If I remember correctly, I read somewhere that often the Jim Crow car was a combine with the baggage section between the other cars in the passenger train and the passenger section in the combine. This seemed to be the easiest way to separate the white and black folks. The thing that always seemed funny to me about segregation was that the staff in most passenger cars was almost exclusively black during this time period, if photos are any indication, so it would seem that segregation was a flawed proposition from the very start.
Unless I’m mistaken (it’s happened), you can buy a Jim Crow car right off the shelf–the Rivarossi 1930 coach.
From the Passenger car list, this car is modeled after Kansas City Southern cars 234-238, built in 1940. Randall’s “Streamliner Cars, Volume 1” describes these cars as “66-seat Divided Coach, 8-seat Smoker”. I’d love to see the floor plans, as it’s conceivable the divider is for the smoking area, but I doubt it.
I also found a Jim Crow diner. It was a “…divided grill coach with double counter service”. Lest there be any doubt on this one, the seating areas on the floor plan are labeled “colored” and “white”. These cars were from the MP & T&P Eagles.
Ed
I personally could never model a Jim Crow car due to all that it represents.
It’s not about ignoring history but about escaping to a magical little world in my basement - and no ideal world in my mind would ever include a divided car.
If I were modelling the South during the Jim Crow era I would use a bit of creative licence and deem that on my layout, racial segregation never happened. Unless someone is creating a layout for a museum, I don’t believe there is anything wrong with that.
Best regards,
Jason
I share Jason sentiments.
For me reading this topic, the timing seemed a bit ironic since my last passenger car metalizing project was a Budd-Baggage Dorm unit.
http://cs.trains.com/TRCCS/forums/p/202367/2211558.aspx
Up until the late 1950s->early 60s Bag-Dorms were used as modern Jim Crow cars on trains that ran in or to the south. But like Jason, in my modeling world there is no segregation or civil unrest. For me the Bag-Dorm will be just another revenue producing car behind a sleek group of EMD E-units.
When modelers ask me about my feelings regarding segregation on trains from the past (I’m a Back Latino)…I remind them that many commercial airliners and interstate buses also had some form of segregation, so I don’t dwell on it and acknowledge it as a painful part of history. I just want to enjoy this hobby.
If I visit a layout where a modeler exhibits a Jim Crow car, then so be it. Like many of us, he’s trying to capture the look of a real world prototype. My interest would be in the paint job and weathering techniques.
Sorry to be a late comer to this topic folks. I noticed the posting about splicing a Roundhouse/MDC overton combine and coach together to make a Jim Crow Combine reminiscent of the Wadly & Southern #12. This is a very viable option because I have made separate models of an open platform/center baggage Jim Crow Combine using this technique. The secret is to make the overall length approximately 50’ scale feet, relocate the truck bolsters 24” closer to the center, and try to align the skylight openings so they are equally sized and distributed when splicing the clerestory roof. The stock arch bar trucks need to be replaced with a two wheel coach truck. I pulled a pair off an old Tyco wooden coach for one of my models, the other I used an old pair of Central Valley trucks.
A modern heavyweight type Jim Crow Combine can be constructed from an Athearn 72’ round roof steel heavyweight coach. You’ll have to cut out the opening for the New England Rail baggage doors and you can use their window kit with the filler strips to make the baggage compartment. You can also use stock styrene strip to fill in the windows and apply Archer resin rivets on the seams. This variation is similar to the Harriman style Jim Crow Combine’s used on the Central of Georgia and the Wadley Southern #73. I finished out this model with roof vents, smoke jack, tail end gates, and marker lamps.
There is an exceptionally fine article on the topic of the Jim Crow era (passenger cars and depots) in the February 2001 issue of Trains magazine, by John Edward Wilz. Not many photos but solid information.
And lest we in the north get smug about this some years ago at an antique store I saw for sale signs that marked restrooms for whites and Indians – I believe the items were marked to have come from a Northern Pacific depot. I had never heard of such a thing and while the southern railroads had at least the excuse that they were compelled by some state laws to segregate, I am not sure the NP had any such basis.
