I recently ran across a slide and it has me baffled. It was taken in Springfield on 12-22-67 which was a couple of weeks after the discontinuance of the last scheduled passenger service. The photo shows a clean, green heavyweight coach standing between two other cars on one of the platform tracks at Springfield station, looking very normal except that it has been carefully renumbered 105640 in Dulux gold. The car only that had vestibules at one end and the only car of this type with this number and arrangement of windows was number 767. We've all seen photos of passenger equipment which has been converted to work train use and given a six-digit number, but everything I have seen in the past had been painted all-over silver, had diaphragms removed, etc. In this case, 105640 has had no apparent modifications, either external or internal. Did the Frisco intend to keep some small amount of passenger equipment for special train use? There was a second-hand market for the lightweight cars and they were quickly sold off, but heavyweights were only valued as scrap so it would make sense that this is what they'd keep. This is all speculation on my part, but otherwise why the neat renumbering? Is there someone out there that I could send the photo to that would be willing to post it? Gordon
Gordon--That car was probably used as an instruction car. Maybe Karl Brand might have an idea about that re-numbering?? Tom
Tom That's always possible, of course, and the only thing that makes me question it is that you can clearly see from the photo that the original coach seats are all still intact. Usually when a car was made into an instruction car the interior was stripped out and rearranged in more of a classroom style with tables and chairs. Gordon And to Bob, thanks for the offer but I can't attach the photo to a private message either -- I would have to send it to someone's email address.
The renumbering of this car and others was part of the "1968" numbering that was instituted to provide a unique number for each piece revenue rolling stock, non-revenue rolling stock, and motive power. As noted there was a second-hand market for the lightweight passenger, but not for the older heavyweight stuff. Until the heavyweight equipment was converted to MOW service or otherwise deposed, it needed a valid "new" number. There were several such chair cars at the 19th Street Coach Yard that lingered for a while. Express box 467 received similar treatment... See http://www.frisco.org/shipit/index.php?threads/slsf109163.1090/#post-6027
I knew Karl could shed some light on the numbering! Thanks Karl. The car was nicely lettered (numbered) so it was evidently still available for service should it be needed for an excursion or special of some kind. Tom