SPF's, Erie fanatics, Alco fans, and Nixon fans unite!

[randgust]

Got sent a link to this photo and I was floored.

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1069829

Oil City, PA, while not entirely in the backwater of PA, certainly wasn't where you'd ever expect to see:

1)  A Nixon vice-presidential campaign train arriving behind brand-new Erie Alco PA's (on an Erie branch that hadn't seen a passenger train since...?? between Meadville and Oil City)
2)  Passing it off to the PRR right in the middle of a downtown crowd.....
3)  A PRR M-1 that's so clean you could eat off of it - to take the campaign train to Buffalo

Heading out of town.....wow....
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1269661


Oh, and lets make sure we pose the Erie PA beside the PRR M-1, so that it can be used in a future BLI N scale ad for both locomotives.

[Chris333]

Sweet.

I read once that back when the Erie mainline was 6' gauge the track between Warren, OH and Meadville was dual gauged so they could move oil from Cleveland to Oil City without changing out cars.

[C855B]

I'm trying to figure out how they shoehorned all those cars into that parking lot!

[seusscaboose]

is that a Pullman logo on the upper corner of a passenger car peeking out near the Erie unit?

[Chris333]

is that a Pullman logo on the upper corner of a passenger car peeking out near the Erie unit?

You mean the PRR S12?

[Mark5]

I'm trying to figure out how they shoehorned all those cars into that parking lot!

Yeah, so unrealistic .... 

[garethashenden]

Nixon still has fans? 

[seusscaboose]

You mean the PRR S12?

maybe it is a hand rail on the S12

[Chris333]

Randy, Know anything more about that team track crane?

[CodyO]

Awesome great find my 2 favorite railroads together!

[Bob Bufkin]

Isn't this the same place where the Straights Shows changed engines?

[chicken45]

Interesting that the tender deck and and car roof didn't get the FCC treatment. I thought that started with the M1 class.

[randgust]

What you're looking at in that photo is toward the northwest.  Both the Erie and PRR had freight houses right where the junction was at the Wye where the Erie came in from the west.    The Erie had two tracks at their freight house, and at the far end of the one track was that gantry crane.

Another CLASSIC shot shows the crane a little better.   
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1063550    You're looking east-northeast in that shot.

The Erie freight depot is behind the PA's, PRR freight depot to the right; PRR passenger depot would be distant left rear.

There's very nice aerial views of this entire area in PRR Triumph VII, that's how I got my orientation.

Oil City is more typically known for that possibly one-of-a-kind curve-in-a-truss bridge plus a wye on a deck girder bridge right in the middle of the Allegheny River.  Still there, you can see it on Google Earth.  WNYP is the operating railroad now.  (If you're every trying to design a wye/reverse loop/engine terminal for a layout you want to see it.  I almost went PRR just based on that.  Think of the river as an aisle and it's just an outstanding track plan)

That previous PA+M1 scene today is right where the McDonalds is downtown.  The PA's would be sitting in the drive-through lane.

That 1948 AFT shot is getting some real study in here because the AFT timeline shows it came from Erie and was then going to Pittsburgh.
With the train 'nose in' to the Erie gantry crane, we're making some guesses on how it moved between Erie and Oil City, one PRR route alternative is that it went right by the house I grew up in and that would be fun to prove.

Oh, and yeah, Nixon has fans.   The antique store next to our office is actively selling election memorabilia.   There's a local car that now has a Nixon for President bumper sticker on it.  Well, somebody certainly knew how to orchestrate a campaign whistle-stop train, you have to say that much.

I also got a kick out of the photo credits, as Lloyd Kern was the owner of the very first hobby shop I was ever in as a kid and bought most of my Tyco HO from him.   He lived in Oil City, and the hobby shop was only as big as the front porch of his house, and he jammed a lot of stuff in there.  Until I saw these shots I didn't know of any of his photographs he'd ever taken locally. 

I'm not sure exactly when Erie quit passenger service to Oil City, but I think it was in the 30's as it was always a branch.   PRR bailed from Oil City in 1953, and the typical train was an RPO, coach, baggage operating Pittsburgh-Buffalo via Oil City.   So yeah, PA's and M1's, Oh My!

North of Oil City this ex PRR line runs to Titusville, and the Oil Creek & Titusville is alive and well as an excursion railroad in PRR dress, running behind Alco switchers with Erie DL&W MU coaches.  http://www.octrr.org/    So you can still get a PRR/E-L/Alco fix today, just not as potent.

[Spikre]

 
   Randy,
   cant get the picture here,but Nixon was running for VP after june or july 52.
  the Erie PA fleet was complete with 862-863 during 1951.
  the earlier Erie PAs 850-861 were built during 1949.
   so what is being shown here is the Care Erie took of their 1st generation diesel
  fleet.
   and Erie did run the units hard,they weren't shop queens.
  want to see this picture eventually,nice find.
      Spikre
       

[Chris333]

Here is the wye in 1952: