Quote from: Johnson Bar Jeff on September 03, 2009, 03:10:55 PM

Quote from: Bigboy on August 05, 2009, 06:50:23 PM
The Lincoln Funeral car was a 16 wheel special. I believe it was an experimental car recently built by the fledgeling Pullman Company as a development exercise to find a sleeping car which gave an improved standard of ride over the primitive trackage of the period. This proved to be a not the success hoped for and was not pursued any further.

The need at the time was for something a bit special and available at short notice and that one was on hand and filled the bill.

The received wisdom used to be that the car was built by the U.S. Military Railroads in its shops in Alexandria, Virginia--for sure there is a famous photo of the car coupled to a beautiful Mason 4-4-0 named the "W.H. Whiton"--but it's been years since I read anything on the subject, so perhaps more information on the car's origins has come to light.

Legend had it that the car had 16 wheels to support its weight because it was armor-plated, but I don't think that's true. But I don't know for sure.

You're quite right. My statement was made off the top of my head, powered by my somewhat faulty memory.
I've since checked on Google and found several relevant sites.

This one shows a well researched model of the car. Which is indeed NOTHING like the Hawthorne Village stuff.
http://showcase.netins.net/web/creative/lincoln/news/train.htm

And this one about the train and events relevent to the funeral.
http://home.att.net/~rjnorton/Lincoln41.html

Hope this helps,
Alex

Where does the Hawthorne Village train claim to be the Lincoln Funeral Train?

The web site says it is to commemorate the 200th anniversary of his birth.

Would a funeral train be gaudily painted with pictures of the deceased.?
Funerals of that period were especially sombre affairs with much black drapery and plumage on the carriage horses.

And have him standing on the observation platform in his trademark top hat?

The Lincoln Funeral car was a 16 wheel special. I believe it was an experimental car recently built by the fledgeling Pullman Company as a development exercise to find a sleeping car which gave an improved standard of ride over the primitive trackage of the period. This proved to be a not the succes hoped for and was not pursued any further.

The need at the time was for something a bit special and available at short notice and that one was on hand and filled the bill.

Hope this helps,
Alex

Hello John,
Glad you found that info helpful.

I've no idea how many of these cars were normally operated together. The cars appear to be completely self contained; the caretakers compartment seems to have a built in heating stove as there is what appears to be a short chimney sticking through the roof. In which case the cars could be run as single items in general freight trains or as many together as required for the traffic movement. The limit being the availability of both cars and caretakers to staff them.

I have no figures for the size of the Humane Stock Cars company's fleet but the 1949 Cyclopedia lists general figures for 1932 for Canada and USA.
There are 93,187 total railroad owned stock cars of which only 27 are listed as 'poultry'.
Of the privately owned cars there are 3,507 total of which 2,807 are poultry.


I have seen many photos of stock car trains of this period which run to 50 or over cars. A few were also accompanied by Drovers cabooses. These appear to be similar to ordinary freight cabooses but with accommodation for perhaps a dozen or so drovers. These would be required where the cattle had to be let out for rest and watering at federally regulated intervals in the middle of the boonies as many of these western trains found themselves running through.
Perhaps cattle trains calling at well staffed yards would only carry a couple of drovers who could use the regular caboose and would only be there to attend to any irregular 'emergency' events.

The Cyclopedia does not specifically state that the Humane cars were used for poultry such as chickens and turkeys. The somewhat similar poultry cars I mentioned previously were also 40 footers and it states that one of them, belonging to "The Live Poultry Transit Company", had 128 coops. The other, very similar, car belonging to "The Palace Poultry Car Company"does not state the number of coops but lists the car as 10 ton capacity.

I would think for a small layout, bearing in mind the number one rule "It's my railroad, I'll run what I like" that single cars running in general freight would be more realistic than a special train all of 'Humane' cars.

Perhaps the 'Humane' cars also had moveable partitions to suit the size and quantity of the small livestock being conveyed.

In British practice cattle was conveyed in four wheel vehicles, all more or less the same size. Most were fitted with moveable partitions which could be set to give 'Small', 'Medium' or 'Large' capacities to stop the cattle being unduly thrown around the vehicle during transit.

On continental Europe a variety of cars were used for animal transit.
Some early (but used well into the 1950s) cars were open topped, others were wooden slat sided, like American 40 foot stock cars and others railways, latterly, just used ordinary ventilated goods vans. At least in France, some 8 wheel 50'   versions of ventilated vans were used for cattle and some horses. No cattle are now conveyed in Britain but I am not sure about Europe though any such traffic will now be much reduced.

I was speaking at an exhibition to a well known British '0' gauge modeller who has a well detailed and very well researched French layout set in late 19th century. His 4 wheel cattle trucks, which like British ones, are fitted with open ventilation apertures near the top and the full length of the vehicle and about 2 feet deep are fitted with curtains. He explained that these were to keep the sun off the occupants. Early Humane cars?

Hope this helps,
Alex

I have one of these cars but it is in storage just now and not readily accessible so I am refreshing my memory from the Bachman product photo.

There is a photo of the prototype car in my copy of the 1940 Car Builder's Cyclopedia Page 163. My copy is a 1973 Kalmbach reprint.

The car seems to be owned and operated by a small company called "Humane Live Stock" as its reporting mark is HSLX 1.

The caption to the photo describes it as a triple deck stock car for sheep, lambs and small live stock. Provision for feeding and and watering. Caretaker's room at one end.
I presume the compartment at the other end would be for food, water and bedding.

The previous two photos show poultry cars belonging to different companies. These are somewhat similar except the caretaker's compartments are in the centre rather than the end.

The Car Builders Cyclopedia generally showed the most recent developments but sometimes if a product was becoming obsolescent the relevant photo may be quite old. Such seems to be the case here as the car has a vertical handbrake shaft (as the Bachmann model) and the lettering style seems early 1930 ish. I cannot make out any of the dates in the photo. 
Hope this helps.

Alex

Your difficulty in sourcing a Peppercorn A3 Pacific seems to be caused by some confusion in your requirements.

There is no such thing as a Peppercorn A3 locomotive. The A3 Pacifics were designed by Sir Nigel Gresley who was the Chief Mechanical Engineer of the LNER. A. H. Peppercorn was a later CME who designed, among other things other Pacific locomotives. (Class A1)

There was also a pacific locomotive named after A. H. Peppercorn

Gresley A3 models, of which the "Flying Scotsman" is the most famous are VERY common on the British market and have been produced in 4mm scale in various forms mainly by Hornby for many years. Other models in other scales are also fairly common as this is one of the most popular British locomotives.
Any model shop which stocks Hornby should be able to supply as well as all the usual second hand sources.

A possible source of confusion is that under the LNER classification, the Gresley Pacifics were originally classed as A1 when built. They were later modified, mainly by being superheated and reclassified as A3. Near the end of the LNER's existance there was a major renumbering and reclassification . Under this the few unmodified A1 s were reclassed as A10 until such time as they could be upgraded to A3 specification which had been hindered by WWII conditions. Two new classes of Pacifics were then introduced as A1 and A2.
BTW none of Peppercorn's A1 locomotives were preserved and a special group has been formed to build a new one to modern standards. This locomotive is nearing completion and has been named "Tornado" and is currently undergoing testing. See http://www.a1steam.com/

Hope this helps,
Alex