Firelock, that wouldn’t be the potato cars we see scrambled all over the Boston and Maine line in the Potato Wreck of 1934, by any chance?
Boston and Maine? I thought it was the New Haven, and in 1937. I’ll have to check it, it’s been a while since I’ve watched that video.
I’ve had my video cassette watching on hold for a while. The old VCR decided to eat my tapes! Finally found a new DVD/VCR player a few weeks ago. What a relief, at least someone still makes them!
OK, I’m back and Wizlish you’re absolutely correct, the wreck WAS on the Boston and Maine in 1934, and in Clinton, Massachusetts.
Man, was I wrong on that one!
Perhaps the most colorful billboard reefers were the Hanrahan refrigerator cars owned and operated by the Colorado Midland. They featured a full car sized Ute Indian on the right side of the middle ice bunker doors. They were built by Pullman in 1897 and most ended up on the Midland Terminal after the CM was abandoned during WWI.
The Santa Fe also rostered Hanrahans during this period and the CM’s were probably influenced by AT&SF since Santa Fe contolled the CM during the 1890s.
LaBelle has offered a custom wood kit in HO scale for years of the CM’s reefers. Other models in various scales have been offered from time to time in this colorful scheme albeit applied to regular reefer designs and not the Hanrahan.
The most beautiful CM model I have seen is the one in #3 gauge built by Barry Bogs. It can be viewed at www.cumberlandmodelengineering.com along with other fine large scale models. The Santa Fe Hanrahans were lettered in full AT&SF lettering on the right side of the middle car ice bunkers and featured the “Santa Fe Route” herald on the left side. This was before the holy cross herald and SFRD were created it appears.
“Billboard Refrigerator Cars” by Richard H. Hendrickson and Edward S. Kaminski, is also recommended by Jeff Wilson in his Model Railroader book “Produce Traffic & Trains” in the Guide to Industries Series, which itself is an excellent book and also well illustrated.