I was traveling down I-70 on Saturday between Columbus, and Zanesville, Ohio, when I noticed that a farmer by the interstate had 3 or 4 PCC cars in his field! They appreared to be Cleveland RTA cars, but I am not sure. Does anybody know of the pre-Cleveland heritage of these cars? I know some of the RTA cars came from Louisville, where they were never used. Any help would be appreciated.

wilkidm@wku.edu

PCC cars stored in the field near Buckeye Lake, Ohio include:

Cleveland RTA (ex-Shaker Heights Rapid Transit) 40, ex-St. Louis Public Service 1771; built by St. Louis, 1947
Cleveland RTA (ex-SHRT) 41, ex-SLPS 1769; built by St. Louis, 1947
Cleveland RTA 4662, ex-Toronto Transportation Commission 4662, originally Cleveland Transit System 4237; built by Pullman-Standard, 1946
Cleveland RTA 4663, ex-TTC 4663, originally CTS 4233; built by Pullman-Standard, 1946

There are also three Pittsburgh PCC cars on the site: 1976, 4011, and 4012. Several other SHRT PCC cars, owned by the same person, are stored at other sites in central Ohio.

Frank Hicks

Frank@gats.com

> (re) PCC cars stored in the field near Buckeye
> Lake, Ohio

For what are they being used/stored?

hi_plain@yahoo.com

I think we just went over this last month or was it in January? The information should be tracable if you look back over the posts for the past two months. From what others on the board said, this guy just seems to hoard stuff and let it decay and doesn't like to be asked about his plans, such a shame.Since it was mentioned that some of the equipment was built by St.Louis Car Co., I am reminded that I should ask where, exactly, in St.Louis the company was located and if any former buildings still exist? My father-in-law worked for St.Louis Car Co. for many years and there were questions I'd have loved to have asked him but it never seemed the right time. He died last week, now I'll never have the opportunity.It is an all too clear message that every time one of our elders passes on that more of our history is lost, that it isn't just about equipment and buildings but about an all to human factor and stories that need to be told before it's too late and that part of our history has vanished forever.
Sorry if I got off topic on this thread,not my intention.

-Angie


Ladypardus@cs.com

Angie's right, we've been over this more than a couple of times. This guy has had these cars for quite a while: my guess is better than 25-30 years now is some car's cases. Most of them are in very poor shape, as I think both Frank and Angie can attest; I know I can. They looked bad circa 1993-94: nearly 10 years later, they can't be any better.


tjgaffney@phmuseum.org

> Angie's right, we've been over this more
> than a couple of times. This guy has had
> these cars for quite a while: my guess is
> better than 25-30 years now is some car's
> cases. Most of them are in very poor shape,
> as I think both Frank and Angie can attest;
> I know I can. They looked bad circa 1993-94:
> nearly 10 years later, they can't be any
> better.

Well since posts drop off the face of the earth at the bottom of the board, its hard to know if a subject has been discussed before if you don't watch the board constantly. So I don't fault anyone for bringing up the same questions over and over again.


todengine@woh.rr.com

If you go to the link below and type the Message Board URL
(http://208.56.66.127/cgi-bin/Interchange.pl)
into the "search" box, you can find a few older examples of the board, but not when the Ohio PCC's were discussed.


Internet Archive
bilburns1313@ameritech.net

> If you go to the link below and type the
> Message Board URL
>
> (http://208.56.66.127/cgi-bin/Interchange.pl)
> into the "search" box, you can
> find a few older examples of the board, but
> not when the Ohio PCC's were discussed.

I can usually access any of the posts I need to in the archive but they can be a real bugger to find if you are looking for a particular topic. There's no way to make a search for specialized items. Hume would probably have to pay out the ears for a feature like that if it was even offered.

As for the guy who owns those PCC's, I've heard he's an unfriendly critter who doesn't like people snooping in what he considers "his business". This is only what I heard and one of these days I may see if I can cultivate an agreeable response from him, if manage this at some point, I'll let you all know what I learn. Mind you, I won't stray far from my car at first, I hear he also has large dogs with a bad attitude.

Also, has anyone got any information on my last post concerning St.Louis Car Co.? It would mean a great deal to me if anyone can tell me if any of the original buildings exist, what the location of St.Louis Car was, and if they still have any holdings.

Just Train Crazy,

-Angie


Ladypardus@cs.com

I did an fairly extensive search on St. Louis Car Co. and came up with very little. I think the answers to your questions would be very interesting. All I came up with is this:

http://library.wustl.edu/units/spec/arc ... mpany.html

There is currently a company with the same name (though I believe unrelated) in St. Louis:

http://stlouis.bizjournals.com/stlouis/ ... ocus3.html

You might try E-mailing the webmaster at http://www.chicago-l.org to see if he can help with the info. His E-mail addy is:

ggarfiel@uiuc.edu

You might also try posting a message at http://www.northshoreline.com/
The direct link to the message board there is:

http://www.northshoreline.com/wwwboard/wwwboard.html



bilburns1313@ameritech.net

The orginal St. Louis Car Company plant was located in the 8000 block of Hall Street in north St. Louis. While most of the buildings are still in use as either warehouse or manufactoring space, St. Louis Car Company was dissolved and has no holdings. The current "St. Louis Car Company" is not related.



sflinh@stlmsd.com

All the messages are archived, but not all are available at the moment. Virtually all of the messages posted since we switched software (January 2001) are viewable and can be searched fairly effectively using the built in search function.

The old messages, the original software prior to Jan. 2001, are stored on CDs. Someday we hope to make available everything that was ever posted on RyPN in CD form.

Not practical to keep it all online forever. We already have a problem with the Interchange routinely exceeding its bandwidth. And, although it would take awhile, if we saved every message indefinitely, we'd end up exceeding our storage space too.

Railway Preservation News
hkading@rypn.org

I did not know the messages were archived at all on site! Thanks for the tip. I built my own computer, but sometimes have trouble navigating through the stuff the darned machine brings on to the screen. That link I posted (http://www.archive.org/index.html) is an ambitious archive of just about everything internet. Very usefull for any who have a bookmarked link that now comes up "not found", or for viewing past content on a page that has changed. By going there and typing in the RYPN URL one can see some of the changes the look of the site has gone through, for instance.

bilburns1313@ameritech.net