#Chicago Milwaukee St. Paul and Pacific

[collinthenychudson]

Day 3: Little Joe

Info from Wikipedia:

The Little Joe is a type of railroad electric locomotive built by General Electric. The locomotives had twelve axles, eight of them powered, in a 2-D+D-2 arrangement. They were originally intended to be exported to the Soviet Union and designed to operate on Soviet Railways (SZhD) 3,300-volt DC overhead line system. They were never exported to the Soviet Union due to rising political tensions. Only 20 were built, with 15 sold to domestic operators and five exported to Brazil.

After World War II, the Soviet Railways continued its electrification program, this time targeting the Kropachyovo-Zlatoust-Chelyabinsk line of the South Urals Railway. As local factories were recovering from the war efforts, the Soviet government (then led by Joseph Stalin), ordered 20 of these locomotives. Known by their factory classification of GE 2-D+D-2 406/546 8-GE 750-3300V, in the Soviet Union, they would have received the classification of the A-series locomotive, with the A standing for Amerikanskiy elektrovoz (Russian: Американский электровоз), meaning "American locomotive". At the time, this was the strongest electric locomotive, producing a power of 4320 kW, being comparable to the Union Pacific Big Boy.

The locomotives were built by General Electric (GE) at Erie, Pennsylvania, with the supervision of Soviet specialists. The Ministry of Railways of the USSR was so confident about receiving these locomotives, that they were also allocated running numbers, initially 1591-1610 and later 2301-2320. The first test run of the locomotive (unit A1598) took place on 7 September 1948 on a test track of the New York Central Railroad.

GE built 20 locomotives of this type, but the company was prohibited from delivering them as relations between the United States and Soviet Union deteriorated into what became known as the Cold War. Fourteen were built to the track gauge of 5 ft (1,524 mm) and the final six were built to 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) standard gauge.

The locomotives were never delivered because the State Department banned sales of strategic goods to the Soviet Union whilst production was underway. This included the electric locomotives, which were considered strategic to the Soviet Railways. Before the ban, the tensions between the US and USSR caused the Soviet railway engineers to be recalled back to their country. GE completed the locomotives, but they were left with no owner. Two were damaged during the trials. Although minimal, unit 29924 collided with unit 29923, causing significant damage to the leading axle.

The Soviet Union was then forced to design its own locomotive, the N8 (later VL8), which only ran in 1953. This led to the development of the VL10 (3kV DC) and VL80 (25 kV AC) locomotives.

The Milwaukee Road had offered to buy all 20 locomotives, plus their spare parts, for $1 million. That was little more than scrap value, but GE accepted. However, the Milwaukee's Board of Directors would not release the money.  Nonetheless, unit 29927 was tested on 24 December 1948 on the Milwaukee Road, but it revealed some issues during trials.

Demand during the Korean War boosted the Milwaukee's need for locomotives on their electrified mainline. The railroad was also beset by a coal strike that required sending most diesels back East (Milwaukee Lines East steam engines still burned coal, unlike the oil-burning Lines West steamers). So the Board of Directors returned to GE, only to discover that eight locomotives and all the spare parts had been sold. Three had gone to the Chicago South Shore & South Bend Railroad (the South Shore Line), and five to the Companhia Paulista de Estradas de Ferro of Brazil.

Still, the Milwaukee Road bought the remaining 12 locomotives for $1 million. The railroad designated its new locomotives as "class EF-4", denoting them as the line's fourth model of electric freight engine. Two units were modified before delivery for passenger service; these were designated "class EP-4". The Milwaukee's operating employees referred to the EF-4/EP-4 units as Little Joseph Stalin's locomotives, which was eventually shortened to simply Little Joe.

As originally tested, the Milwaukee was not impressed with these locomotives, finding them prone to wheelslip. The World War I-vintage General Electric motor-generator substations had difficulty supplying more than two EF-4s under heavy load, which meant that their true ability could not be demonstrated. Additionally, the controls were initially labelled in Russian. After being modified with increased weight, raising the maximum height of the pantographs and being provided with adequate power, the EF-4s were excellent performers and very reliable. Some substations were later modified to supply up to 3,400 volts to take advantage of the high power of these locomotives.

