This last week Orange Empire Railway Museum took delivery of a box car that dates from about 1906. I'm told one of the wheel sets carried a 1909 date.

While the car is not from our core (Southern California) collection area, we felt that it fits will within our secondary collecting area of the Western States.

Pictured below is the new addition a former Butte, Anaconda & Pacific box obtained (purchased) direct from the current successor operation.


And here is an end view of the car

And here is a close up of the truck. Is this a Fox truck or a similar style?

thanks for sharing. I'll have to check that out next trip.

There are indications that this car was constructed in 1903 instead of 1906 as reported.

Charles V. Mutchler in his 2002 book Wired for Success: The Butte, Anaconda & Pacific Railway, 1892-1985 writes: "In 1906 PSC [Pressed Steel Car] built 46 steel underframed, 30-ton box cars for the BA&P. These were a transitional design with a steel underframe beneath a more traditional, framed wooden body."

A search for additional information shows that the HO-scale model kit manufacturer Westerfield known for its research efforts has model kits of these cars. The description of this firm's kits of these BA&P cars states, "BA&P installed 46 cars of the series 20-118 (even numbers only) in 1903."

This discrepancy caused me to pull out photo copies of the annual summary of car orders published in The Railway Age. The 1903 summary lists that the BA&P had ordered 50 box cars with 60,000 pound capacity from Pressed Steel Car Co. A search through subsequent years lists does not show any other box cars for the BA&P listed.

Clearly additional research is required.

It's very likely that both sources are correct; the cars being ORDERED in 1903, then delayed because the financial panic of that year made it prudent for the BA&P to put them on hold.

This was a pretty common method of car construction right at the turn of the twentieth century, Strasburg has a PRR car that is similar:



Mid-continent has a M&St.L car built by Pressed Steel for the Iowa Central in 1901


More:
http://www.midcontinent.org/collectn/wo ... l4570.html

It's good to see it's original to the BA&P rather than a second hand purchase.

Yes, those are Fox Patent trucks on the BA&P car. A very nice additon to your collection, congrats!!

The latter-day Ajax hand brake is probably the only upgrade to the car since its construction (tho it looks like it may have type- D couplers, new in 1916 and obsolete in 1933).

Howard P.

Well, it got the required upgrade for safety appliances (grab irons changes, etc.). This is a photo in the book Wired for Success:


When I was taking the photos, I did not look underneath to check out the air brake schedule -- I was dressed for passenger railway operations on Sunday. So, I don't know if it still has K or for some reason was upgraded to AB. I've got a call out for the answer.

I have an answer to the question of the car's brake schedule.

This evening I received an email with a photo from OERM's VP of Collections. The BA&P did upgrade the car to AB brake valve.

I thought I'd post the following photo as it shows the relative size of the 1906 box car compared to recent motive power:
It is coupled to one of Orange Empire's ex-SP ALCO RSD12 locomotives. Two of these 1800 hp locomotives were later used at a coal export terminal at Port of Long Beach (CA) prior to joining the collection of OERM.

The photo was taken on Sunday January 17, 2010.

Nice save. Hard to believe some of these cars managed to make it this long with the original trucks under them. I remember helping with unloading the Mid-Continent car back in the 70's. The car was in decent shape for as old as it was. M-C car had a piece cut out of the side frame. I had bent up some some plate to repair it with. Someone else did a better job and did a nice repair job. While looking for something unrelated I found the piece of steel I had bent up a couple of years ago. Still inside of the box car after all these years! M-C car shop guys do nice work don't they? Cheers, John.

My understanding is that these cars were used in captive service hauling supplies, such as explosives, to the mines. As such there was no need to replace/upgrade the trucks. But the company did upgrade to AB brakes; probably to simplify repairs and part stocks.

We are talking about both returning the car to an earlier paint and lettering scheme and to restore the KC brakes. In the meantime, the car is destined for covered storage in the building seen behind it and the diesel.

I thought that BA&P boxcar looked familiar, there are some other PSC cars at Mid Continent, but not with Fox trucks.

http://www.midcontinent.org/news/news17.html

Great save!

Our PRR 96451 (above) was preserved in much the same way. It was acquired from the PRR by the SRC at an unknown time in order to serve as a house car for milk, LCL, etc. That it has "D" couplers, K brakes and a stemwinder probably puts the purchase pre-1933.

Old XM's are "the bomb."

Any car with Carmer cutlevers is cool! (the SRC car, in particular)

Howard P.