anyone know what pulled the union pacific smoothside passenger cars with the two tone gray scheme? or have pictures to the particular train they belonged to? thanks for the help all!
Hello “animal,”
I think it’s true that the only UP streamliner that consistently operated with two-tone gray cars was the joint Wabash-UP “City of St. Louis.” Inaugurated in 1946, it was at first handled by yellow UP E6 units between St. Louis and Denver because the Wabash didn’t have any diesels to pull it until April of 1947. Two-tone gray UP 4-8-4s pulled the train between Denver and Cheyenne, where it connected with other trains for West Coast destinations, so there at least it presented a uniform color scheme. Blue and gray Wabash streamstyled steam engines ocassionally filled in for diesels on the St. Louis end of the route.
When the Wabash was able to assign a pair of blue, white, and gray E7s to the train, they alternated with the UP diesels between St. Louis and Denver. Beginning in April 1951 the “City of St. Louis” ran through to Los Angeles, but by that time the UP had standardized on yellow for all its passenger cars.
Other UP trains carried two-tone gray cars, including the “Los Angeles Limited,” the “Overland,” and the “Portland Rose,” but usually those trains inluded some heavyweight cars and some cars in other colors, such as Pullman Green or the UP’s own dark olive green. Even the “City of St. Louis” often included heavyweight Wabash baggage cars repainted two-tone gray, and until new lightweight diners arrived in 1949 it regularly used heavyweight UP diners painted gray. (When the lightweight diners came, they were painted yellow, and were the first yellow cars regularly assigned to the “City of St. Louis.”)
With all the gray cars and gray steam engines the UP operated in the late 1940s, it might seem strange that there weren’t more solid gray consists. I think the reason is that this was always a color scheme for secondary trains, and that the UP’s real priority was making sure the other “City” streamliners – the “City of Denver,” “City of Los Angeles,” “City of Portland,” and “City of San Francisco” –– consistently appeared in Armour Yellow and Ha
the overland… I think thats the train I am trying to model. wheres the best place for info on this train? and pictures? and thank you for all the info!
There is a book called " The Overland Limited " by Lucius Beebe that has a lot of information about train #27 Westbound and #28 Eastbound. It was handed off to the Southern Pacific and the Cab Forwards also pulled #27 and #28 over the Sierra range into the California. It had both streamline and heavy weights at times with the heavy weights lasting until the fifties.
This book is probably out of print many years ago, but I have a copy and see them used. It is good for the history of the train and has Pictures of the SP, IP, and C&NW steam locomotives pulling the train.
By the early fifties, it was all Yellow like the rest of the trains and became mostly head end cars by 1957, but was pulled by steam most of its time until late 1957, but was all heavy weight cars by that time.
Some other places to look for Union Pacific information is the UPHS.org. The Steamliner in the past has reviewed most of the name trains and talked about the 49er and the Challenger also, which was two tone gray for a short time in its early streamliner days.
Using a little modeler’s license, you can mix and match two tone gray heavy weights and light weight cars with steam until the early fifties, and mostly head end cars with two or three coaches in the late 56 or 57 era. Most of the pictures show the Harriman baggage cars on the Overland with steam on the front.
In the “Last of Steam” on page 168, a picture of #27 is shown with 844 on the head end in 1958, and the caption is , In the fall of 1958 in what is probablyits last year, meaning for the 844. How would they have known how wrong th