Photos and Artwork: Colorful Passenger Trains--updated 2/27

Here are some stills from my days of shooting Amtrak commercials in 1990. Some of these became ads.

hey jon, 

that last group of images not coming through for me.  anyone else having a problem?

They're there for me, of course. Thanks, I'll try to fix in a bit.

Jon, they're starting to show up for me, now.  Thanks.

Visible now? Here's Walt's edition...

The New York Social Diary is a website that would not come up normally when looking for "name" train information.  But, in the course of looking for information on the Santa Fe's Super Chief, that website is a treasure trove of period photos justifying the train's moniker as "Train of the Stars."

Bing Crosby:

Clark Gable and Ava Gardner playing gin rummy; Eddie Arnold watches; and below them, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. and wife:

Kirk Douglas:

Alan Ladd:

Rosalind Russell:

Janet Leigh:

Jimmy Durante:

There are more photos in the article linked above for those interested; and, the write-up on the train that accompanies the photos is a nice synopsis of the Super Chief's origin and stature in that pre- and post-war era. 

And to conclude this post with the emphasis on the train: 

Keeping this Super Chief theme going as I have my second cup of coffee this a.m., some advertising artwork and photos; note the materials (second and last images below) for the New York World's Fair: 

SPECIAL THANKS to CNJ 3676 (Bob) and Mill City (Jon) for their prolific posts in this thread.

I'm glad Tiffany asked for some Amtrak material. Here's some more memorabilia from the archives. Amtrak has issued many very attractive promotional items over the years.

Bob

The famous and popular California Zephyr was jointly operated by CB&Q, D&RGW, and Western Pacific.  On May 1, 1971 the CZ died; but, the Rio Grande continued to operate its portion of the former CZ route between Denver and Salt Lake City as the Rio Grande Zephyr.  The train continued to operate independent of Amtrak until 1983.  During those 12 years, it operated the train with an F9 ABB engine (with a steam generator unit in winter) consist pulling a combination baggage car, four domes, dining car, no slumber coaches, and the, famous dome observation car.

Here's a sampling of views of the train: 

The F9A #5771 and the F9B's pictured were customarily the only motive power for the RGZ's tri-weekly service each way with no train service on Wednesday.

Probably the two best known individual cars of the Rio Grande Zephyr were the dome observation car, Silver Sky, and the dining car, Silver Banquet.

Here's Silver Sky: 

And here is Silver Banquet:

Of course, the four dome cars were an essential element of the train:

And a couple of additional photos:

The unit behind the F9A in the next to last photo is the steam generator unit pictured above.

I don't know if this image is authentically from D&RGW, but it sure caught my eye:

This one is for Carl (Pingman), I haven't followed this thread, but I will change that.

This one is a favorite, and yes, it is a beautiful passenger train. proud to have it on the layout.

For those wishing to learn more about classic passenger trains and their equipment, I highly recommend Arthur Dubin's "Some Classic Trains" and "More Classic Trains." These are big, heavy hardcover books brimming with information and illustrations. They are considered by many, myself included, to be the seminal works regarding North American passenger train travel. Copies of both titles are often available on the secondary market.

Bob

Easily one of the most enjoyable threads on the forum.  Thanks guys.

Art

"Jon, they're starting to show up for me, now.  Thanks."

and me, too.

CNJ 3676, the Amtrak calendar images are terrific!!!

Thanks for posting them; I had no idea anything like them existed.

In addition to the artwork, I was wondering if the rail lines commissioned any musical talent to drive interest in their services.  I've been listing to 40s on 4 (Sirius/XM radio) lately.  There are the train themed songs like Chattanooga Choo Choo and so forth, but I was curious if popular musicians were paid to write songs to promote a certain passenger service or company?  Thanks

Varied Palace cars...

Great post, Bob.  Did LIONEL, MTH, etc. ever offer anything close to a prototypical Auto-Train?

someone on the forum recently posted pictures of the auto train he has assembled.  pretty impressive.

Thanks, Forrest; must have missed it.  I'll give the search function a shot.

This post on the Golden State stems directly from the listing of a set of passenger cars in the For Sale section of the forum--I didn't know what they were.  They're definitely good looking; red's my favorite color and it looks great with stainless steel--much like The Texas Special.

So I looked on the net and found out, according to those sources, that the Golden State was a lightweight, streamliner "name" train that was jointly operated by Southern Pacific and Rock Island between Chicago and Los Angeles from 1948 to 1952.  It was, in fact, the successor of sorts of a previous name passenger train jointly operated by those roads dating back to 1902, the Golden State Limited.

For locomotive power, SP provided fresh E-7's and RI supplied E-6's, colorfully painted.

The passenger cars were distinctively red paint and stainless steel purpose-built for the train.

In keeping with the times, print advertising and marketing materials were abundant:

For more images and information, check-out this site. 

Carl,

The Golden State was pulled by a RI E6AA consist early in its career.  Lionel made a model of these engines a while back, and they are a match for the K-Line GS 18" set.  Mine are currently in storage, so I don't have a good picture of them.  Here is a picture that does show the front of one of them.

Here is a picture of a K-Line GS dome car.  There are three available; two as part of the 9-car set and one factory error.  All the cars in the set are great looking, but unfortunately the real GS never had dome cars.

Ron, thanks for the correction on the RI E-6's.  I've corrected my earlier post.  Frankly, I couldn't find a photo of the RI units, and I didn't look closely enough at the RI artwork which, in hindsight, is very much like an E-6's sloped nose.

As for including a dome in the GS set, I'm trying to represent The Texas Special and LIONEL produced a dome for it when it, like the GS, never had a dome.

A really good friend from my days in Chicago was the late Rich Sherry, and one of his best PW LIONEL F3 repaints for customers was that wild RI livery.  Every time I see it I'm reminded of him.

Thanks, again, for the correction.

Here is a vintage Southern Pacific ad poster that my son just bought me.  The mailman just delivered it!  It advertises the SP in the San Francisco Bay Area.  I love it!  It is going to be framed and hung in my Train Room!

Great looking poster; thanks for sharing.

Some of my photos of the Verde Canyon Railroad, Clarkdale, Az.: