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There is a really interesting business in the UK (while that entity lasts) named ModelU which? 3-D scans of people in whatever costume they desire and posed for railroad or general activities (shopping, standing around talking, etc.) and reproduces them through 3-D printing? in most common scales. See?. Check out some of their reproductions and you will see how good they can be.

The? ModelU are a little pricey for a large set. The sets of women shopping and just talking in 1930's costume for the Pendon Museum are incredibly artistic.?

Note, I have no business interest in ModelU other than wanting to buy a lot of their figures reproduced in 3.5 mm.? For Dianne I'm sure they can be reproduced in 1/160 (instead of UK N scale of 1/152) as well. I am pretty sure?

I have yet to find anything similar in the US so if there is anyone in the UK wants to get dressed up like a California 1940's-1950's icing crew and get scanned (Brian Moore are you listening) we can possibly get the figures. I have a couple of these figures for my weird 4 mm scale (OO, remember HO is 3.5 mm/ft.) occasional binge. They are excellent, easy to paint and deploy.??

kja

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Icing Platform Series

Tony Thompson's Modeling The SP Blog ( ) had several articles on icing platforms and links to some of these previously were posted. Below are links to the entire series to date.

These articles feature photos and good modeling tips.

Bob Chaparro

Moderator

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BAR Reefers In PFE Service

Posted 10/23/19

Some comments from Tony Thompson Modeling The SP blog at . The photos in the original article () are not used here. Instead, there are photo links.

Bob Chaparro

Moderator

In a previous post, I discussed the presence in Pacific Fruit Express territory of “foreign” refrigerator cars, that is, reefers not owned by PFE. I emphasized ordinary (AAR Class RS) ice-bunker cars used for produce loading, as opposed to, say, meat cars. You can read that post at:

.

I spent some time in that post talking specifically about Bangor & Aroostook cars, because of a very interesting article in the BAR employee magazine, Maine Lines, about the lease of the entire BAR fleet to PFE between June 1 and October 1 of each year. Effectively every single BAR reefer went west for PFE use during those months, June through September, busy harvest season in PFE territory.

What do we know about those BAR cars? First, we know that from at least as early as 1924, there had been a contract between BAR and New York Central’s Merchants Despatch (MDT) to provide empty reefers for use. That is documented in Roger Hinman’s book, Merchants Despatch (Signature Press, 2011). Such a contract obligated MDT to supply cars as requested by BAR, but had the drawback that when car supply was tight for MDT, they might not be able to meet all of the BAR requests.

The first significant change in that situation was in 1950, when MDT was in the process of scrapping a number of older wood-sheathed reefers. These were cars built in the decade 1920–1930 and were being superseded in MDT service by steel reefers. As author Hinman put it, BAR bought cars “right off the scrap line” at MDT shops (Page 159), and rebuilt them at their own Derby Shops.

These cars went to BAR in the summer of 1950. The ORER (Official Railway Equipment Register) issue for July 1950 shows zero RS cars in the BAR listing, but in the following issue, October, there were 288 cars listed, and by the issue after that, January 1951, the full 325-car purchase was listed. Over the following years, BAR acquired a few more of these cars. For example, in the ORER issue for January 1953 (my benchmark for my own layout), there were 338 cars in this group.

Some of these cars were painted in a striking scheme with a broad blue stripe across the lower part of the car and an upper white part, with a brown potato. This undated photo from the Bob’s Photo collection, shows the first car, numbered 6000 (all the BAR cars from MDT were numbered in the range 6000-6999). This is one of the 1926-built MDT cars with corrugated steel ends:

But we know that many of these newly acquired reefers were simply painted yellow (and a few years later, orange, instead of the dramatic blue-white scheme). Why the difference, and how many cars of each paint scheme were in the fleet, is unknown to me. I hope someone with BAR knowledge may volunteer information on that point.

[Moderator's Note: No BAR refrigerator cars were painted red-white-blue. The prototype BAR cars incorrectly identified as refrigerator cars actually are insulated plug door boxcars. Model manufacturers continue to churn out BAR refrigerator cars in this erroneous paint scheme.]

I chose to use a Red Caboose paint scheme of a BAR wood-sheathed reefer, which has the black railroad emblem as compared to the outline emblem you see in the photo above. I don’t know for sure which is correct for 1953 (or maybe both). I also suspect that the absence of lines above and below the reporting marks, and the absence of periods in the initials, may correspond to a time later than 1953.

These rebuilt wood-sheathed cars were perhaps a stopgap for BAR, and during 1951, BAR went to Pacific Car & Foundry (the 1953 Car Builders’ Cyclopedia incorrectly says it was Pressed Steel Car Company) with an order for 500 new cars, very similar if not identical to the then-new PFE Class R-40-26, with sliding doors. These 500 cars were first listed in the ORER issue for April 1952. I have seen a wide range of dates assigned these cars in model publications, but clearly they were built at the beginning of 1952. Here is the builder photo included in the 1953 Cyclopedia (19th edition):

Before long, BAR went to Pacific Car & Foundry for 350 more cars, these placed in the 8000–8350 series, and those cars were dimensionally identical to the 7000-series cars.

