1900-1930's trains in Texas

[Rangerflyer]

Hi I am wanting to model a steam layout of the area that I live ( central Texas) in what I need to know is this. What names would you find on rolling stock ? My engines I want to model would be the Wichita Falls Ranger & Fort Worth Railroad.
I have found pictures of boxcars from AT&SF,Frisco,MKT,T&P what others might be found ? Thanks for your help.

[J3a-614]

Hello, Ranger, welcome to the hobby.

In regard to what you are modeling and the time period, boxcars were very much general service cars, and a boxcar was indeed one that could come from anywhere and wind up anywhere.  Most would be from more local or regional roads as you have noticed, almost all would have been painted some sort of dull brown or red, but there would still be others from everywhere else.  And one of them will have to be from the Pennsylvania Railroad, because that was the biggest railroad in the country, and it owned 10% of the entire national freight car fleet!

Other cars might be more localized.  I don't think you would normally see hopper cars for coal in Texas (oil country), and it would be really unusual--almost impossible--to see a coal hopper from an eastern road like the B&O.  Those cars might run in interchange, but not too far, because the cost of shipping coal would become uncompetitive with a local fuel if the coal had to travel too far.  The same goes for cars for sand or other mineral products, with certain exceptions such as unusual ores, and even those are quite rare. 

Other "interchange" cars you might see in Texas in the 1930s would include flatcars for machinery and other things (mostly from the midwest, some from the east, some local), refrigerator cars (actually, most were not railroad-owned, but were run by car companies, such as Pacific Fruit Express), and tank cars (again, most would not be railroad owned).  Refrigerator cars would be colorful, and the same could be said for some tank cars, but keep in mind that most tankers would be pool service cars painted black and owned by a company like Union Tank Line or Shippers Car Line.  Other cars that would be common in Texas would likely include stock or "cattle" cars; most of these could also be home-road cars, but there could also be a good deal of interchange cars, especially as you seem to be modeling a relative small railroad.

Some passenger stock could also be in interchange service, too.  This could include sleeping cars running on a through route, and head-end cars, specifically express cars.  Express cars could be railroad owned, or they could be assigned to a carrier like Railway Express Agency (typically, these would be express refrigerator cars, but could include others). 

Of course, you will need cabooses for your freight trains, and in the time period you speak of, it would be almost absolutely guaranteed  that these would be home-road cars.  In fact, until the 1960s, most cabooses not only were on one road, almost all were assigned to particular conductors; if you saw a caboose and recognized its number, you could likely guess the name of the conductor and rear-end brakeman.

Have fun.

[Doneldon]

Ranger-

In theory, you might see rolling stock from any railroad in North America. No railroad serves every mine, city, range, grain elevator or industry, so cars must be exchanged by the railroads in order to avoid expensively unloading and reloading every car when cargo needs to change lines. And by and large, the cars on a given railroad will reflect the kinds of materials produced or used in the area served by that railroad. Hence, you can expect to see many hoppers at harvest in the farm belt, gondolas full of coal near coalfields or where the coal is used, stock cars on the plains, ore cars near mines or plants which process the ore, boxcars around manufacturing centers, reefers near food producers or the cities where hungry people anticipate the food, flat cars near factories that produce oversize products like farm implements or heavy equipment, and so on. That's a bit of a simplification, of course, but my point is obvious:. The cars on a railroad are determined by the nature of the cargo to be moved.

Another factor which affects the mix of rolling stock on a railroad is the era. You could expect to see long strings of stock cars years ago but not very many today because most animals are slaughtered and dressed close to the farms and feedlots where they are grown. Today it's common to see long strings of similar cars like coalfield-to-power plant unit trains of hoppers or container cars carrying merchandise from ports to markets, or even other ports. (It's often cheaper to unload containers on one coast, ship them across the continent and put them on a second ship at the destination port than to send goods on an extra long sea voyage to market. Without the Suez and Panama Canals, virtually all goods to or from the Orient would likely move this way.) Also, the cars themselves have evolved over time from small, all wood cars through the late 1800s, to ever larger and more metallic cars with the passing of time. Until at least the middle of the 20th Century you would see lots of ice-cooled reefers but they are unheard of today because mechanical refrigeration is cheaper, faster and more reliable than ice.

The moral of the story, then, is that your rolling stock inventory should reflect the producers and users on your pike. You can expect that nearby regional railroads will be well represented on your rails but you can pretty much include any car which suits your fancy. And don't forget cars of your own pike; there's a lot more money to be made when you ship things in your own rolling stock than just hauling another railroad's cars. (That wouldn't be true if your pike is merely a transfer railroad which shuttles cars between other railroads but doesn't directly serve trackside businesses itself.)

Good luck with your planning and your model railroad. I'll watch for updates from you as you make progress.
                                                                                                                                                                    -- D

[richg]

You might find a little info in the below link.

http://tinyurl.com/6fnmgho

Rich

[Rangerflyer]

The local industries at the time were:

Thurber,Tx coal, and a major brick manufacuring they made brick for roads that paved streets all over Texas.

OIL Ranger Texas was a major oil field in 1917 the Ranger field was discovered
This is credited with winning WW1.

And you had Cotton gins, peanuts and cattle for local agricultural interests.

[ebtnut]

One source for info would be the Official Guide for that era.  This publication was once issued monthly and listed every common-carrier railroad in the country and the services they provided.  This included timetables for all the passenger trains.  These show up periodically at train shows, but can be a bit pricey.  If you can find a large library (maybe a university library) they may have back issues in reference. 

[Ken G Price]

There was coal being mined in the central Texas area in that time period. Now days the coal being mined is in the east and south west parts of the state.

My layout is located in Texas 1995, approximately south east of San Angelo. Even though coal was mined a county or two to the east I have a coal mine, as this is close enough to being plausible in this area.

[Johnson Bar Jeff]

I have found pictures of boxcars from AT&SF,Frisco,MKT,T&P what others might be found ? Thanks for your help.

Missouri Pacific? Kansas City Southern? Cotton Belt? I'm not really up on railroad history in that region, so I'm just throwing out road names that I associate with adjoining regions.