I saw the following article in Flimsies:
http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/jersey/index.ssf?/base/news-4/1157609398140820.xml&coll=1
Having grown up in Blairstown, I read this with great interest. Blairstown was home to three railroads - the DL&W, the NYS&W and the Lehigh & New England (on trackage rights over the Susquehanna). So why does a town like this pay $26,000 for a New Haven caboose? Surely someone could have found a caboose from a home road for less than that? You wish people like this would talk to people with some railroad knowledge before spending this kind of money on something that has no connection to the town buying it.

Well, the Susquehanna had steel cabooses that were very close to New Haven NE-6's. Plus, apparently the caboose was already there in town.

Just to be argumentative.............

YOU go ahead and find an intact, authentic caboose from the DL&W, NYS&W, or L&NE on the market.

Go ahead. Get back to me when you find it. And then tell me what the shipping charges are to Blairstown.

To be blunt, it's probably far easier to find a NH caboose. And, depending on the exact design/class, it *might* be absolutely identical in design. (There was one standardized class of caboose shared between a bunch of roads in the Northeast.)

Isn't there still a line of blue Conrail cabooses available in PA for maybe only $8K or so, and from a variety of Conrail predecessors? $26K sounds steep and maybe another $5K for the move??

Anyway it does not sound like it will be restored or remain intact as the railroad used it.

Bob Kutella

Well, if it's an NE-6/International Car, that's pretty much identical to the Susquehanna's steel cars. If it's a "northeast" Reading-style caboose, you could point to the LNE steel hacks. Other than that, it's about as appropriate as the Pennsy N5 set as a memorial to the Maybrook Yards along Route 208 in Maybrook NY -- it's a caboose, in the generic sense.

I'll take that challenge, from the last to first, but I am not second-guessing the Blairstown decision. It is what it is, and maybe it saved a caboose headed to scrap.

Back to the challenge... To my knowldege, the NH did not use any of the common "northeastern designs" but as a previous poster mentioned their NE-6 model was used by the Susie Q.

Now, the first part, which is really too easy a challenge...

We covered here on RYPN a couple of months ago the L&NE wooden hack, intact, in MA ready for a new owner. So there's one. Truck it out. Less than $26K? Mebbee?

Barhart has an EL bay window car in South Plainfield, NJ for sale, just about 50 miles from Blairstown. Truck it out. Less than $26K? Mebbe?

They just missed a CNJ hack that could have been "LNE'd" easily, The URHS donated that one to Fanwood, NJ. There are a number of other "northeastern" hacks that are available in some form or another (lease, donation, sale).


Rob

eldiner wrote, "Blairstown was home to three railroads - the DL&W, the NYS&W and the L&NE. So why does a town like this pay $26,000 for a New Haven caboose?"


Hi,

Does anyone know the number for the Town Hall caboose?

There is a second NH caboose reported in the Blairstown area at the closed Rock Ledge Nursery, Kerr's Corner Rd., north of town. Is this one still at the nursery and is the number known?

I used to go to a BSA Camp at Cedar Lake and worked on the Yards Creek pumped storage project, both near Blairstown. I lived in Oak Tree (Edison) while a Boy Scout and in Columbia while on the Yards Creek project.

Thanks, Roger