The E20 and E21 locomotives became EP-4 engines to be used for passenger service. They were modified before delivery to remove driving controls and windows at one end to permit moving new, improved main circuit breakers into a cooler environment. The Milwaukee Shops replaced the operating controls in the "B" end with a steam generator before they entered service. The loss of this cab was operationally inconsequential, as many Milwaukee electric locomotives were normally turned at the end of their runs in Avery, Deer Lodge or Harlowton, the road having preferred to maintain only one set of controls even on double-ended units. The most important and final major modification was the provision of multiple unit controls for trailing diesel-electric locomotives. This system was designed in-house. It was not uncommon to see several diesel-electric locomotives being led by, and controlled from, one or two Joes (or a set of Boxcabs) in the 1960s and 70s.

The external difference that most readily distinguished class EP-4 from EF-4 was the use of roller bearings on all axles on the E20 and E21 as delivered. The EF-4s were delivered with roller bearings on the forward (unpowered) trucks only, though they would have individual roller bearing axles substituted piecemeal in the shop whenever original plain bearing axles on the motorized sets burned out or were wreck-damaged.

Like almost any locomotive class, the Little Joes were occasionally involved in accidents. One such, in 1966, resulted in the E78 being rebuilt (back east in the Milwaukee Shops) to a slightly different appearance from the other 11 units, due to the use of a pair of stainless steel side ventilation grilles intended for use on EMD F-units.

The Milwaukee Road used two for passenger service, designated class EP-4 (2-D+D-2), and the remaining ten for freight, designated class EF-4. They were used on the railroad's electrified Rocky Mountain Division in Montana and Idaho to take the place of older GE boxcab electrics that had been operating there since the 1920s. They were never used on the road's electrically disjunct Coast Division in Washington, as none of that division's substations were upgraded to accommodate them. Three had been delivered in standard gauge, while the rest were converted to standard gauge in the Milwaukee's shops.

The EF-4s performed well, so much so that Milwaukee management soon desired to utilize the two EP-4s exclusively on freights. This was being done by 1956, when the passenger Joes were replaced by newly migrated EP-2 Bipolars. After the latter turned out to be ill-suited to the Rocky Mountain Division, they and the EP-4s were replaced by three-unit consists of EMD E-unit and/or FP7 diesels which hauled the Olympian Hiawatha end-to-end, unassisted, until its discontinuation in 1961. Neither EP-4 received the post-1955 Union Pacific-inspired Armour Yellow, red and gray paint scheme used on Milwaukee passenger power, such as the Bipolars and GE Passenger Motors.

The Little Joes lasted until the end of electric operation on the Milwaukee on June 15, 1974. By that time, they were the Milwaukee's only electric road locomotives, all the GE Freight Motors (except two which were used together in MU as the Harlowton switcher) having succumbed to old age.

The South Shore, while primarily a commuter railroad between Chicago, Illinois, and northwestern Indiana, used them in freight service. hey were modified to operate on 1500 V DC catenary, and were delivered with roller bearings on all axles as on the Milwaukee EP-4s. In service on the South Shore the "Little Joe" name was not generally used; they were called "800s". Two of the three lasted until 1983, making them the last electrics in regular mainline freight service on a US common-carrier railroad. Today, freight trains are pulled by diesel-electric locomotives.

Two 800s survive today, 802 at the Lake Shore Railroad Museum, and 803 in running condition at the Illinois Railway Museum.

The Companhia Paulista de Estradas de Ferro converted its locomotives to its 5 ft 3 in (1,600 mm) gauge. They became known as Russas, and stayed active through each re-organization of the Brazilian railways, finally ending up with FEPASA in 1971.

