[N&W] 12-1 Pullmans

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

Rick Morrison writes:

The only way we can record the history of these cars is from the
recollections of folks like Dick  Fisher and Bill Palmer.  Dick Mentioned
Island Rose which was a 10 sec. 1 drawing room  1  compartment car as was
Island Regal.  I believe these cars were initially built for service on
the Rock Island.  It looks as if these cars  were still in Pullman green
after their purchase by N&W.  As frugal as N&W was, I suspect that  if
the green paint was in good shape when they acquired the cars, they were
satisfied to leave it that way until they actually needed repainting.   I
recall, in the summer of 1960 or 61 seeing  a heavyweight Pullman
lettered Norfolk and Western in Tuscan red dead heading west  from
Washington in B&O's Cleveland Night Express.  I was too young to take
note of a car name, but seeing an N&W car on the B&O mainline was a rare
occurrence.  A  friend of mine who had a travelling sales job used to
keep me posted  when he saw things like this.  I still have a postcard
dated 2/10/66 reporting that 10 section lounge car Norfolk County, in
red, was seen in Cumberland MD dead heading behind the motive power on
B&O's westbound Capitol Limited.  I think there was also a Dinwiddie
County and Roanoke County.  One of these cars now belongs to the Richmond
Chapter NRHS. It's interesting  that  these 10 sec lounge cars never
appeared in The Official Register of Passenger Train Equipment under N&W
ownership, but they were still on the property long after they sere out
of regular service.  Anyone have any info about this?  These cars were
the last heavyweight sleepers assigned to the Pocahontas, and they ran
through from Norfolk to Chicago (PRR beyond Cincinnati).  Dropped from
the consist in 1953 or 54.  All of the 12-1 and the two 10-1-1 sleepers
were still in the equipment register in 1959, but by 1966 all were gone.
I have no registers in my collection between '59 and '66.

There was a question raised about the possibility that the 12-1 cars were
used as back up cars for the lightweight 10-6 cars.  That may have been a
possibility, but available photos don't seem to bear this out.  I think
with the number of cars N&W had there were more that enough to cover
assignments and still have some spares.  If you study some of the videos
on the  market you can spot  10-6 cars on the Pocahontas from PRR, NYC,
and UP.  So whenever more cars of a  10-6 configuration were needed,
something always seemed to be available.  However an emergency like a
derailment could and did happen.  That would require a "make up train" to
be assembled on short notice, so who knows what was used?  I  have read,
though, that travellers had little enthusiasm for standard Pullmans after
the advent of more modern cars.

Rick Morrison