I just had to see that, so to Google I went.
https://penneyvanderbilt.wordpress.com/2013/04/19/pulling-steam-locomotives-by-hand/
Scroll down just a little, there are two pictures.
Mike
Of the two photos cited above, the steam loco shot is probably around 1945, or so.
The freight car one looks to be mid '50’s. Or so my fashion sense says.
There’s also this one which predates the others:
Photo taken in the early thirties.
Ed
Yep, that picture also showed up in my search. Not sure if it was on the same vanderbilt site as the others.
Mike.
1111 is the famous Timkin “Four Aces” - a 4-8-4 from Alco built for Timkin but no railroad, that barnstormed the country showing host railroads the benefits of roller bearings. 1930 to 33, at which time the Northern Pacific bought it (mostly because they had damaged it).
I have also seen pictures of Charles Atlas pulling an entire train (the Broadway Limited) equipped with roller bearings.
Dave Nelson
There were at least two other ones.
MDC/Roundhouse Bettendorf Roller Bearing conversion trucks
Eastern Car Works Bettendorf Roller Bearing conversion trucks
Both out of stock (well, the ECW trucks are out-of-stock/sold-out at Walthers; the Roundhouse wouldn’t even have been listed with Walthers since the Horizon take-over).
Sorry, no images I could find on-line.
IIRC I had a pair of the MDC trucks, they were kind of interesting looking. This was decades ago, well before Rapidio.
Hi Tom,
First of all, I try to avoid the term “Bettendorf” except when I am referring to very specific products produced at the Bettendorf, IA foundry. Bettendorf was just one of many foundries that made very similar (although not necessarily identical) versions of cast steel truck frames, and not all Bettendorf products looked the same.
Timken was a pioneer in the roller bearing feld in the 1920’s and 1930’s, as has been mentioned. Some of the railroads that served Timken’s home city of Canton, Ohio and the adjacent region, were early supporters of Timken. The Wheeling & Lake Erie specified roller bearings on their switchers and Berkshires of the 1930’s and 1940’s; and AC&Y bought R-2 Mikados with roller bearings in 1941. In 1942, during WWII, AC&Y bought fifteen 70-ton ACF covered hoppers for Soda Ash service out of Barberton, Ohio. These had plain bearings in cast steel trucks; but an additional 1947 order for 25 more of the same had roller bearings mounted in National B-1 trucks. Also in 1947, AC&Y was one of International Car’s first customers for postwar steel cabooses, purchasing six cars (AC&Y 60-65) with roller bearings.
Timken bought a single 1937 AAR boxcar, number TRBX 88, in July, 1943, and painted it in a green scheme with advertising placards for demonstration. The car was displayed at the Chicago Railroad Exposition in 1948 in a yellow livery with a white band and black roof and lettering. In 1951, the AC&Y entered into a lease of that boxcar plus a companion red and white Timken roller bearing gondola. These cars operated as AC&Y boxcar 600 and AC&Y gondola 1500 until 1958. Both cars continued to carry a modified version of the Timken paint scheme with “Roller Freight” logo during this period. Several versions of the yellow Timken boxcar have been produced in HO, and Lionel even produced a version applied to a 6464 series boxcar; but I am not aware of any of them that are truly accur
I hope some lucky salesman got comission on the sales of roller bearings.