These were the most powerful electric locomotives in the country. On this railway, the locomotive of number 6454 gained the title "Engenheiro Jayme Cintra" - a tribute for an important person of the Paulista Railway history: he was the responsible for electrification of the main Brazilian railway of that season.

They continued to operate until 1999, becoming the last units of their class in revenue service. It was at this point that FEPASA was privatized, and electric operation was ended.

Surviving Little Joes:

Milwaukee Road #E70 is on static display at Deer Lodge, Montana.

South Shore #803 is preserved, in operational condition, at the Illinois Railway Museum (IRM). South Shore #802 is preserved and on public display at the Lake Shore Railway Historical Museum in North East, Pennsylvania, 10 miles (16 km) away from Erie, where the GE Locomotive Assembly Plant that constructed the Little Joes is located.

In Brazil, 6451, 6453, and 6454 were scrapped after the deactivation. Number 6452 is in a museum in Jundiaí, São Paulo and #6455 is in a museum in Bauru, São Paulo, but is missing many parts. As of 2008, 6455 was transferred in safe for the stop-station gare and now is safe in a rail station-museum.

Models and Route By: RRmods, Auran, and Download Station

[trainsgenderfoxgirl2816]

More context

This is more Milwaukee Road

And more Great Northern

[clovisfo]

Locomotiva Hiawatha. Os Hiawathas eram uma frota de trens de passageiros operados pela Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul e Pacific Railroad (também conhecida como Milwaukee Road) entre Chicago e vários destinos no meio-oeste e oeste dos Estados Unidos. O mais notável desses trens foi o original Twin Cities Hiawatha, que servia as Twin Cities em Minnesota. O trem foi nomeado para o poema épico The Song of Hiawatha de Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

[littlewestern]

So @greatwesternway and I had an adventure weekend (+2 extra days) where we trekked all over the Chicago suburbs and into the city to do some research for our Train Letters and see some fish at the aquarium for good measure. You'll be hearing more about our trip in the coming days from both of us, no doubt, but I wanted to share this quick anecdote myself because while it's not really related, I think it's kinda fun.

Since I live less than an hour away from the city, and the train runs right through my town, Metra is my drug of choice for getting up to Chicago. On Sunday we went to the MSI and took the Milwaukee District West line in early. That line passes right by the Western Avenue coach yard where you can catch a glimpse of a bunch of different engines and coaches on standby, up close and personal.

Now, Metra engines are not particularly interesting visually. They run a standard blue/grey livery with a dash of orange for flavor.

(It varies depending on how old the unit is, but these guys are a bog-standard example.)

Point being, the coach yard is usually pretty boring. Unless you like ogling the older equipment, it's just a visual indicator that you're getting off the train soon.

Except this Sunday, I got an eyeful of something interesting!

Orange! How novel! I'd never seen it before, didn't even know it existed until it flashed by us on our way inbound. Of course I whipped out my phone and started googling furiously. From the Metra website:

Through its heritage locomotive program, Metra is reproducing the color schemes of its predecessors on its locomotive fleet. So far, five locomotives have received special paint jobs. In January 2019, Locomotive 405, an MP36PH-3S, emerged in the orange, maroon and black of the Chicago Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad (also known as the Milwaukee Road). The locomotive also features a Hiawatha decal. The powerful figure represents the golden age of passenger travel and was the icon of the Milwaukee Road’s Hiawatha routes.

What a nice thing to see early on a Sunday morning! I tucked my phone away, satisfied I'd been able to start my train day off with a bit of a treat, and thought nothing more about it for about 24 hours.

The next day we decided to keep it local and do some thrifting in the next town over. One which also happens to abutt the MD-W. On our way to the store we get stopped at a railroad crossing. Down come the gates and I look up to see...

METX 405! I squealed and pointed. "Oh! Oh! It's the heritage unit!" Like I didn't just learn about it yesterday. How cool, two sightings in as many days!

So naturally it was on my mind all through the next day, our last day downtown. "It's too bad we didn't get to see it again..." I said, dreamily to DJ who was not talking to me anymore after I made her walk all day in freezing cold lake-effect drizzle.

