[PRCo] Lancaster Birney car

[Fred Schneider]

Here is a picture I never posted ... don't even know who took it.
The car was built for Conestoga Traction Company, Lancaster,  
Pennsylvania, in 1926, as part of the final order of five safety cars  
for use in the city of Lancaster.     One was also used on the loop  
in the borough of Columbia until 1932.   Because the traction company  
had lost money in every year after 1923 owing to automobile  
competition, it didn't have the money to pay for the new cars.   The  
last five were ordered by a subsidiary, United Gas Improvement  
Corporation.   I pay my gas bill today to UGI Utilities, Inc.    
Another affiliate was Pennsylvania Power and Light Company, today  
part of PPL Utilities (which includes Montana Power).   All were  
under Lehigh Power Securities, which in turn was under Electric Bond  
and Share Company, which was owned by General Electric.   EBASCO was  
the principal holding company which Roosevelt considered the most  
notorious and which caused him to ask for the Securities Divesture  
Act in 1938.   Where did all the money that was in EBASCO go?   Ever  
here of GE Credit Corporation?   It's funding credit cards today.

When people get on their high horse about GM and National City Lines  
and conflict of interest about selling buses, I just laugh.  GE was  
selling electric railway hardware the same way.   Westinghouse had a  
brother in the consulting business who could recommend his  
hardware.   Nothing was different except the names of the companies  
and the people.

At any rate, this car was preserved by the Lancaster Chapter, NRHS in  
1947.   Today it operates on several hundred feet of track in front  
of the Manheim (PA) train station.

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania owns the car and leases it to the  
Manheim Historical Society.

The head of the MHS's railway operating department is Fred Schneider.

Yes guys, this is another one of my museum headaches.    If any of  
you are in Lancaster in the off season or in the middle of the week,  
a call to 560-2091 and a donation to the hysterical society will get  
the car out of the barn.

Fred Schneider






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