RMEO Part II: Two cabooses, two stories

This is the second in a series of posts profiling some of the more interesting pieces of rolling stock on display at the Railway Museum of Eastern Ontario in Smiths Falls. Read the first post in this series here.

At first glance, this CP caboose resembled the centre-mounted cupola cabooses I remembered from my childhood. Of course, most railfans would recognize this car as being quite a bit older, since the cupola is mounted off centre and is clearly clad in tongue-in-groove wood. But as I neared this old caboose, I noticed something was not as it should be.

And this closer look confirms it. Expecting to see the slated wood finish, I discovered this old caboose was actually clad in plywood. It made me wonder why. So I did a little digging.

It turns out this caboose, CP 437169, was built in 1945 at Canadian Pacific's Angus shops in Montreal. The museum's website mentions that the car was actually constructed with plywood, instead of tongue-and-groove slats, due to ongoing materials rationing that was a result of Canada's war effort. Let's put this aside for a moment. We'll come back to it.

The museum's site also stated that the car, over the course of its career, went through 3-4 paint schemes before finally undergoing its final transformation in the CP multimark livery. The car served in Eastern Ontario before being retired by the railway in 1990. Upon its retirement, it was donated to the museum.

Below is the view you get when you walk into the car. You can see the interior is made of slated wood with a bench, desk, bed, stove, kitchenette and the cupola off toward the other end of the car. All in all, not a bad setup. The museum has done an excellent job of maintaining the interior of this old van.

Below is a sister caboose to the one above. Numbered 437169, this car was also made in Montreal at the Angus shops and was retired in 1990 after serving in the Eastern Ontario region. If you compare this side profile with the side profile of the caboose above, you will see they are identical, but for the paint. The museum's website states that this car was originally built with slated wood and then sheeted over with plywood sheets at some point in its history.

If you look closely, you can see the nailing edge on the end of the car.

So the question remains, which story is correct? I can't imagine that one car would have been built with plywood while the other was made with slats. The interior of the yellow caboose shows that its interior was clearly made of slated wood, which leads me to believe that it too was re-sheeted at one point.

The next question is, why were these cars re-sheeted? Scanning a few websites, the best answer I found was that the railway found it was easier to maintain these cars with a plywood veneer rather than maintaining the slats. The one unintended consequence of this cost-saving measure, however, was that the exterior sheeting actually contributed to the slats underneath rotting, which compromised the structural integrity of the cars.

Penny wise, pound foolish? Maybe.

 

This last shot was my attempt at framing the above caboose next to a backdrop of the station. I shot this image in the area between the passenger waiting rooms and the railway express office, which was in a separate structure, although both were connected by the same roof.

 

I have to say that I have always been fascinated with old rolling stock being dressed up in contemporary railway liveries. I found this car in the Sarnia rail yard and was amazed that a car so old was repainted in the wet noodle paint scheme. The wood CP caboose in the multimark scheme appeals to me for the same reason. I was drawn to it immediately. I think it's the mixture of railways past and present that makes these cars unique.

 



Bedell Ontario Part III: Big Time Railroading

At long last, I am able to share some big-time railroading photos from my recent adventures in Bedell Ontario, a small hamlet south of Ottawa. Bedell is situated on the Canadian Pacific's Winchester Subdivision, the main line between Montreal and Smiths Falls. Due to computer issues, which have finally been resolved, I was able to recover my Bedell shots and back them up. Yes, this was a very good lesson for me to regularly back up my photos.

Click here to read Bedell Ontario Part I.
Click here to read Bedell Ontario Part II.

On July 17th, I made my first visit to Bedell and was able to capture shots of the remnants of the old CP Prescott Subdivision, which was being scrapped. After doing a little exploring in the weeds of that old line, I heard a westbound freight making its way toward my spot along the main line. For those unfamiliar with Bedell, it is a former CP stopover and servicing point. There is little left now, but the area does offer a spectacular view of main line action from an old parking lot and plateau perched trackside, both of which offer safe, legal places to shoot trains.

This freight was being led by ES44AC 8719 and AC4400CW 8565. After shooting mainly old geeps around Ottawa, it was refreshing to see some modern workhorses. As I was putting this post together, I thought about the last time I shot CP action and I realized that it was in 1992 in Banff, Alberta. You can read about those adventures here and here.

As you can see, I was unfortunately on the shadow side of the train, which wasn't a huge loss considering the lighting was decent. You can see the steel coil cars trailing the lead units above and below. In the shot below, you can also see a turnout for bad orders. This turnout was once part of a much larger rail yard in the area, most of which is gone. You can also see a bit of an old signal tower behind the trailing 8565 unit. You can see that tower in the final shot below.

