Trying to determine if the Union Pacific ran dedicated express-mail trains in the late 1940s/early 1950s such as Santa Fe’s famed Fast Mail Express or SP’s Klamath?
Any dedicated express-mail trains operating on the Northwestern District? If so, would passenger Challengers have been assigned to these trains?
What woud have been a typical consist?
Appreciate your help
Bob
Yes, they operated several such trains.
My 1956 Official Guide shows UP mail and express trains #11 and #12 operating between Green River, WY and Portland, OR. Most dedicated mail/express trains carried a coach on the rear to accomodate the trainmen who would have been in a caboose on a freight train. #11 and #12 are listed as doing that in the OG. They would accept passengers who insisted on riding the trains in that one coach.
The rest of the trains would have consisted on primarily heavyweight baggage cars carrying storage mail (mail that wasn’t sorted en route.) There would have also been Railway Epress equipment such as express reefers and high speed box cars. Both the reefers and box cars used on these trains would have been equiped with passenger trucks for the higher speeds. I do not know if the trains carried a working Railway Post Office car where mail was sorted en route. If I had to guess I’d guess they did.
#11 & #12 connected at Green River with Omaha-Oakland trains #27 and #28. The westbound #27 set out cars for #11 to take to the Northwest and #28 picked up cars from #12 from the Norhtwest. Because they handled these connecting cars, I doubt the trains were ususally large enough to require the services of a Challenger. But the UP used Challengers on passenger trains to/from Oregon.
http://www.uprr.com/aboutup/history/loco/locohs01.shtml
If a Challenger took a large passenger train into Oregon, and was not needed to bring another large train back east, they well could have put it on #12 just to get the engine back to where it could be well used.
Some facts, some “informed” speculation. Hope it helps.
The Klamath wasn’t a dedicated express-mail train. It was an accommodation train. Although it contained a lot of express/mail cars, the train also included coaches, sleepers and a diner. On the other hand, the Pacific Mail (Oakland-Ogden) and the Argonaut (Los Angeles-El Paso) trains were virtually all express/mail except for one or two coaches to accommodate local travelers and deadhead railroad crews. Those trains even had a news-agent car or all-day-lunch car at least during the mid-1940s.