I know over the course of their history cabooses came in a variety of lengths and shapes. As newer cabooses came along, older cabooses were either scrapped, rebuilt, or designated for different assignments.
Q: Generally speaking, did the length of a caboose ever dictate what kind of service it was used in - e.g. local vs branchline vs fast freight, etc?
For the NYC I’ve seen lengths of 24’, 26’, 30’, 32’, and 36’. I recently purchased an undecorated brass 24’ NYC caboose. I was just curious what types of service one would or should expect for a caboose that length, or any of the other above lengths.
The B&O was another road with at least 1,100 “bobbers” on the roster.
Much changed with the passing of a 1913 Ohio law (parts of it are still listed in the 2011 ORC) requiring cabooses to have a minimum of four axles and length of 24 feet. The PRR reassigned their bobbers to other states.
By the twenties, steel underframes became the norm as wood cars were subject to crushing if used ahead of pushers. Some states required the caboose to be moved behind the helper or the train crew had to ride the pusher.
In later years it seemed to make a difference by how much “pull” the train crews had with the railroad. Some cabooses were loaded with creature comforts including better riding trucks and lighting, refrigerators, better heaters and cushioned, high-back swivel seats while other roads only provided the bare required minimum.
No date given with the negative but repack stencil shows West Detroit, January, 1911.
Note, no truss rods but evidence of diagonal truss stays (threaded rods in brackets along bottom sill).
I’ve seen those “extended” marker brackets on other NYC cabooses. There’s the usual marker/flag brackets at the corners, too.
What are those sheet-iron “diamonds” on either side of the end door? An early high-visibility sign such as the B&O and others used as reflective attention getters?
Those wood-beam trucks look like they belong under a passenger car. Was that their original use? This car must have rode like a Pullman.
Handrails on both ends of the cupola indicate crews were still climbing out the windows to gain access to the roof walk. Love the hardware on the belly tool box.
Click the image to enlarge. I uploaded a huge photo.
Maybe slightly off topic but I think (?) this originated from Eds archives, which I “borrowed” for a Beartoon, and for this thread removed the captions.
I can’t quote all the sources from memory, or dig up a bunch of pictures real quick, but here some of what I know.
Longer cabooses were more common out west, and I have read it had to do with them needing to be more “self sufficent” at intermediate stops and longer runs.
Passenger/express trucks were moderately common as shown in the pictures above. Leaf springs were generally standard in regular freight trucks.
My freelanced ATLANTIC CENTRAL has some with “passenger” trucks.
Eastern roads favored the center cupola, although there are exceptions.
With or without outside influence, railroads in the mountains shifted to steel underframes and a steel cars pretty quickly to allow safe pushing. They simply moved the wood cars to divisions without grades.
The B&O was an early adopter of bay windows, not sure why.
Reading is another one that had a lot of the little 4 wheel ‘bobber’ cabooses. The need for pushers and other rule changes, plus the older cars simply wearing out, drove the adoption of newer one in the familiar 8 wheel center cupola pattern. Other Easter roads copied the Reading design with some variation, and Reading even built cabooses for some others.
Various state law changes drove other changes, such as a PA requirement that a caboose used on run over a certain length had to have toilet facilities.
Reading was pretty conservative in design. While there were differences between various classes of cabooses built at different times, until the wide vision design purchased from International Car Co, they were all in-house built and varied mostly by details, not overall design. There is literally a book on the subject which explains each class and the changes over the years in great detail.
I recall reading that the Reading based their steel caboose on a 1920 USRA design and that the only railroad to have the actual wood-sheathed, steel underframe USRA model was the Pittsburgh & Shawmutt. (More on that in another reply)
Here’s yet another example of special spring-bolster trucks installed for better riding qualities. Note the different mounting of the left-most window, and only that one has the rain gutter. I first spotted a similar arrangement like this on many NYC cabooses. I presume this window is arranged for the crew to open fully? Perhaps it slides to the side instead of vertically?
B&O and bay window. I wonder how much influence their pressed-steel “wagon-top” design had to do with adopting the bay window? Certainly fitting a bay window was easier than trying to design a cupola using the curved steel sections.
Tom, in a way, the service a caboose was in could be reflected in its length. A car used by a crew in yard or local service where, the crew went home to their own beds at night would not need to provide sleeping accommodations. Think of the “transfer” caboose. Cars used on runs that ended at distant terminals were often the crew’s home away from home and, were often assigned to and, used by one conductor. As “his property”, they were highly personalized and, added to the train when he got on and, removed when he got off. These cars were long enough to provide bunks for up to five.
As union agreements changed and railroads faced stiffer competition from other modes of transportation, the railroad YMCA and, contract boarding houses began to provide lodging at the “away” end of the run. The crews liked the idea of a real bed, toilet facilities, and meals they didn’t have to cook, away from the noise and smoke of the railroad yard. Thus began the era of the “pool caboose” which could be put on at one end of the railroad and, run all the way to the other, no matter how many crew changes that took place. The railroads liked this because the cabooses could be smaller, and they didn’t need so many of them.
Cars used where runs terminated in remote areas might still need to be capable of sheltering the crew and had to provide sleeping and eating capabilities. These cars were often cabooses removed from mainline service, having been replaced by the pool cabooses. As much as modelers and the general public romanticize about the “little red caboose”, they could often be a pretty miserable place to ride. Too cold in the winter-the Canadians’ final iteration of the cars had TWO heaters. They could also be convection ovens in the hot climates. Imagine sitting in a dark painted steel box on a 106 d
I think the B&O developed the bay window caboose due the clearance problems they had on some of their lines. If you had a caboose with a 10’ inside height and then added a cupola it would not get through some of their tunnels which limited the cars to those with 10’ inside height or lower. The B&O bought 10’ inside height cars a lot longer than most other railroads until they raised a few of their tunnels to accomodate 10’-6" inside height cars.
I did my version of “extensive” research (I read one book) on cabooses when I was making my plans for the final STRATTON AND GILLETTE.
What I found was cabooses 32 to 40 feet could be used in any service. Most 40 foot cabooses were rebuilt from other types of freight cars.
Wood cabooses lasted well past the end of steam.
Western cabooses, as Sheldon pointed out, were more “live-aboard” in general than Eastern cabooses.
I decided the “standard” caboose on the SGRR would be this brass model of a wooden GULF MOBILE AND OHIO prototype. I have collected ten of them, which is all I need.
I also have seven (I think) one-off other STRATTON AND GILLETTE cabooses in my collection.
The GM&O prototype looked generic enough to me that it really could not be readily identified as Eastern or Western, it was wooden, but not “old-timey”, and most important… it had a CENTERED cupola!
I love this caboose, forty feet long and a deep fishbelly underframe. I plan to eventually srcatchbuild one of these for the SGRR.
I often wondered if it had anything to do with mountain terrain. I have riden a good bit of the B&O mainline west, and it is like an endless snake thru woods and rock bluffs.
Looking at the side of the train might provide just as much or more information to the crew as looking at the top of the train?
As cars got taller, looking over the top became less and less possible. There were two options - the wide vision cupola liek the International Car Co design, with the cupola overhanging the sides, or the bay windows with no cupola at all.
Just checked a drawing for a PRR N5 Caboose, top of cupola was approximately 13’6" above the top of rail, would have been taken off in some of the B&O’s low tunnels.