Although it may seem I was right beside the track, I can assure you I was a safe distance from the train and using my camera's zoom.

As I have mentioned before, a mixed freight is the best freight to shoot, in my opinion. Intermodal double-stack trains are the most common, but they don't offer much variety. This train was a true mix. It reminded me of the mixed freights I shot along the CSX Sarnia Subdivision as a teenager. Boxcars closely followed the coil cars on this train, as you can see below.

It wasn't long before a few ballast cars came into view with some old CP Rail multimarks. I have a HO-scale blue hopper car painted in this livery at home, so I took a shot.

There was a long line of tank cars before a couple of hopper cars gave way to the double stacks at the end of the train. You can see the whistle sign in this shot, as well as old rail that had just been lifted from the old turnout that led to the abandoned North Prescott Spur, formerly the Prescott Sub.

The double stacks included a number of Canadian Tire containers, which wasn't unusual since CP is the retailer's main long-distance cargo hauler. The sunny blue skies, scattered clouds and full summer foliage made for a perfect backdrop.

Alas, all good things must come to an end, as did this manifest freight. You can see the bad order turnout more clearly in this shot as well as some angled crossing signals at the Bedell Road crossing. These lights are angled due to the path of the road, which parallels the track before taking a sharp turn at the crossing.

A few weeks later, I made sure to get a shot of the old signal tower, just in case the railway decides to get rid of this relic.

 

So that was my first encounter with a CP freight on the Winchester Sub. I am planning to return to Bedell very soon to see if there is anything left from the old Prescott Subdivision. Also, I hope I won't have to wait 22 years to shoot my next CP freight.

 



The wet noodle, the safety scheme and beyond

One thing I've noticed about Canada's two major railways is their consistent appearance. Their looks have both remained largely unchanged over the last half century. CP has not deviated from its choice of red on its locomotives, although its more recent decisions to adopt the gold beaver and then the new Canadian Pacific script for the side of its engines stand out as the biggest changes to the CPR's looks since it adopted the modern red and multimark look in 1968 (I'm leaving out the 1993 decision to adopt the CP Rail System Flag scheme, which was short-lived).

CN has been even more consistent since it first developed its wet noodle logo in 1960. Along with that decision came the radical transformation of the look of its locomotives, cabooses, freight cars and passenger coaches. Amazingly, after 50 plus years, one could put a 1960s vintage CN diesel next to a modern diesel and easily make the connection that the two belong to the same road.

The first, and longest-lasting version of CN's modern look, was the so-called safety scheme, which featured slanted white stripes against a black backdrop and a red cab. The wet noodle was plastered on the front of the engine. When you look at the modern paint schemes of North American railroads, CN was definitely an anomaly in that it did not have its corporate logo on the side of most of its diesels when it changed its look in the early 1960s.

CN F7A 9162 in Edmonton, Alta. in 1973 (Photo from the Canadian Science and Technology Museum archives)

However, there were some exceptions to the rule when CN went modern. Over the years, a number of its locomotives were painted in a nearly all-black scheme. These units had the CN logo on the side and red fronts and backs. I've often wondered why some units were given this scheme.

CN GP9 in 1967 at an unknown location (Photo from the Canadian Science and Technology Museum archives)

Another notable exception to the safety scheme was CN's fleet of workhorse SW1200s, which prowled rail yards and local spurs for decades. These units were given a mainly black scheme with the CN logo on the side. Unlike the GP9 above, the SWs were given red cabs and red trim on the front panels. This grunt and mate 1215 are pulling a load of autoracks to the St. Clair rail ferry in 1993 in Sarnia Yard.

These schemes changed in the early 1990s when CN finally decided to make a change to its look by adopting its CN North America logo, which featured the grey continent image beneath the CN logo. This look coincided with CN's first major marketing foray into the US. You can read about this paint scheme in greater detail by checking out this post in the Trackside Treasure blog. This scheme was around for a few years and it really did suggest what was to come for CN after it was privatized in 1992-93.

CN SD40-2 6002 in Sarnia in 1993

The CN North America logo didn't last all that long and was soon replaced with the look that CN locomotives sport today, like these two brutes below, shot in Markham on Aug 10, 2013. When I was looking through photos in government archives, like the two at the top of this post, I was struck by the consistency of the CN paint schemes over the last 50 years. Compared to the era before the modern logo was adopted, which was marked with constant image tinkering, the wet noodle and red/black/white scheme have been remarkably stable. It's hard to think of a railway that has had such consistency over the same period.

