What car at the tail of a consist pre WW2?

[oldstuff]

I'm used to UK practice, where each independent section of a train needed a guard, either in a seperate van, or in a special compartment in a passenger/brake carriage, either at the rear or in the middle of the train, but I'm not clear what US practice in the steam era was (specifically 30s 40s). It is clear that a combine, which looks like a UK passenger/brake, is mostly just a passenger and baggage car, and in lots of cases sits at the head end of a train; and I know that "head end" cars such as express reefers could also be tagged onto the tail end if they needed to be detached en-route. So are there any rules, or general practice, about what types of cars are allowed/required at the tail end of a passenger consist? I'm aware of observation cars, but cleary they weren't carried on every train, and they don't usually have any kind of "guard" function. The usual solution of looking at photos is hampered by the fact that very few photos are of tail ends, unless they feature an observation car.

 

[dave1905]

The concept of a "guard" isn't in the US (I'm not even sure what they did).

On a passenger train the crew were just in the passenger compartment and they didn't have any car of their own. Typically the last car in a passenger train was just the last car. In most cases a coach. Special "name" trains would have an observation car.

A combine has a baggage compartment, its not quarters for the crew.

 

[bob]

Dave, the "Guard" is the brakeman/conductor in the UK.

For quite some time, not sure exactly what dates, the job required being an actual brakeman, using a hand brake in the guard van to slow the train, help control slack between the cars etc. So it was a lot like our caboose, except used far more for braking.

I'm not well versed on UK rail history, so I don't know when they switched braking systems, and I know they used vacuum brakes for quite some time.

Here in the United States, the modern style air brake was created in the 1872 and improved with a fast acting valve in 1887. It's essentially the same system in use today. By 1900, they were widely used, and brakeman no longer had to run over the top of the cars apply the hand brake manually. Of course with so many railroad cars and lines, the full transition took a long time.

I am of the impression that the UK never had running boards / roof walks on the top of the cars. They did shorter and lighter trains, had buffers to control slack, and used the guard van for braking power. So their brakeman was the guard, and he worked entirely from the brake van. They had a large brake wheel mounted vertically in the center of the car.

Also, the UK took far longer to install full braking. Per wikipedia:
"In Great Britain, freight trains without a continuous train braking system in either the whole train or the rearmost section of the train ("unfitted" or "partly fitted", respectively in UK railway parlance) were still prevalent in the 1970s, but mostly eliminated by the 1980s. "

British railway brake van - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[bob]

I'm used to UK practice, where each independent section of a train needed a guard, either in a seperate van, or in a special compartment in a passenger/brake carriage, either at the rear or in the middle of the train, but I'm not clear what US practice in the steam era was (specifically 30s 40s). It is clear that a combine, which looks like a UK passenger/brake, is mostly just a passenger and baggage car, and in lots of cases sits at the head end of a train; and I know that "head end" cars such as express reefers could also be tagged onto the tail end if they needed to be detached en-route. So are there any rules, or general practice, about what types of cars are allowed/required at the tail end of a passenger consist? I'm aware of observation cars, but cleary they weren't carried on every train, and they don't usually have any kind of "guard" function. The usual solution of looking at photos is hampered by the fact that very few photos are of tail ends, unless they feature an observation car.

A combine was, as the name implies, combination of a baggage car and a passenger car. Typically they were used on branchlines and lines that didn't have a lot of passenger. We had something called a "mixed train", which was a train made up of freight cars, and a passenger car, often a combine, tacked on the end. It would haul baggage, express, and a few passengers. Those were quite common on branches in rural areas.

As for a regular passenger train, typically you'd have a full size baggage car. There could also be a Railway Express boxcar, the UPS/FedEx of the day. Many lines also carried mail cars. These had windows, as the mail crew would work on board, sorting mail as the train went, and tossing off and picking up mail along the way. At a glance, you might mistake those for a combine.

The train would then have passenger cars, maybe a diner, maybe a lounge car, and then sleeping cars when appropriate. If it was a premier train, usually a "Name" train (one that had a name instead of just a number), it would have a "tail car". Often a lounge or observation car. Typically for first class passengers only, it was a way to attract customers. In the streamliner era, if you were lucky, it would be a dome car. Earlier era might have the open platform observation car, the classic car you might think of on the back of the train.

However, for many regular trains, commuter trains, lesser passenger trains, etc., the last car in the train was, simply, the last car. Coach or sleeper if the train carried them. Nothing special and no special braking function or crew accommodations. The conductor would often make use of a room in one of the sleepers, if space was available. If not, he'd simply find space in the coach or if he would have a dining car in the train, where he could grab a table, giving him a place for his paperwork as well as a supply of coffee. In that era the conductor was almost always a male, I'd say always but maybe during the war some line had female conductors? If so, it was very unusual.

 

[oldstuff]

Excellent info! Thanks for all this. This is a real help. Not having room for a giant layout (This is the UK, and my house is a cottage built in the 1790s) I'm working up a passenger shifting layout. A what the heck? I hear you ask. You can see the end of a terminal. Trains come in, but you only see the first few cars. The loco is taken off to be serviced, the head end cars (express reefers etc) are taken away and the consist disappears back off scene to be cleaned, or turned., but you only see the first few cars. When it is time for the train to depart a shifter draws in the train, tail end first. After a suitable pause for the (unseen) loco to be attached the train departs.

I have had no problem with finding consists for the big name expresses, but I wanted to know what the lesser trains would look like at the tail end, and now, thanks to the forum, I do. Of course building the correct cars (and some of the locos) is not so straightforwards and will keep me occupied for a while, and for some trains I might only have one end, but then this is only half a station, and there are obviously other tracks and platforms. Date is slightly flexible and runs 1937 to 1941. Location, a fictional Chicago. Lines represented are going to be the Pennsylvania, the New York Central, and the Illinois Central.