There is a fairly near car body to this sliding-door car, the Accurail 8500-series steel reefer (you can see their whole line at this link: .

It is in fact a Fruit Growers Express prototype, and has a straight side sill instead of the tabbed sill you see above on the BAR car. The placard and route card boards seen above could easily be added to the Accurail model, as could some representation of the fan plate. I have in fact discussed these changes to make the very similar PFE Class R-40-26 car, in a previous post (and that post can be found here: . Below is the Accurail model (Accurail photo). Incidentally, this kit, Accurail 8511, appears to be currently in stock.

I may eventually work on modifying one of the Accurail 8500-series models to represent a BAR steel car, but for now, the model shown above of a wood-sheathed ca, BAR 6166, represents the BAR presence in the PFE fleet in harvest season on my layout.

Tony Thompson

Yahoo Citrus Industry Modeling Group Is Closing - Please Delete Your Membership In The Yahoo Group

As some of you may know, on December 14, 2019, Yahoo Groups will no longer host user created content on its sites. New content can no longer be uploaded after October 28, 2019.

I am moving the members, message archive, photos and files of that group to this group.

If you are a member of both groups I recommend you delete your membership in the Yahoo version of this groups to avoid having two memberships in the Groups.io version.

Bob Chaparro

Moderator

Some comments from Tony Thompson Modeling The SP blog at . The photos in the original article () are not used here.

Bob Chaparro

Moderator

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Those interested in refrigerator car operations in the 1950s will know that most owners of such cars borrowed cars from other owners from time to time. Sometimes these were formal leases, sometimes they were other kinds of agreements, such as simple one-time loans. The point of these agreements was two-fold: first, of course, for the borrowing or lessee operator to have enough cars to serve their shippers; but second, putting the cars to work generated revenue tor the lessor or loaner from otherwise idle cars.

Pacific Fruit Express was certainly no exception. Though their fleet of about 40,000 cars was the largest in North America by 1950, they nevertheless did not have enough cars to cover peak harvest periods in the August to October time frame. In the early 1950s, PFE’s own statistics show that about a quarter of all carloads moved by PFE in peak season were in foreign cars, that is, cars not owned by PFE.

Some of the “foreigns” were informal car loans, ad hoc arrangements with car owners in particular seasons, but most were either leases or car-use contracts. In a lease, an agreed number of cars was turned over to the lessee for the period of the lease, and operated as the lessee wished. In a contract, normally cars were supplied according to demand, rather than a block of cars all being turned over to the receiving user.

We know from employee recollections, conductor log books, and from photographs that the biggest source of PFE foreigns was American Refrigerator Transit (ART). I have discussed this in prior posts (for example: ). As far as I can determine, this was a contractual arrangement.

This photo, taken by Al Phelps near Antelope, California on September 10, 1950, shows SP Mikado no. 3306, with a 99-car train of all reefers, plus caboose, headed eastward and about to reach Roseville. The first three cars happen to be ART cars, though no other ART cars are recognizable in this train.

Two other major sources of foreign reefers in PFE territory were Merchants Despatch (MDT) and Fruit Growers Experess (FGEX, along with pooled operation of BREX and WFEX cars). Again, photos show these kinds of cars in trains and in yards, but important data from a conductor’s records provide statistics on these cars’ presence (see my analysis in this post: .?

Another well-known source was the Bangor & Aroostook Railroad (BAR). The BAR fleet was primarily intended to serve their own shippers of potatoes, which was a traffic peaking in the late fall and continuing through the winter. This was nicely matched to PFE, whose traffic was tapering off by then, and who would be happy to return the BAR cars in late fall. In this case, the car transfer was under a lease. The actual dates of the PFE lease were from June 1 to October 1 of each year.

I want to thank Ed Shoben, who contacted me with questions about the relation between PFE and BAR, and who sent me an interesting 1957 article from the BAR employee magazine, Maine Lines. I understand that the article was provided to Ed by Ron High. I have used the scans sent to me to create a document on Google Drive, which anyone can access at the following link:

.

This is a fascinating description of how the lease of the BAR cars to PFE looked from BAR’s perspective.????

The article also mentions Merchants Despatch as a source of refrigerator cars for BAR. Those MDT cars were available as part of a long-running contract (since 1924), not a lease, and car availability was not always what BAR wanted, thus the ownership of a large fleet of their own cars.

Careful study of train views in the West will show an occasional BAR reefer in among the PFE and other reefers in a train. The example below is another Al Phelps photo, this one taken at Broderick, California (now part of West Sacramento) on September 3, 1955, with cab-forward SP 4179 powering a fruit block from San Jose. The BAR car nearest the camera is no. 7107.

Another example, an SP photo, shows a BAR car in a freight train in a siding west of Truckee, meeting passenger no. 27, in March, 1952.

