[PRCo] Re: West Penn 706 Question

[Fred Schneider]

Fred of Wheeling Fame:

If I am unable to baffle you with brilliance, perhaps I can befuddle you with
senseless bullshit.  Some of the B. S. may, for some strange and unknown reason,
give you an added clue.    Frankly, I never saw a West Penn toilet inventory!

Interesting question.   And your suggestion makes a lot of sense.  The Cincinnati
lightweights commonly seen on Fairchance were 831 and 833.  In that case I would
guess that they were the only 800s assigned to Uniontown.  After that the only
700s I have pictures of are 705 and 706.  The toilet may be the issue.

A few words about the rebuilding of 700s.  Remember that West Penn had enough
one-man 200s, 600s and 700s (707-715, 721-739) to provide all interurban service
when the one-man conversion was completed.   Those two-man 700s that were in
service between Connellsville and Greensburg on the last day of two man service (I
think 1933) were simply retired.  The 280s were retired in 1937 when McKeesport
local service quit.  Note they were retiring the newest cars and keeping wooden
cars!  All of that makes sense for a company that by then recognized that they
were going out of the transportation business.  (Ed and I talked to a man named
Kupp, the son of the last southbound motorman on the mainline in 1952.  The son
wanted to work for the railways before World War II and was hired but was strongly
discouraged by management because they knew they were shutting down).

The 280s were advertised for sale in 1937.  The low 200s and 610s .,.. both early
1900 wood cars converted to one-man ... were perfectly adequate compared to
spending money converting the 280s to one-man.  Within two years that policy
changed, the unsold 286-297 group were rebuilt with double front doors for one-man
service and went into service on Irwin and, I think later, on South
Connellsville.  Ten of those cars got trucks swapped from 1902 Stephenson-built
200s.  The others kept the arch bar trucks they had in McKeesport.

The two-man 700s were stored ... some at Iron Bridge and some at Connellsville ...
for about ten years.  Increased traffic during World War II caused them to be
rebuilt for one-man service.  There are all sorts of stories about why the 830s
were not suitable but none of them make sense ... the only thing that make sense
to me is that the 830s were due for, to use today's terminology, a mid life
overhaul.  The 800s had racked up between 452,000 and 477,000 miles each on the
Allegheny Valley Street Railway.  I have no mileage records after they came to the
Coke Region in 1937, but the range of miles on the cars could be between an
additional 175,000 miles and an extreme of almost 950,000 miles.  So by the middle
of the war,  we're taking cars with around 650,000 miles on them.   By best guess
is that given the fact that you are going to have to spend money overhauling
something and the motormen and possibly the public were complaining about over
crowding, where do you spend you money?  If it were my company, I would give
serious consideration to retiring the 800s and putting the 700s back in service,
which is what they did.

The cars that were rebuilt during the war included 703, 704, 705, 706, 707, 716,
717, 718, 719 and 720.  Cars 701 and 702 were never touched and came out of Iron
Bridge in 1951 for scrapping (Vince Seyfriend took a picture of them at
Connellsville that year.)  Car 700 was lost in fire in 1929.   One other
noteworthy things is that cars 700-706 had a narrower center door, which might
have accommodated more seats.  One more point, Ed Lybarger's research has
disclosed that some of the two-man 700s were used during World War II to haul
military inductees from Fayette County up to the Pennsy station in Greensburg,
implying that they were really having a car shortage.

If I can find any other details, Fred, I'll try to remember that you were asking.
There may be some drawings in the PTM library if they bothered to draw up
something for two extra seats in the center section.  On the other hand, if you
are only doing it to two cars, the drawing may be only been a sketch on the back
of an advertising car card that got thrown away.

Fred the Curmudgeon


Fredbruhn at aol.com wrote:

>
> West Penn 706 was the regularly scheduled car on the Fairchance line.  Almost
> all of the photos I have show this car, or an 831 series holding down the
> schedule.
> Car 706 and its sister 705 are shown to have 58 seats after being rebuilt in
> the 1930's
> while the balance of 707-739 show 54 seats.
>
> My question is, can anyone tell me why 706 was used mostly (if not entirely)
> on the Fairchance line, and where did the extra space come from for the 4
> additional seats.
> Would eliminating the restroom provide that much space?
>
> If 706 lacked lavatory facilities and the Fairchance line was the shortest
> served by the 700 series, maybe management felt patrons could hold their needs
> for the length of the trip.
>
> Thanks for any help, factual or otherwise.
>
> Fred Bruhn