Miserable weather for June. We disembarked our final train, stepping onto the platform just as the drizzle turned into a full-on downpour. We dropped our heads against the wind and rain and ran for the car. I lifted my head as the train started to pull away, just in time to see the Milwaukee orange heritage unit that was pulling us all the way home disappear into the night.

DJ wasn't as excited as I was for some reason!

[20th-century-railroading]

MILW/CGW, Melbourne, Iowa, 1973 by Center for Railroad Photography & Art Via Flickr: Westbound F45 leads Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad freight train as it ducks under Chicago Great Western Railway line at Melbourne, Iowa, in June 1973. Photograph by J. Parker Lamb, © 2017, Center for Railroad Photography and Art. Lamb-02-107-09

[zponds]

12 days, I made a post going over my OCs from the Chicago & Northwestern. Now this post will go over my OCs from…

Now these engines in the Milwaukee Road heritage fleet are under ownership of Soo Line, BNSF and Union Pacific, and these engines are only found…

on railroad territories there were once owned by the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul, and Pacific Railroad (CMStP&P), which was more commonly known as The Milwaukee Road. And these OC engines from the “Route of the Hiawatha’s” are…

Mike, the 4-4-2 Class A #2 and first Twin Cites Hiawatha engine

Otto, the 4-4-2 Class A #3 and first Midwest Hiawatha engine

Stevenson, the 4-6-4 Class F7 #100 and second Twin Cities Hiawatha engine

Penny, the 4-6-4 Class F7 #102 and second Midwest Hiawatha engine

Gaston, the streamlined 4-6-0 class G #10 and North Woods Hiawatha engine

Whitsun, the streamlined 4-6-0 class G #11 and second North Woods Hiawatha engine

Hubbard, the streamlined 4-6-2 class F3 #151 and first Chippewa Hiawatha engine

Cassie, the streamlined 4-6-2 class F3 #152 and second Chippewa Hiawatha engine

Courtney, the 2-8-2 class L2 #361

Maxie, the 4-8-4 class S3 #261

Olympus, the FM Erie-built #6 and first Olympian Hiawatha engine

Zeus, the FM Erie-built #5 and second Olympian Hiawatha engine

Reanne, the EMD F7 #60a

Amanda, the EMD F7 #80a

Grant, the EMD F7 #109a

James, the EMD F7 #69a

Cal, the EMD GP40 #2026

Arthur, the EMD GP40 #2057

Mindy, the EMD GP40 #2035

Norman, the EMD GP40 #2006

[grantgfan]

Hey, Ellie. The first thing I wanna mention about my alternative history regarding American railroads is that it involves 20 American railroads;

New York Central

Pennsylvania Railroad

Chesapeake and Ohio

Baltimore and Ohio

Norfolk and Western

Southern Railway (USA)

Seaboard Air Line

Atlantic Coast Line

Gulf, Mobile and Ohio

Illinois Central

Missouri Pacific

Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific (Rock Island)

Chicago and Northwestern

Chicago, Milwaukee, St Paul and Pacific (Milwaukee Road)

Chicago, Burlington and Quincy (Burlington Route)

Northern Pacific

Great Northern

Union Pacific

Southern Pacific

Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe (Santa Fe)

ellie: whoa

[urbs-in-horto]

Looking north toward Wrigley Field and Addison Avenue down Seminary Avenue. There used to be a multi-track rail car yard just west of Wrigley, serving a number of businesses adjacent to Clark and Addison. I remember a coal yard and a poultry processing plant. The Milwaukee Road railroad, more formally named The Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad (CMStP&P) once provided freight service as far south as Diversey via street level sidings. More info about the forgotten days of freight trains in the city at Industrial History website. (Many more shots of Wrigley Field area)

[chorusfm]

The Decemberists – “Burial Ground”

