Norfolk and Western coal train

[Fernando]

Hey folks,

How was a typically NW coal train consist, in the late '50? I know it had Virginian and NW cars. But, in the mix, were there other railroads cars?

Thank's

[Piyer]

The Virginian / N&W merger was at the very end of the 1950s - December, 1959 - so, in theory, there was no mixing of cars until the 1960s. That said, a typical mine run would have been all N&W cars; however, that doesn't mean that only N&W cars could be found on their rails. RailPictures.Net has one photo (see below) from August of 1958 that shows a Y6a (2-8-8-2) in helper service. The caboose it is pushing against is clearly N&W and the last car in the train is clearly Clinchfield. Other photos on that site show the hopper to be part of a regular freight train - at least giving one the justification for running foreign road hoppers on an N&W model railroad.

[jward]

the n&w and virginian were fierce competitors, hauling coal from the same fileds to the same port. before the merger, Virginian cars in n&w trains were probably pretty rare. they were, however, a common sight after the merger right up to the early 1980s. for what it's worth, I've never seen an accurate model of a Virginian car. the ones I commonly saw had a distinctive flare to the bottom of the side sheets, toward the ends of the car.

[Fernando]

Thank's for the information. But what I would like to know was the typical composition of a coal train after N&W acquired Virginian, in the late '50 or early '60. As I said, it was, mainly, a mixed of N&W and Virginian hoppers, but I heard that cars from other rairoads, like C&O, Clinchfield or so also might appear in the consist. That's the question. Thank you again.

[jward]

this is a little later than you asked, but the 1970s were the era I saw firsthand.

in addition to the mix of n&w and vgn cars, you'd often find former nickel plate cars. the nkp were 3 bay offset side cars which really stood out in the trains. cars were a random mixture of 70 ton and 100 ton cars, most if not all of the smaller 55ton cars had been retired by that time.

perhaps the person to ask would be the n&w historical society. ed painter, who was a society officer, gren up in narrows, va between bluefield and Roanoke, and saw the constant parade of coal trains on a daily basis. I got down that area with my dad maybe once a year, but I lived within 5 miles of the former p&wv, and the mix of cars in the coalfields of west pa and eastern ohio was pretty much the same as Roanoke.