CP Rail's Windsor Rail Yard in 1991



I only visited Canadian Pacific's Windsor rail yard twice, but neither time disappointed. As readers know from past posts, my grandfather worked for CP for forty years, many of them in this yard. He first took me to this yard when I was very little (possible three years old) and took me aboard a locomotive to show me how it worked. The second time he took me, I was a teenager. It was the summer of 1991, on a very hot dry day. The visit did not disappoint.

 

I wasn't there more than a few minutes when yard switcher 1621 whizzed by with a CP multimark-equipped cylindrical hopper trailing behind (see below). You can see an autorack and an old CP Rail caboose on the track behind. This was right around the time when the multimark was fast becoming a memory on CP's locomotives and rolling stock. This GP9 looks like it is due for new paint soon.

 

In many ways, CP's Windsor yard is very much like CN's Sarnia yard. Both yards feed international tunnels and both have a wide variety of rolling stock making its way across the border. In the case of the Windsor CP yard, there were fewer tank cars than in Sarnia, but there were some oddities like a centre beam lumber car (left, below). These were a rare site for me (although they are more common in Ottawa). You can also see the difference between two GP9s below. 1619 looks like it is next in line for new paint sans multimark while 8226 is fresh with new paint.

Here's a better look at 8826, without the multimark, but with a much fresher coat of CP's famous red paint. You get the idea of what a dozen or so years of harsh summer sun does to a locomotive's paint job (left).

I've included this photo before in Favourite Train Photos #1. This old Alco relic was just coming off the turntable after receiving service in the roundhouse. As this was happening, my grandfather was talking to his old co-workers, many of whom were quite happy to see him again. One mentioned that they really needed someone with his expertise around the yard again. Other than the fact that this is my only roundtable shot in my collection, I like this image because you can see a rare open-air autorack in the background. These autoracks were nonexistent in CN's Sarnia yard at the time. You can also see Detroit's Renaissance Center in the background, which gives you an idea how close this yard is to the Michigan border.

In 1991, CP's Michigan Central rail tunnel to Detroit had not been expanded to handle larger rail cars, although a few years later, it was expanded to accommodate autoracks. This tunnel still failed to accommodate double stack container trains, which left CP with a massive competitive disadvantage compared to CN's St. Clair Tunnel in Sarnia, which was completed in 1994. This disadvantage has yet to be resolved, although there are hopes that a new rail tunnel will be built to give Windsor and Detroit a fully functional rail tunnel that is able to handle modern rail operations.

For the purposes of a rail fan, having a yard crowded with cars that were queued for the rail ferry was a good thing. There was no shortage of traffic when I visited, including this train, headed by SD40 5744.

Here's another shot you've seen in an earlier post, Relics on the rails. I included it because I wanted to feature the entire set of photos from that day. I had more at one point, but I have lost those prints. You can see the Renaissance Center, a boxcar and a CP Rail flatcar behind this St. Lawrence Railroad boxcar, sitting just outside the roundhouse. Also, check out those axles! I was very lucky to have such access to these areas of the yard that would have otherwise been out of bounds for me.

I don't have many shots of CP Rail trains in my collection, which is what made that trip to the Windsor yard such a treat for me in 1991. It's a great memory I have of my grandfather, one which continues to fuel my fascination with railways.

Banff 1992 (Part II)

As mentioned in Banff 1992 (Part I), I was lucky to catch a parked grain train on a summer evening at Banff Station. I was able to get shots of all three units at the head of the train from both sides, including this shot of the lead unit, SD40-2 5865 perched in front of Tunnel Mountain. Compared to the previous evening when I visited the station, this evening proved to be a success.

I was busy shooting everything I could, including this shot of the front of the train. I've said it many times in this blog, but I would not recommend ever doing this. I was blissfully ignorant of the dos and don'ts of rail photography etiquette as a teen. I love the shot below, but I shake my head at how I captured the shot. You can see Banff Station, with its handsome fieldstone trim, on the right and a freight shed on the left.

As I mentioned in the previous post, I was in for a great surprise that evening when the Rocky Mountaineer pulled into Banff Station, giving me the opportunity to capture shots of the famous tourist train. This shot, which I have shown in a previous post, is one of my favourite shots. It shows the train pulling into the station with an impressive backdrop and interesting evening light. You can see the fellow rainfans to the right. Read about my run-in with these folks in the link above.

The evening sun was tricky to work with that night, which explains the curious whiteout effect near the front of B36-7 7488. I remember having to manually block sunlight from ruining this shot by using my baseball hat. During this trip, I saw a bear in the wild for the first time, hiked up Sulphur Mountain, I went to a Calgary Cannons double header and hiked the Paradise Valley. Still, this was one of the highlights of my trip out west.