after 1977.

True, but I photographed in-service cars as late as 1999 with running boards. In the 1970s, they were still relatively common.

QUOTE:
I don't remember the midwest being burdened with dying railroads other than the Rock and the Milwaukee.

Then you must have forgotten all the roads that made up Conrail, and which made it to Chicago and beyond, E-L and PC especially. And none of the roads that came into the Midwest from the east really looked healthy. The N&W was still choking on it's 1964 NKP and Waba***akeover, and had a really bad looking roster with at least three of it's own schemes (remember their blue phase?) plus all the schemes of the absorbed roads. The Monon was still (barely) alive, but hadn't seen paint in 10+ years. The Soo introduced a nice white & red paint scheme, and then never washed it. Even BN looked horrible for a few years after their 1969 merger, since nothing got cleaned or touched up until the engines or cars were ready for a major shopping or scrapping. The early and mid-1970s was a circus trapped in a coal chute.

[soumodeler]

So basically everything needs to be weathered to some extent except for the brand new cars and locomotives like the SD40-2s? I have several 40' boxcars from C&NW, CofG, VGN, etc. Weather these heavily? Newer boxcars such as Southern 50', light weathering?

soumodeler
-----------------
The Southern Serves the South!
www.cgmrc-macon.com

[SpaceMouse]

Don't believe any of them. If you remember the 70's you weren't there.

[West Coast S]

Ah.. Spacemouse, Hustle to the strobe of the Disco Ball...BTW what did you name your pet rock?


Dave

[AntonioFP45]

Hmmm. It wasn't all disco. Seems like that's the stereotype image of the 70s.

But then again I'm sure 20 years from now, the stereotype of this time period will be ganster rap and goth, inspite of the fact that there's a lot more than those two music genres (which, BTW, I can't stand)

Let's see, since I was there in the 70s, what other music do I remember?

Pablo Cruz, The Emotions, Brick, Steely Dan, The Doobie Brothers,

10CC, Al Stewart, Paul McCartney, Loretta Lynn, Johnny Cash,

Isaac Hayes, Manhattan Transfer, The Commodores, Heatwave

,.............Looks like there was plenty of Soul, Rock, Comtemporary, and Country to go around in the 70s. [;)]

How much fun it was for me as a teen......working on my Blue Box Athearns in my bedroom as I Iistened to "tunes" on my parents hallway stereo from the groups above.

[TrainFreak409]

PLEASE, tell me you are going to put in a Roller Disco, or at least a simple Roller Rink.

One of the many structures that are rarely modeled...Roller skating rinks.

I'll have one![:D]

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by orsonroy

QUOTE: Originally posted by ebriley

"Roof walks" (correctly called running boards) were illegal in interchange after 1977.

True, but I photographed in-service cars as late as 1999 with running boards. In the 1970s, they were still relatively common.

Not in interchange. Company service cars maybe.

Then you must have forgotten all the roads that made up Conrail, and which made it to Chicago and beyond, E-L and PC especially.

Never saw either in the 70s. I lived a couple of hundred miles west of the Mississippi. Neither came this far west.
. The Monon was still (barely) alive, but hadn't seen paint in 10+ years.

None of us west of Indiana saw much (if any) of the Monon

The Soo introduced a nice white & red paint scheme, and then never washed it.
I'll take your word for it.

Even BN looked horrible for a few years after their 1969 merger, since nothing got cleaned or touched up until the engines or cars were ready for a major shopping or scrapping.

I often visited the BN yard in St. Joseph, MO in the mid 70s and photographed a lot of the action there. Everything was always clean and shiny. Much of it was still in Chineese Red and even saw some stuff in Big Sky Blue. Nearly all of it was clean. The merger was in 1970, not 1969.

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