[PRCo] Re: Question about 69 Squirrel Hill Route

[Dwight Long]

Herb

I think that's a 55A car, not a 55.  A 55 going to Kennywood would be very 
misleading, the paper sign not withstanding.  However, a 55A going to 
Kennywood would just be a logical extension of the route.

Dwight

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Herb Brannon" <hrbran at cavtel.net>
To: <pittsburgh-railways at dementix.org>
Sent: Tuesday, May 01, 2012 4:37 PM
Subject: [PRCo] Re: Question about 69 Squirrel Hill Route


> The June, 1937 PRCo Trolley & Bus Guide indicates to reach Kennywood Park
> customers should take Route 60 from East Liberty or Route 68, and any 
> other
> route with a "Kennywood Park" destination sign, from downtown Pgh. This
> hints that several different routes were used to get people to the park.
> The photo of 1600 and 1609 shows a Route 55 car sitting behind 1600 with a
> 55 Destination Sign and a cardboard "Kennywood" sign on the dash. Thus,
> another route which ran Kennywood direct service.
> Also, It would be nice to know the date of the 1600/1609 photo. The Car
> Assignment List from 1/1/1952 shows both 1600 and 1609 housed at Craft
> Avenue CH.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, May 1, 2012 at 16:09, Fred Schneider 
> <fwschneider at comcast.net>wrote:
>
>> My transcription of the route cards, Phil,  does not include any 
>> reference
>> to route 69 being extended on down Murray and out to Kennywood.   But two
>> cars side-by-side at Kennywood with that sign up suggests it was done on
>> peak days.   It would be very logical on Sundays or those days when 
>> schools
>> were having their picnics at the park.
>>
>> Sixty-nine was essentially the same route except from the 1918 until 1958
>> except for changes in the downtown loop and the fact that it was rush 
>> hour
>> only before Oct. 28, 1927.   The Diamond, Ferry, Ross, Diamond loop was
>> used was used from 1937 until the end.
>>
>> Why was it rush hour only until 1927?   Probably because there was simply
>> no demand until then.   For one thing, Squirrel Hill has long been a
>> heavily Orthodox Jewish neighborhood, so that there would limited lower
>> demand for through riding on route 69 than in other neighborhoods on the
>> Sabbath.   Why not just let the folks transfer from route 60 to the trunk
>> lines?   Second point ... Oakland, Shadyside and Squirrel Hill were low
>> density neighborhoods ... homes of the rich ... mansions.   The students
>> who later filled the cars were not there until the teens and later. 
>> Frick
>> Park, which is off base but it gives some idea, was part of Henry Clay
>> Frick's own back yard, until 1919.   It was private land.   Carnegie Tech
>> was founded in 1900 and construction was going on in 1905 in an empty 
>> field
>> in Oakland; it was probably about 1909 that the first class graduated and
>> it only had about 100 students.   University of Pittsburgh adopted its 
>> new
>> name in 1908 and began relocating to!
>>  Oakland in 1909; the monstrous Cathedral of Learning was a vision of
>> chancellor John Bowman in 1920 which he wanted to build on empty land in
>> Oakland ... part of the Schenley Farm.   It was finished sometime early 
>> in
>> 1930s ... I have a picture of my mother standing on the unfinished roof
>> slab of that building in 1930.   Several sources say Squirrel Hill began 
>> to
>> mushroom because of construction of the Boulevard of the Allies which was
>> completed in 1923 to Oakland.
>>
>> Both those pictures have that certain smell like Charlie Dengler's hand
>> was on the camera.?   One of the clues is that CD never spent any money 
>> on
>> panchromatic film as long as there was cheaper orthochromatic film 
>> around.
>>   Verichrome was good enough even if the reds were rendered as black and
>> the blue skies washed out to white.
>>
>> That 1600 certainly exemplifies how one-off or one-of-a-kind cars lead
>> orphan lives.  It was all over the system, from barn to barn, only 
>> lasting
>> ten years until the fire.  We have pictures of it working out of Craft,
>> Tunnel, Homewood, Herron Hill, Highland Park.  And yet it differs very
>> little from the Johnstown and Philadelphia (2100s and 2700s) and Boston
>> all-electrics.   But in Pittsburgh, the accelerator, the master 
>> controller,
>> the line breaker, the window sash and many other parts were different 
>> from
>> other cars.  Anything goes wrong, you wait for a part.
>>
>>
>> On Apr 30, 2012, at 3:17 PM, Edward H. Lybarger wrote:
>>
>> > Route 60 cars went to Kennywood at times.  Not sure about 69.
>> >
>> > -----Original Message-----
>> > From: pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementix.org
>> > [mailto:pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementix.org] On Behalf Of
>> Barry,
>> > Matthew R
>> > Sent: Monday, April 30, 2012 2:59 PM
>> > To: pittsburgh-railways at dementix.org
>> > Subject: [PRCo] Question about 69 Squirrel Hill Route
>> >
>> > A few weeks back, there was a photo being offered on eBay of 58
>> Greenfield
>> > on Loretta Street between Murray and Greenfield Avenue, with a date of
>> June
>> > 1958.   The abandonment dates of routes 68 and 69 were in Sept. 1958. 
>> > I
>> > noted in this photo, that the wiring that would've taken route 69 on 
>> > its
>> > loop from Greenfield Avenue back to Murray Avenue, had been removed.
>> If
>> > the date of the photo was accurate, I wondered if in the latter years 
>> > of
>> > service, route 69 cars travelled further, perhaps to Munhall Loop or to
>> > Kennywood Park.
>> >
>> >
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> -- 
> Herb Brannon
> In Cuyahoga Valley National Park
>
>
>