So far I'm looking at boxes containing most the bits I need to build what I want. The shifters are all diesels from the Illinois Central and the Elgin, Joliet and Eastern. I have a reasonable amount for the head and tail of the Twentieth Century Limited, and The Broadway Limited, and the tail end of the South Wind. also a couple of consists of heavyweights from the Pennsylvania, and the Illinois Central. I've started on collecting stuff for the James Whitcombe Riley, and the Trail Blazer, and maybe more heavyweight stuff.

There is going to be a fair amount of converting and scratch building going on. Is the Bethlehem Car Works still in operation, or has it gone the way of most of the small suppliers?

 

[bob]

My suggestion would be to visit the historical society webpages for the railroads you're interested in. Many of them have extensive records, and would be able to give you a list of what trains arrived and departed during a certain time period. So, let's say you pick PRR and 1940. The first thing you'd do is look at the public timetables. You'll see a list of all trains arriving and departing. Then you can start working on typical consists for those trains.

I've seen photos of layouts like the one you suggest, and also seen some creative ways of saving space, like "selector plates", "staging cassettes" and transfer tables to allow you to take trains on and off the set, so to speak, in minimal room.

 

[Selector]

Trains prior to about 1980 (I don't recall exactly when, and it varied between the US and Canada), either had a caboose (freight and some mixed consists where a short line might run a couple of passenger cars and some freight at the same time), or simply an observation/parlour car at the tail end of a full passenger consist. Also, passenger-only trains were not the norm, although not unheard of by any means. I mean that most passenger trains, especially express trains where the head-end power was capable, would also have reefers and mail cars, plus the usual baggage cars. The Class 1 "limited' crack trains that ran between major centres at 79 mph were often 18 or more cars, many of them the 70+ ton heavyweights, with one or more dining cars running nearer to 85 tons. There would have been no great desire to add a 40 ton caboose to the tail end of such a consist that had to make it on its own up the sometimes severe grades on a given run.

 

[dave1905]

Also, passenger-only trains were not the norm, although not unheard of by any means. I mean that most passenger trains, especially express trains where the head-end power was capable, would also have reefers and mail cars, plus the usual baggage cars. The Class 1 "limited' crack trains that ran between major centres at 79 mph were often 18 or more cars, many of them the 70+ ton heavyweights, with one or more dining cars running nearer to 85 tons.

I would disagree with the premise that most trains were not "passenger only" (which I assume you mean to be all coach). Most model railroad trains are certainly are, but prototype trains, maybe not. For example, the PRR might run one Broadway Limited a day, but would run 300 all coach trains in and out of New York and another 200 trains a day in and out of Phillie. The Reading ran maybe a dozen trains a day with head end cars and a hundred or more all coach trains per day. In New York, by the time you add in the CNJ, DLW, NH into the mix there were probably 10-20 all "passenger" trains for every train with head end equipment (if not more).

The difference is that nobody wanted to photograph the boring, they all look the same, commuter and coach trains. The exciting and cool looking trains were the name trains. They were the ones photographed.

 

[Selector]

I could have taken the time to state my case more carefully, Dave. Agreed, commuters, most with fewer than seven coaches, and often powered by 4-6-2 steamers, would have been solely coaches. However, the mail had to get from hamlets and wayside towns to the hubs as much as the mail had to be expressed between the major centres, and faster than many freights could get them there, so some would have had a combine at the very least. On the express trains going between Chicago and St. Louis, for example, there would most often have been two, three, even four express/mail type cars. Due to their need for fast shipment, especially over-night, reefers and mail cars were preferentially assigned to fast power.

 

[cv_acr]

On the other hand, the specific question was "what would be on the tail end of 'lesser' trains?", which would be "nothing special".

Observation/lounge cars were only on the fancier "name" trains.

Regular local trains might have a baggage and one or several coaches, and that's it. The "combination" baggage-coach cars were used on really minor branchline runs with low traffic so that a single car contained both baggage and passenger space. Sometimes these branchline trains were also "mixed", meaning they handled both the regular freight on the line as well as the combine passenger car. Such a mixed train would generally also have a caboose for the train crew like any other freight train. Otherwise, North American passenger trains did not ever have anything analogous to the UK "guard" compartments.

 

[Iron Horseman]

Date is slightly flexible and runs 1937 to 1941. Location, a fictional Chicago. Lines represented are going to be the Pennsylvania, the New York Central, and the Illinois Central.

It doesn't matter for your plan but just FYI. In the prototype Chicago each of those railroads worked out of a different station. Pennsy was in the Union Station, NYC was at the La Salle, and the IC had their own Central Station. In all Chicago had 6 main (and a few lesser) stations serving the 24 or so railroads of the city.

For consist information the best thing would be to inquire at each of the respective railroads historical society. Usually the work-a-day trains got generic equipment or hand-me-downs from the premier trains. Unfortunately I have not studied any of the roads you mentioned but for example the Rio Grande, when they needed a daily passenger train say from Denver to Salt Lake the switch crew would get a list that said 3 coach, 1 diner, and 1 parlor. They would just go and pull what ever cars were available from the coach yard/commissary track and throw them into a train. They continued this practice into the streamlined era. That is why many D&RGW trains looked so wonky and miss matched. There was no concern for matching paint schemes or mixing heavy weight cars and the stream liners.

Another note. Some passenger cars floor plans actually have a conductor space or office in them. Can't find my book that says which of the Pullman plans that do right now, but later than your time frame, the California Zephyr Budd dome coaches came in three varieties. The one designated as design CZ-21 had an office for the conductor. It even had a window! It was generally the 2nd dome in the train.