Dave Nelson
What era of cars are you seeking? Contrary to general belief “Jim Crow” cars did not originate in the Old South after Reconstruction. In fact, the first mention of racially segregated railroad cars called by that name dates back to the 1840s when their use was a common practice on early New England railroads. The term, apparently first used on the Boston & Providence in 1841, was taken from the name of a blackface character performed on stage by Thomas Dartmouth “Daddy” Rice in the late 1830s. Charles Dickens remarked on this practice during his trip through the area, and Fredrick Douglas recorded its effect in his 1855 work My Bondage and My Freedom: "Regarding this custom as fostering the spirit of caste, I made it a rule to seat myself in the cars for the accommodation of passengers generally.
I agree Jeffrey, but then how many of us are guilty of having “whites only” layouts ?. I’ll be the first to raise my hand. I have over 50 people on my layout and every one of them are white. About the only black figures available are porters, shoe shiners and a preacher with his congregation…
Tracklayer
My layout isn’t intentionally segregated, but there are only three people on it who don’t fit the majority profile - and two of them are toddlers. This isn’t a result of turning a blind eye, this merely recognizes that non-Japanese in up-country Japan in the 1960s were only slightly more common than polar bears in Panama.
Since there is precious little in the Upper Kiso Valley to attract tourists, I doubt that the situation is very different today.
As for the three oddballs, the little boy takes after his mother (and looks Japanese) while the younger girl shows very few non-caucasian features. (This is still true now, 49+ years later.) The other is that squirrely gaijin with the camera and notebook who has been all over the local rail facilities.
When I first went to Japan in the mid-1950s there were still a few ‘Occupation’ EMU cars running on the Chu-o Sen out of Tokyo. The closed section at the front of the first car had been reserved for Allied troops and families during the military occupation. By the time I got there the occupation was history and those compartments were just as full of commuting salarymen as the rest of the train.
Also, for anyone concerned about the preponderance of peach-skinned people on their own empires, relief is just a paintbrush away.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964.)
If the era and locale you model would have had Jim Crow cars, by all means add one to your train. Contrary to what some segments of the population think, doing do does NOT mean you support the sort of practices that led to the existence of such things. It’s a part (shameful though it may be) of our history - to ignore that there ever was such a thing is the surest way to see it happen again. Like the famous quote from George Santayana - those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. There good things in the past and there are evil things in the past - we cannot choose to just remember the good things. Like it or not, the evil is a part of who we are and how we got here. The best we can do is never forget it and never allow it to happen again.
–Randy
Rather than splice two Overton cars together to make a 50’ car, why not just use a Roundhouse 50’ open-platform car?? The old MDC undecorated ones turn up fairly often, if you can’t find one for the railroad you’re modelling.
http://www.athearn.com/Products/Default.aspx?ProdID=RND84860
Amen, Jeffrey-Wimberly!
I can’t believe that MR would allow this posting to become what it has. A simple question about modeling a car has led to a race discussion. Personally, I don’t care if someone wants to model this type of car…it is what it is…a passenger car. Get over it.
I likewise don’t care if somebody chooses to model something like this. But it’s not just another passenger car - it’s something that existed solely because of racism and institutionalized discrimination. As such, there will be strong opinions, and that shouldn’t surprise us.
Rob, you are right, but will there ever come a time when we can get past this? To me, this is just a hobby and racism has no place in it.
This sounded right from when I went to the B&O Museum in late '11. I remembered a wooden combine that had some explanations inside about railroad segragation. I think the segrated section was closer to the engine and was also the baggage section. It was built c. 1900 and later became C&O property. Operating in Virginia.
In apartheid South Africa trains 1st class was rfr “whites” only, Others rode 2nd or 3rd class. Many years ago I read an article about South Africa’s premier passenger trains. I thought it was in Trains, but have been unable to find it. It had photos of a very luxurious car for rich “black” patrons.