PRCo Paint

[Fred W. Schneider III]

Somewhere in this house is a copy of the Pittsburgh Railways paint book ... the
car-by-car record of all paint work, inside, outside, partial, complete, colors.
But it is a very large document (meaning 14x17) and I can never remember where I
hide it from one use to the next.  Cars were maroon in the earlier years of PRC
but I don't know if that goes all the way back to 1902.  Just like West Penn
changed from green to orange as a result of an accident, PRC determined that
orange might also prevent accidents.  I believe that all cars through the 4900s
came in maroon, certainly the 4200s, 4300s, 4700s, some 4800s, and the 6000s were
maroon.  The low-floor trailers were maroon.  The builder's photos of 5200 show an
orange car.  Interestingly, the builder's photo of 5200 also depicts how weak
those cars were ... the diagonal crease across the front body plate behind the
door was already evident; the front platform was sagging even before it was loaded
on a flat car for shipment to Pittsburgh.  Some service cars may have never
received orange paint ... I think 3487 at Arden, which had been the Charleroi line
car, may never have gotten to the paint shop during the orange car era. For
certain, it was photographed outside Charleroi car house during the 1940 NRHS
convention trip and it was in maroon paint then.  The trim color on it is silver
but I cannot vouch for its authenticity.

My suspicion is that the orange or yellow paint began with the 5000s.

I believe that all the interurbans got red and gray (note that the low 3700s were
originally maroon) with some getting cream later in life if gray wasn't available.

The PCC red was, by the way, Mountain Ash Scarlet.  I don't know off hand if the
PCC red and the interurban car red were the same ... I've seen both but I never
saw a 3700 or 3800 in fresh paint.  And I was 12 the last time I saw an
interurban.

Jim Holland wrote:

> Greetings!
>
>         Just looking at a photo from the Ed Lybarger collection used in the
> 1992 PTM calendar of an 3700 series Brill interurban in downtown
> Washington shortly after delivery.  The photo caption indicates that the
> car was painted *maroon.*
>         Apparently this was the *standard paint scheme* for all equipment very
> early in the 1900s.  I would assume the equipment had a black roof and
> this photo shows a little gold trim on the front dash.  Were other
> colors used for trim and how?
>         How long did this paint scheme last and when did the
> *PRCo--"Yellow"-(Orange)* debut?
>
>         From all current indications, the interurbans (3700--3714 and
> 3800--3814) were not painted in *Yellow.*  Possibly just before the
> debut of the 3800s, the 37s were painted red with cream/white window
> area and black roof while the 38s came with red and gray window area.
>         Does this sound correct?
>
> James B. Holland
>
>         Pittsburgh  Railways  Company  (PRCo),   1930  --  1950
>     To e-mail privately, please click here: mailto:pghpcc at pacbell.net
> N.M.R.A.  Life member #2190; http://www.mcs.net:80/~weyand/nmra/