In celebration of the presentation of the recently refurbished JOSEPH LISTER at the National Railroad Museum here is the Builder's Photo of the sister car EPHRAIM McDOWELL. It is amazing that the JOSEPH LISTER was brought back to life by the Museum given it was essentially only a shell.

Note the style of the lettering - the car name doesn't start with large caps. Except for the "c" in "McDOWELL" all of the letters are the same size - standard Pullman practice. For reference, I would recommend Arthur Dubin's "Pullman Paint and Lettering Notebook". The JOSEPH LISTER would have been lettered similarly. The use of large caps on Pullman car names is a common mistake when they are relettered - it seems like it would be correct but that was not Pullman's practice.

It was Pullman's practice to only photograph one car from each Lot because they were identical except for the car names. To preempt IV from questioning cars from the same Lot looking alike and having the same details: according to "The Pullman Photographers", written by Don Horn and published in Railroad Heritage Magazine, No. 7, 2003, "The practice of photographing one car out of each new lot continued; however, sleepers, passenger, private, mail, and express cars were now photographed with six or more views taken of the interior and exterior. Freight cars, flat cars, and hopper cars continued to be photographed for the exterior side only; however, end views were now also being taken. Normally the first car in a production run was photographed."

Here is an interesting article from the Pullman News July 1930 about the EPHRAIM McDOWELL and JOSEPH LISTER. I don't have my original of this issue of the Pullman News with me but I believe the cover had a photograph of the car interior. Once I am back with my files I will scan the cover and post it.