These photos both happen to show the new BAR sliding-door steel reefers, built by Pacific Car & Foundry as copies or near-copies of the PFE Class R-40-26. But BAR also had a number of wood-sheathed reefers. (I should reiterate, as I’ve said several times in the past, that Santa Fe was emphatically not among the sources of foreign reefers for loading in PFE territory, and the same was true for PFE cars in Santa Fe territory. Cars of both fleets were returned empty to their owners, as employees of both companies have said, because neither wished to load its competitor’s cars in its territory.)

But let me return to BAR. For a modeler of PFE territory, as I am, including BAR reefers in one’s freight car fleet is both interrsting and prototypical. I will return to the BAR car fleet, and to modeling issues, in a future post.

Tony Thompson

Jesse,

I wholeheartedly support the recommendation of Cliff and others of the website link also known as Packing Houses of Southern California. Jim Lancaster and Bill Messecar, supported by a team of citrus rail experts, have masterfully put together an extremely valuable resource organized by county and then by city, thereby making making an area of interest just a few clicks away. I believe every citrus packing house of SoCal that once existed gets coverage, usually with extensive history and photos.

For anyone with an interest in railroading in Orange County I also recommend the two volume work “Rails Through the Orange Groves” (1990) by Donaldson & Myers. It covers all aspects of OC railroads from the very beginnings. The Orange County Public Library system and the Fullerton Library & its Local history room had copies last I checked.

Finally, I invite you to visit the Corona Model Railroad Society located in the Corona Heritage Park & Museum at 510 W. Foothill Parkway in Corona. While we do not model Anaheim, you will see Fullerton, Riverside, and Corona at circa 1949 at the height of the citrus industry. In addition to being open to the public each Saturday from 10-2, CMRS will have an Open House on Saturday, November 16 from 9 to 4. Visit us at cmrsclub.com.

Bruce Hendrick
President, CMRS

Prior to August 1965 there were lines operated by the Southern Pacific and the Pacific Electric, which the SP controlled from 1911. The Pacific Electric was merged into the SP in 1965 and all the track of the railroads were operated as the SP.

The Santa Fe served town and station that were served by the SP or PE in many citrus producing places east of Los Angeles. In some area they might be indifferent parts of the town or next to each other, in some case they served the same packing house.

Here are some places served by the Santa Fe and SP: Santa Ana, Anaheim, Tustin, Pomona, Riverside, Highgrove, Redlands.

Santa Fe and PE: Orange, Fullerton, Sunny Hills, San Dimas, Lamanda Park, Azusa, Glendora, La Verne, Claremont, Upland, Rialto, Corona, Redlands and Highland.

Perhaps some more?

Locations where two RR served a packing house: Orange, Sunny Hills, San Dimas, Glendora, Claremont, Upland, Corona, Riverside, Redlands, Rialto and Highland.

cliff prather

Hello my name is jesse and I grew up in Southern California in Anaheim then lake forest. And since I grew up in that area I learned and loved the history of the orange groves and also the railroads that worked in Southern California. ?So me I love the Southern Pacific and the Santa Fe. ?So with my layout I want to show the citrus industry on it. I model in Ho scale. ?So my question I need help with is was there a area in Southern California where the SP and the ATSF both worked in the citrus industry? Like one place that served both railroads?

Orange Crate Labels On Crates

Images from the Smithsonian Institution.

Some of these are from Southern California

Bob Chaparro

Moderator

Still On Yahoo?

If you are also on the Yahoo version of this group you may have seen the notice below from Yahoo.

I already have plans for moving the content (messages, files and photos) of the Yahoo group to this group so it is not necessary for you to save the Yahoo content.

As part of that move all members of the Yahoo group will become members of this group. If you are a member of both groups I recommend you delete your membership in the Yahoo version of this groups to avoid having two memberships in this group.

Bob Chaparro

Moderator

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Understand what's changing in Yahoo Groups

Yahoo has made the decision to no longer allow users to upload content to the Yahoo Groups site. Beginning October 21, you won't be able to upload any more content to the site, and as of December 14 all previously posted content on the site will be permanently removed. You'll have until that date to save anything you've uploaded.

What features will go away?

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What will happen to the site?

The Yahoo Groups site will continue to exist, however, all public groups will be made private or restricted. Any new group members will need to request an invite or be invited by an admin. Admins will still be able to manage various group settings, though some functionality will be limited.

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On October 21st, you will no longer be able to upload any content to the site. To share info with members of your groups, you'll continue to be able to do so via email.

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?

ITTPRODUCTS.COM is great source of sound modules with MP3 samples playable on the website.? The speaker they sell makes plenty of LOUD sound, better than several others I've tried.? For a portable public display (usually a noisey environment), I have a barnyard sounds under a farm scene and get a lot of positive feedback.? Same for a factory set up.? Needs 9V to (I think) 20V AC or DC with the ability to run continuously or only when a button is pushed (train gets to a particular location and triggers a one time station sound, etc.)

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