Railroadiana Items In Your Collection

It's great to see such a variety of railroad-related items. Thanks to everybody for sharing. My railroadiana consists of two vintage timetables, and four ashtrays and matchbooks for the four roads I run on my layout. These are inexpensive, and are easily found in antique malls and at train shows. It's a bygone era where most people smoked, so the railroads put their names on smoking-related ephemera. If I had more room, I'd probably fill it all up with more railroad-related items.

My daughter knew I had to have this B&M sign when she saw it in an antique shop.  It’s in remarkably good condition for a glass sign.  I had a custom frame made for it and my wife let me hang it in the den!

John

More odds & ends, hundreds of keys, locks, wax sealers, etc. 7 Santa Fe and U.P. bells, I mostly collect locomotive whistles and lanterns now, specifically presentation types.

@locopilot750 Boy, that is some collection of whistles and beautiful lanterns. The only place I saw cleaner lanterns was at the Depot Attic store in Dobbs Ferry, NY (long ago closed).

Congrats on a first class assortment.

Tom

@Steam Crazy posted:

My daughter knew I had to have this B&M sign when she saw it in an antique shop.  It’s in remarkably good condition for a glass sign.  I had a custom frame made for it and my wife let me hang it in the den!

John

That is an interesting sign. I have the same glass sign that says Hiawatha Railroad Tickets. I wonder who was making these? Any one know?

@locopilot750 posted:

More odds & ends, hundreds of keys, locks, wax sealers, etc. 7 Santa Fe and U.P. bells, I mostly collect locomotive whistles and lanterns now, specifically presentation types.

What a great collection of whistles! Do you know what engines they came off of? Anything from the DM&IR? Look familiar

@leapinlarry posted:

Railroadiana and other types of memorabilia are very interesting pieces of history and have different meanings to model railroad buffs as well as those folks that just love Railroading. From riding the rails, to watching fun videos, and those that take great pictures, it’s all Fun, and this is a great thread to review. I do not have much to show, but I like what others are offering for our pleasure. Happy Railroading Everyone

Is that C&NW brass lock from Wilson Bohannon?

Got this sign and switch stand from a friend of mine. The switch stand is currently being painted and should be put in place in the next week.

I have 4, a track side junction box, a day target for a switch stand, a badly damaged 2 aspect signal, and a railroaders flashlight from the 1920's.  When I was working down in FLA 36 years ago, I had the option of taking a dirt road to a microwave site that paralleled the Southern RR from US HWY 301 at the Crawford intersection where the SOU and SCL crossed, to Moniac Ga.  I found the day target and the junction box stuck in the mud in the ditch that ran along side the Southern tracks.  I cleaned up both, but the junction box got some fancy paint, and mounted to a wood base using 4 cut off RR spikes, again from the SOU line, that I drilled so screws could hold it down from the bottom.  I had hoped to put a lamp in the target, but the inside of the lenses is coated with silver to make them reflect at night  and you only get a couple pixel size holes of  light though them.  The SCL took down a massive set of block signals near the Crawford diamond and just left them in the woods along the right of way, where they lain for years, with pine trees and underbrush intertwined amongst all that steel and cast iron.   So, retrieved this badly damaged by vandals signal, the door latches were broken off, and the lens and lamp holders broken out.  It is all cast iron and weighs a ton.  Before I had a 4WD, I used to put it in the bed of my 2WD pickup in the winter so I could get traction in the snow, NC not FLA.   It is under my shed next to my 3 pt tractor crane and log tongs with a 4X6 used in the bottom to hold it up.  Has a birds nest in it right now.   I have a new set of lenses for it and hope make new lamp holders and restore it one day.  The flashlight my wife got me for a present of few years ago.  A standard 6 volt lantern battery fit in it just fine, like they did years ago, and I still use it.

I forgot one, the fifth one was another gift from my son.  A Russian candle lit lantern.  I don't know if it had colored lenses or clear, from the movie 'The Train'  I saw one very close to the same design that had clear lenses so put in some clear glass.  It has a small latch wire you move up to open the front to light or change the candle.  What is interesting is the date stamped in the vent cap, '1954'.  So, in 1954, the Russian apparently were still using candle powered lanterns.

Jeff asked if I had any DM&IR stuff, not much, a couple of switch keys and this Hancock/Viloco three chime used on the Yellowstones (without the red handle of course)

@locopilot750 posted:

Jeff asked if I had any DM&IR stuff, not much, a couple of switch keys and this Hancock/Viloco three chime used on the Yellowstones (without the red handle of course)

I thought that looked like a Yellowstone's whistle. When did you get that one? Did you get it from Carr's Hobby auction?? Lucky you. I couldn't bid higher than I did.     If you got it elsewhere do you have the engine number? Thanks.

I did get at Carrs auction, Jeff Hosford had a correcy recast lever, which DMIR didn't use, they blew those with the air valves.  No engine number dang it. But it's in like new condition, so very low mileage.

@locopilot750 posted:

I did get at Carrs auction, Jeff Hosford had a correcy recast lever, which DMIR didn't use, they blew those with the air valves.  No engine number dang it. But it's in like new condition, so very low mileage.

Glad my scrutinizing paid off. I have a few pictures of it standing at the auction and compared to your picture and could find some areas that were a dead ringer for your picture. You are lucky you got that whistle. I know I finally had to bow out. Carr's auctions were all very interesting. Lots of headlights etc. lots of DM&IR items. I got a number of handlanterns and O gauge stuff as wellas I attended all his auctions even though Duluth is 300 miles away. Jack was a very nice guy, and died before the auction. He was not retired for very long. I visited the hobby shop each year I vacationed in Duluth.  Since then the building has been torn down. I will attach a couple of photos for your interest.

I goofed again on captions. The three photos were taken on 5-16-2020. The table full of headlights was taken on 10-25-2019. The next attached photo here was taken in the hobby shop on 9-18-2017