The Decemberists have returned with “Burial Ground,” their first new song in six years. They’ve also announced some new tour dates. Tour Dates 04/30 – Kingston, NY @ Ulster Performing Arts Center 05/02 – Boston, MA @ Roadrunner 05/03 – Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Paramount Theatre 05/06 – Toronto, ON @ Exhibition Place – Queen Elizabeth Theatre 05/07 – Pittsburgh, PA @ Stage AE 05/08 – Philadelphia, PA @ The Fillmore Philadelphia 05/10 – Washington DC @ The Anthem 05/11 – Durham, NC @ Durham Performing Arts Center 05/12 – Atlanta, GA @ The Eastern 05/14 – Dallas, TX @ Majestic Theater 05/15 – Austin, TX @ Bass Concert Hall 05/17 – St Louis, MO @ The Pageant 05/18 – Milwaukee, WI @ Riverside Theater 05/19 – St Paul, MN @ Palace Theatre 05/21 – Chicago, IL @ Salt Shed 05/22 – Detroit, MI @ Royal Oak Music Theater 05/24 – Nashville, TN @ Ryman Auditorium 07/12 – Bend, OR @ Hayden Homes Amphitheater ^ 07/13 – Oakland, CA @ Fox Theater 07/15 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Bellwether 07/18 – San Diego, CA @ Humphreys 07/19 – Tucson, AZ @ Rialto Theater 07/20 – Phoenix, AZ @ The Van Buren 07/22 – Santa Fe, NM @ The Bridge at Santa Fe Brewing 07/23 – Denver, CO @ The Mission Ballroom 07/24 – Sandy, UT @ Sandy Amphitheater 07/26 – Missoula, MT @ Kettlehouse Amphitheater 07/27 – Spokane, WA @ Spokane Pavilion 07/29 – Vancouver, BC @ Queen Elizabeth Theatre 08/03 – Troutdale, OR @ McMenamins Edgefield Press Release The Decemberists will head out on an expansive North American tour with both spring and summer legs. The tour kicks off on April 30th in Kingston, NY at the Ulster Performing Arts Center and wraps up in August on the West Coast. Highlights include the Brooklyn Paramount Theater on May 3rd, the Salt Shed in Chicago on May 21st and the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville on May 24th. The band will return to their home turf, wrapping the tour in Troutdale, OR on August 3rd at McMenamins Edgefield. VIP pre-sale begins tomorrow,  Wednesday, February 7th at 10AM Pacific. The tour will go on-sale to the public this Friday, February 9th at 10AM local time. Full tour dates listed below. For 20 years The Decemberists have been one of the most original, daring, and thrilling American rock bands. Founded in the year 2000 when singer, songwriter, and guitarist Colin Meloy moved from Montana to Portland, Oregon and met bassist Nate Query, keyboardist Jenny Conlee, and guitarist Chris Funk, The Decemberists’ distinctive brand of hyperliterate folk-rock set them apart from the start with the release of their debut EP 5 Songs in 2001. After making their full-length debut with Castaways and Cutouts in 2002, the band signed with Kill Rock Stars for the release of the acclaimed albums Her Majesty the Decemberists (2003) and Picaresque (2005), which was produced by Chris Walla. The 2004 EP The Tain – an 18-minute single-track epic – made the band’s grand creative ambitions clear.   Around this time the band’s permanent line-up fell into place with the arrival of drummer John Moen, and they made the unexpected leap to Capitol Records for their first major label album in 2006. Fans’ concerns of whether the band would alter their trademark sound quickly vanished when they delivered their most ambitious and audacious record to date in The Crane Wife, a song cycle produced by Walla and Tucker Martine (who would become a longtime creative partner) that added elements of ‘70s prog, hard rock and even quasi-disco to their palette. The album was met by wide acclaim from The New York Times, Rolling Stone, SPIN, Stereogum, and was named Best New Music by Pitchfork.   Three years later, The Hazards of Love – a full-length concept album based on Meloy’s idea for a stage musical - was a Top 20 hit. In 2011, they topped themselves yet again with their first #1 album, The King Is Dead, which featured the GRAMMY-nominated song “Down By The Water.” After their 2015 album What A Terrible World, What A Beautiful World, which included the #1 AAA radio hit “Make You Better,” The Decemberists changed up… https://chorus.fm/news/the-decemberists-burial-ground/

[locomotive-idiot]

Locomotive of the day: The MILW EF-4 ‘Little Joe’!

The Little Joe is a type of railroad electric locomotive built by General Electric. The locomotives had twelve axles, eight of them powered, in a 2-D+D-2 arrangement. They were originally intended to be exported to the Soviet Union and designed to operate on Soviet Railways 3,300-volt DC overhead line system, however, they were never exported to the Soviet Union due to rising political tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union. Only 20 were built, with 15 sold to domestic operators (one of which being the MILW) and 5 exported to Brazil.

[directly ripped from wikipedia]

I personally love the little joe, its such a beautifully underappreciated locomotive.

[collinthenychudson]

Well, here we go again everyone. Here's round two of another Train-Themed Christmas Advent Calendar.

Day 1: Milwaukee Road Class F7

Info from Wikipedia: 

The Milwaukee Road's class "F7" comprised six (#100–#105) high-speed, streamlined 4-6-4 "Baltic" (Hudson) type steam locomotives built by the American Locomotive Company (ALCO) in 1937–38 to haul the Milwaukee's Hiawatha express passenger trains. Following on from the success of the road's class "A" 4-4-2s, the F7s allowed the road to haul heavier trains on the popular Chicago–Twin Cities routes.

The F7s are major contenders for the fastest steam locomotives ever built, as they ran at over 100 miles per hour (160 km/h) daily. One run in January 1941 recorded by a reporter for Trains magazine saw 110 miles per hour (180 km/h) achieved twice—in the midst of a heavy snowstorm. Baron Gérard Vuillet, a French railroading expert, once recorded a run between Chicago and Milwaukee where the locomotive reached 125 mph (201 km/h) and sustained an average 120 mph (190 km/h) for 4.5 miles (7.2 km).[1] However, the British locomotive LNER Class A4 4468 Mallard is officially accepted to be the world's fastest, with a run recorded at 125.88 mph (202.58 km/h) but authenticated at 126 mph in 1938. The Mallard run was slightly downhill and the locomotive broke down at the end of the run.

The Milwaukee F7s are accepted as the fastest steam locomotives by a different measure—scheduled speed between stations. In 1939, shortly after they were introduced into passenger service, the Twin Cities Hiawatha schedule was modified such that the engines would need to run the 78.3 mi (126.0 km) between Portage and Sparta, Wisconsin in 58 minutes—a start-to-stop average of 81 mph (130 km/h)

In the late 1940s, the Milwaukee F7s were modified to equip an additional Mars Light above the original single highlight to further enhance the safety of daily highspeed operation.

On July 27, 1950, F7 #102 was on a run between Chicago and Milwaukee on the "North Woods Hiawatha." 73 miles from Milwaukee, the right main crosshead froze in its guide. It immediately overheated, broke, and dropped from the guide while the train was traveling at an estimated speed between 90 and over 100 mph. Air brake lines were severed, putting the engine into emergency. The engine was severely damaged, broken drive gear tore up ties and roadbed, and debris (including the main rod) was found as far as 1400 feet west of Edgebrook Station. Information is conflicting on the amount of injuries that resulted; some report that two railroad employees were injured. Another report stated that as the locomotive passed by the Devon Avenue crossing, an automobile driver was injured by flying debris. Whatever the case, no one was killed. The train stayed on the rails, and continued to over 10,560 feet from the station until coming to a complete stop.[2] The cause of the incident was later found to have been caused by the failure of a connection link between the valve gear's combination lever and a Nathan mechanical lubricator. In fact, both of the locomotive's crossheads had been running dry on lubrication, but the right one was the first to fail. After this incident, #102 never ran again, as the cost was not considered worth repairs.

The first one built, #100, was also the first withdrawn from service, on November 10, 1949; and the last one built #105 was the final one in service and was withdrawn August 10, 1951. None survive today, as the last one was scrapped in 1951.

Models and Route by: RRmods, Auran, and Download Station

[marmarinou]

Caption: “Milwaukee Road 866 shoves a string of Pullman Heavyweights into Union Station for a Boy Scout Special in the early 60's.”

Chicago

Photo by Frank Hirsch

(via Days Past)

It is impossible to recreate this view today due to the development of this area. The tracks shown here, which run along the Chicago River between the century-old Lake Street Bridge in the background to Canal Street behind the photographer, are now completely covered:

https://goo.gl/maps/zEj9tNDkBCA2

[acarefullycuratedmess]

Mason City

[aryburn-trains]

CMStP&P EMD diesel locomotive 99C on eastbound passenger train 6 the Morning Hiawatha at Union Depot scene. St. Paul, MN September 3, 1962

[alightinthelantern]

Milwaukee Road “Skytop” lounge-sleeper cars, 1948

In early 1948 the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad built four “Rapids” series lounge-parlor-observation cars in their home shops for their “Morning Hiawatha” and “Afternoon Hiawatha” passenger services, daytime trains that ran twice-daily through the Great Lakes region. Dubbed “Skytops”, these cars were designed by famed industrial designer Brooks Stevens, whose accomplishments vary from trains and automobiles to home appliances and even the original Wienermobile. These "Skytops” featured a radical design, with their tail-end an elongated quarter-sphere with a bullet-tip floor plan in a complex curvature made up of flat sections joined like a polyhedron. The cars’ tails were 90% glass and featured flat panels of glass only, no curved glass at all in their construction. The four “Rapids” series cars, which each boasted a name ending in “Rapids”, were parlor cars, with comfortable single seats which swiveled, rather than benches as in Coach, offered at First-class rates.

In late 1948 Milwaukee Road outsourced to the Pullman Company the construction of six “Skytops” for use on their long-distance “Olympian Hiawatha” service which ran between Chicago, Illinois and Seattle, Washington. Dubbed “Creek” series, with names all ending in the word “Creek”, these “Skytops”, delivered between December 1948 and January 1949, were lounge-sleeping cars rather than lounge-parlors, and featured eight bedrooms, sleeping sixteen, in the forward majority of the car, each with private toilet, plus a public toilet at the head of the car, and an enlarged lounge area seating twenty at the tail-end. Visually similar to the “Rapids” series cars in exterior, the “Creek” series lounge-sleepers had an extra bay of windows and skylights forward of the main tail section, and a different arrangement of windows along the sides of the car forward of the lounge.

During its existence the “Olympian Hiawatha” saw stiff competition from several rival trains along the same route, and the Milwaukee Road Company created bold, stylish passenger cars such as the “Skytops” and “Super Domes” in hopes of giving their service an edge. However, the 1950s saw the creation of the US Interstate Highway System and the subsequent diminishing of the railroads at the hands of an automobile boom, and with diminishing ridership and mounting losses the Milwaukee Road cancelled the “Olympian Hiawatha” in 1961. After this the six “Creek” series cars were sold to Canadian National, and served on various trains throughout the 1960s and early seventies. The cars, which had exits only at their forward ends, saw the end of service when new safety laws decreed all passenger cars in service must have at least two exits, and an exit at each end. After this Canadian National scrapped three of the cars and sold the rest to US interests. One car “Coffee Creek”, is currently under restoration, and the last two, “Gold Creek” and “Arrow Creek”, are stored as cut-up hulks at the Milwaukee Road Heritage Center.

Photos:

Image one is original concept art for the Skytop sleeper, painted by Brooks Stevens.

Image 3 is an edit of Image 2 which I personally did.

Image 4′s source is here

Image 5 is a model of the car.

Images 6–10 are historical photos from various sources.