Had an opportunity to recently visit Orange Empire out in Perris California and appreciated the opportunity to get a behind the scenes visit of a number of pieces that I never knew existed before... I thought some members of the forum might find these photographs interesting as perhaps not everyone knows of the existence of this unique piece of railroad equipment and Americana.. I quote from an on line source...

In the days before fast food chains, it was the roadside diner that provided a hot meal as America took to the highways. Many roadside diners were built from retired railway cars. O'Neill's was originally located alongside highway 395 at Van Buren Boulevard, north of Perris.

Because of war time expansion of March Air force Base, in 1943 it was closed and relocated four miles south. It sat vacant until 1948 when it reopened as the Liberty Bell Cafe. It became a local landmark know for good food and remained open until 1982.The main section of the diner is an all wood passenger car built in 1906.

The yellow paint and the curved nose of the dinner were intended to evoke the image of the Union Pacific Railroads's famous 1930's streamlined passenger trains. O'Neill's Streamline Diner was located along Highway 215 at Ramona Expressway 1948-1982. Freeway construction forced the diner to be moved from it's long time home.

Anyway... thought this was certainly very interesting... and fascinating that OERM was able to save this piece of local history in Perris California. Perhaps many members never knew of the existence of this M 10000 replica... I for one, found it interesting enough to have spent about a half hour studying this unique piece of equipment... Even though the M 10000, which was delivered to the railroad on February 12, 1934, and scrapped in 1942 ) was only around for about 8 years, this unique piece of equipment lives on... now 70 years after the M 10000 was scrapped for the war effort...

Hopefully some members on RYPN find it as interesting as I do....and perhaps someone from OERM can explain the efforts to save this piece of history...

Interesting ?... Well you be the judge.


Dean Levin

for those who wanted to compare details


Dean

Interested to know what the wood car is, not so worried about the Flintstones streamliner.

Mike Pannell

Mr. Levin,

Thank you for the photos. I find the artifact very interesting, and am glad OERM decided to preserve it, rather than try to return it to a wooden passenger car.

Mike, I think you are being rather shortsighted by calling the car a "Flintstones streamliner." The car shows how older railroad equipment was adaptively reused for other uses when it beams outmoded. It also shows how streamlining was in the public's consciousness in the 1930s after the introduction of the M-10000 and the Pioneer Zephyr.

Not every chicken coup, diner, or body used as a storage shed can be returned to its as-built condition. Keeping items preserved in the "as found" condition, or preserved showing how railroad equipment was adaptively reused for non-railroad purposes is another way for railway preservation to show some relevance.

David..

thanks for the comments, and I agree with your position .. This display, although at first might not mean much, but I agree with your comments, that this really is not only about railway preservation, its about American life in the 1930's and beyond... something that is mostly lost today... In my eyes, those at OERM that had the vision to capture this relic... and preserve it as is, are to be commended... It can only be hoped that one day, the object can be made available again, to serve a hamburger and a drink... to relive its days when it was a roadside attraction... as that likely, in its current state, is more important than another wooden coach....

just an opinion


Dean Levin

is there enough room in the nose to put a power plant, so it cam become a self propelled "diner car"?

Not to steal the M-10000's thunder, but that and what used to be the Zephyr Diner (most recently Kelly's Pub) in Sandwich, IL could be bookends. This photo isn't mine, so you'll have to follow the link:

http://www.modelrailroadforums.com/foru ... 1237507957

Interestingly, this too is an old wood car, reputedly used in Teddy Roosevelt's "Bull Moose" campaign train. Here's an interior view (again, not my photo):

http://www.modelrailroadforums.com/foru ... 1237508362

At one time OERM had a pair of San Diego bodies that they planned to display as either diners or residences. Unfortunately the bodies were destroyed in the fire they had several years ago. It would've made for a nice interpretation of the value of streetcar bodies after their service days were over.

Does anybody know what the inside of this diner looks like?

Blimey sorry i opened my mouth ! I only said Flintstones because it looked like a stone streamliner................ wow.

Mike Pannell

The O'Neill's diner is made up of a 1906 or 1907 Santa Fe coach body that was retired in the early 1930s. Inside it still has the "Empire" ceiling and a partition made out of columns.

As a roadside diner it was at several locations in the area north of Perris. The first one was near March Air Force Base near the Santa Fe depot and the junction between the future highway 395 and a road coming over the hills from Riverside. Then as 395 was improved from 2 to 4 lanes the diner was moved several times. By the time that the California DOT bought the land and car for upgrading 395 to freeway standards the diner was called "The Liberty Bell."

CalTrans then looked for a home for the carbody. The first offer to Orange Empire included numerous reporting requirements, etc. So we passed on the car. And CalTrans moved the body and the kitchen add-on to a storage yard.

When the construction project was done CalTrans again contacted Orange Empire and again offered the carbody and the kitchen addition. This time they included funds for a foundation and no other strings. The Orange Empire board accepted it by a 5-4 vote. Opposition by some was because it was no longer a railroad car with no chance of becoming one.

However, I have found that the public enjoys and recognizes the significance of preserving the second use of the railroad car. And in any form it is one of the few examples of a first decade of the nineteenth century wood passenger car and probably the only such Santa Fe car.

By the way, I was one of the five votes on the OERM board.

I do not think the M-10000 was scrapped. I thought is was rebuilt into an E-3?

When the M-10000 arrived in Oakland, after unloading it ran through the city streets to the IER shops in Alameda for servicing. I do not know if this was a skill or craft thing, but someone thought it was more like an electric interurban than a steam loco.

For better or worse, the diner in Sandwich no longer has its shovel-nose front end. It's been recently rebuilt and reopened as the Bull Moose Pub, and now looks more like a cartoon version of a Lake Shore Electric car or something:

http://hickscarworks.blogspot.com/2008/06/roadside-diners.html#Sandwich

The Union Pacific Streamliners by Harold E. Ranks and William W. Kratville provides this information the the trains with this style of power unit:

M-10000 "City of Selma" retired and sold February 12, 1942, to Aaron Ferer of Omaha
M-10001 "City of Portland" cars retired in 1939 and sold for scrap Aug 13, 1941. Power units, etc reinstalled into a new carbody that became CD-07-C (a booster unit for a "City of Denver" power set) in 1939
M-10002 "City of Los Angeles" (and later used as "City of Portland") power units were sold to Northrup-Hendy in 1947.

Union Pacific's M-10000, the "City of Salina", may have been the 1st internal combustion train to depart from Kansas City's Union Station. Some changes of equipment later, in 1957, it was the last steam train to leave that place, according to a note in Trains Magazine that year.

Mike, sorry, I thought you were commenting on the diner's conversion, not the actual "quality" of the "streamlining." It does appear to be rather homemade.