[PRCo] Re: Pittsburgh Railways 1200 Model

[Fred Schneider]

Intriguing about Homewood.   I always heard the complaints about  
Homewood being all white until urban renewal broken up the Lower Hill  
District.  But sometimes people believe what they want to believe.    
I'm more prone to believe you if for no other reason than Negroes  
were migrating north and west from the farms in the southeast during  
World War II for jobs and there would be no reason for them not to  
have come to Pittsburgh.   We know they were moving to Chicago and  
Cleveland and Detroit and Los Angeles and St. Louis so why not  
Pittsburgh too and Herron Hill would not have been big enough, so I  
think I have to agree with your assessment.   Furthermore, the  
suburbs were already developing before the war and that allowed some  
people to move out of the city and vacate homes in Homewood.

My father, for example, built a home in Crescent Hills in Penn  
Township (Penn Hills) in 1937.  As I recall, the area from there into  
Wilkinsburg and Homewood along Laketon Road and Frankstown Road had  
already been pretty solidly built up.   When the war ended, the  
building continued but a lot of it was already established before the  
war.  Deere Brothers already had hourly bus service on Frankstown  
Road before the war.

On Jan 14, 2007, at 8:42 PM, Jim Holland wrote:

> Fred Schneider wrote:
> .
>
>> I agree with the all races part, Jim, but if we are going to be
>> historically accurate, and you wanted to do that with motorman's
>> badges, then you also need to have some accuracy with the racial
>> splits of people who rode cars in the years when those cars were new
>> to the property.
>
> .
> Forgot to mention that we need clothing on model psgrs. for Princess
> Summer Spring Winter Fall!!!       Then our models need to be cast in
> T-Storms, gray skies, overcast, Smog, Snow, Hail, Rain, Sleet,
> Ice.......!!!!!!!
> .
> .
> .
>
>> And 1200s new in Pittsburgh? Most of the negroes at that time  
>> lived in
>> Herron Hill and would have been on the 85 line. Pittsburgh had a very
>> small percentage of minorities and until the Lower Hill Redevelopment
>> Program, they were essentially in one area. One would be safe with
>> nothing but whites in anything but a model of an 82 or an 85 car for
>> many years. If you are painting cars for PAT and grunging them up for
>> later Pittsburgh Railways appearance, then Blacks on route 75, 76,  
>> 82,
>> 85, 87, and 88 probably would have been perfectly normal but I don't
>> think they really migrated into the area served by route 8 until it
>> became the 11D bus.
>
> .
> Blacks were Very Common in Homewood in the 1930s and 1940s    ----
> lived there when born.       School Year Books for parents and others
> show a very good mix!!!       Parents lived a block apart on Race  
> Street
> just above Homewood Yards // Shops and neighbors on All sides were  
> black!!
> .
> .
> .
>
>> Was the Muni hat badge in the Byllsby era the same as the Pittsburgh
>> badge, Jim? Could Leonid make one man with one hat? Really, I think
>> we're asking for two much detail. A round blob or a line drawn on the
>> hat symbolizes a badge. You cannot see much more than that through  
>> the
>> windshield.
>
> .
> Ain't got the foggiest about the badge  --  never included it in the
> original items.       But caps were different  --  some like Bell Hop
> with front brim, others more like cabbies!!
>
> .
> When  SPTC  made the  PRCo  1700s,  they were   PERFECT   PA  Broad
> Gauge and thus had trouble sitting on standard  U.S.A.  "O"-Scale Rail
> of 5-feets even!       Customers complained about this  --  cheeze  
> whiz,
> girls  --  just build your own to scale!!!!!!! :-) ;-) :-P :-D
> .
> .
> .
> Jim___Holland
> .
> .
> .
> .
>
>>> Fred Schneider wrote:
>>> .
>>>
>>>> Well, Mr. Holland, I finally got out the cyano-acrolyte glue and
>>>> mounted the small parts on my 1200. How do you spell Super  Glue?
>>>>
>>>> One thing wrong with that model. No one makes people in O-   
>>>> gauge as
>>>> perfectly detailed as Leonid makes the streetcar models.
>>>>
>>>> And since my 1200 model is signed for 85 BEDFORD (and I didn't plan
>>>> on this for the eve of Martin Luther King Day), it would only be
>>>> fitting that it has a car load of people of color. Yes, guys, they
>>>> did run them on that line initially. Who builds perfect seated
>>>> unpainted people in O-gauge with 1940 clothing?
>>>
>
>>>> On Jan 14, 2007, at 7:16 PM, Jim Holland wrote:
>>>
>>> .
>>> This makes a Very Good Chuckle for Today! What you say Is Very True!
>>> One customer wrote that the SPTC models should be delivered with a
>>> Motorman but the models are 'As__Delivered' from the mfgr. to the
>>> operating company and To My Knowledge, none of these prototypes came
>>> with an Operator!!! Yes -- some are company repaints // rebuilds but
>>> even then, the Operator was not involved!!!
>>> .
>>> With SPTC being Highly Specific about including Every Detail on its
>>> models for that particular operating company, the same would be  
>>> true of
>>> any Operator that SPTC would want to include with its models --
>>> Uniform, Cap, colors, stripes, etc. would have to be specific For
>>> That Property -- a 'Generic' Motorman would not do!!
>>> .
>>> 'Maybe' it would be an interesting sideline for SPTC to make
>>> Operators // Passengers for its "O"-Scale models -- Sittees,
>>> Standees, StrapHangers -- All Races!!!!
>>> .
>>> .
>>> .
>>> Jim___Holland
>>
>
>
>