The Southern Forest Heritage Museum has completed the initial phase of its restoration of Fernwood Columbia and Gulf railcar # M 4. Built by the railroad as a copy of its Kalamazoo railcar M-3 in 1936, the car was last used in FC&G passenger service in 1955. Long time owner of the car, Louis Saillard donated the car to the museum a number of years ago, but it was only in May of 2008 that the car was moved from outdoor storage in Reader AR to Longleaf for restoration.

Louisiana Public Broadcasting has recently completed a short segment on the M-4 and SFHM to kick off a series of programs on Louisiana Railroading and railroads.

http://beta.lpb.org/index.php?swi/

The museum plans to start running the car in regular saturday service early next year.

Additional info:

The FC&G was in Mississippi. The M-4 was homebuilt in 1937, using their M-3 1936 Kalamazoo car as a pattern. Powered originally by a Ford V-8 of 85 hp, the car had seats for 17 and baggage room. The baggage door is apparently being used now for a wheelchair ramp--very forward-thinking on the part of the new owners! Salliard apparently had it on the Reader RR for a spell before its move to the SFHM.

More on the railroad here: http://www.taplines.net/August/augindex.htm

Just a couple of more interesting notes. The car is still powered by an 85 hp Ford flathead V-8. However, we have found out that it is not the original 1936 engine that originally powered the car. When we went to purchase ignition wires for the engine, we found out that the current engine dates from 1942, and is a specific model only produced during that year, so apparently the car was re-engined during WW2.

On the inaugural run, October 24, we hauled over 450 paying passengers at the museum between 5 and 11 pm. Only a few of the original seats from either the M-3 or the M-4 were in the car at Reader, but there were some bus seats (shades of the galloping geese) and now we can haul 27 in the car.