Charter *Grandslam* --- Gleanings From *Trolley Fare*

[John Swindler]

Don't recall backup car 1498 - may not have been used, but it was sunny day 
with 1477.  Memory is vague after all these years, but seemed that they 
tried to use a lot of out of service connecting track.  Photo stops included 
such as turning from inbound 76 to 75 at Fifth/Penn in Point Breeze; from 
Grant onto Liberty downtown; used stub end track on Euclid at Penn in East 
Liberty; backed into stub at end of 82; and Center St. loop in Wilkinsburg.

John


>From: Jim Holland <PGHPCC at pacbell.net>
>Reply-To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
>To: PRCo -- WP -- JTC -- The Big *3* -- <pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org>
>Subject: Charter  *Grandslam*   ---   Gleanings  From  *Trolley  Fare*
>Date: Sun, 01 Oct 2000 19:02:06 -0700
>
>Greetings!
>
>	Gleanings  From  *Trolley  Fare*
>		June--1965
>
>	"Our operation Grandslam, the world's most incredible fantrip (it ran
>from 8.30 AM May 15 until 12.03 AM May 16) was a success.  It made
>money, and it proved that the human body has endurance limits far beyond
>that thought previously possible.  Ask one of the 'victims,' he'll tell
>you!"
>	"May 15th saw Operation Grandslam make a valient attempt to cover the
>Pittsburgh system in fifteen hours, despite motorman Howard Gilson's
>attempt to beat the speed limit we got behind schedule and had to
>abbreviate the routing.  Nevertheless a memorable day was had by the
>forty odd [now WHAT does he mean by THAT?] passengers, in particular the
>high speed interurban run in the cool of the evening was very
>enjoyable."
>
>	Ooooooohhhhhhhhh,  I can feel that one - the high speed ride on the
>interurban.  How I wish I was on it!  A little painful realizing what I
>missed and knowing what PRCo was like - just several years after the
>demise so it was probably still possible to get some really good speed
>running here.  But I was a guest of Uncle Sam in his Canoe Club and
>didn't know about this charter!
>
>	Grand slam was apparently operated with V-front 1477; 1498 was a back
>up vehicle.  The trip was divided into 3-parts with participants able to
>ride any combination of those parts depending upon their time and or
>durability!
>
>Trip A:  Routes 8, 21, 10, 15, 6, 13, 77.
>Start Keating 8.30 AM
>End 4th Wood 11.45 AM
>
>Trip B: Routes 67, 65/55, 64, 75, 39, 73, 71, 82, 87, 76, 75.
>Start 4th-Smithfield 12.30 PM
>End 5th Smithfield 7.15 PM
>
>Trip C: Routes 53, 47, 49, 36, 35, 42/38A
>Starts 4th-Smithfield 8.00 PM
>Ends Keating 11.00 PM
>
>	From the May--1965 issue about the Grandslam:  "There have been some
>slight changes made to the trip routing as listed over the page.  PAT
>removed the turn from Negley to Penn (old route 96) at the end of April
>and this has resulted in increasing the running time of section B.
>Route 39 will be covered in the evening instead of route 36.  There are
>several sections of track being covered that are not in regular service,
>(provided we beat the asphalt there) and there will be opportunities for
>photographs at some of these."
>
>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/
>
>

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