Those helium cars

[Chris333]

So the 3rd gen 30 tube car built by GATC #1013-1078. Would anyone know where the plant was that built these?

In 1928 GATC purchased Sharon Tank Car Corporation, whose manufacturing facilities in Sharon, Pennsylvania, became GATC's second building site.

I'm guessing their first plant was in East Chicago, Indiana.

They also had a plant in Warren Ohio.

[peteski]

Yes there were blimps in Akron and the Erie went through there, but it was the regular looking bottle business that got me thinking these could be just about anywhere.

That "AIR REDUCTION" business looks like a distributor of gasses (the loading dock is full of metal gas tanks).  Helium was likely one of the gasses they distributed.  For industrial uses, and for blowing up party balloons.   

[DMetz]

That building reminds me of one of the Woodland Scenics built up buildings.   It was lettered for a tire company, and now is sold as a barrel factory. 
https://woodlandscenics.woodlandscenics.com/images/NewWSWeb/BR4924_f_1.jpg

Not an exact match on details and size, but the overall layout is similar.

[GhengisKong]

The railroad museum in Tomball, Texas has one of these cars. I believe it was used by NASA.

There is a museum in Amarillo, too, that has several on display. The Texas and Oklahoma panhandle as well as around Southwest Kansas has the world's largest helium fields. ATSF, FW&D and Rock Island were the big shippers out of there.

[C855B]

There is a museum in Amarillo, too, that has several on display. The Texas and Oklahoma panhandle as well as around Southwest Kansas has the world's largest helium fields. ATSF, FW&D and Rock Island were the big shippers out of there.

My wife inherited shares of two helium wells in the OK panhandle on the ol' family farm. We kid each other about our "investment" in helium, that it's always going up, and adjusts for inflation. Our cut of the output is so small it's barely enough for a lunch or two each month, and a paperwork aggravation come tax time.

Sadly, the government's old processing facility on the west side of Amarillo was mostly gone the last time we were through there (near the former site of "Cadillac Ranch"). I did pass by the helium plant about 15 years earlier, however, and it was largely intact, plus there were a couple of the cars sitting around IIRC. It spurred an interest in picking-up the Roca cars for a while and I managed to accumulate 8 or 9; I'd like to build an excuse for them on the layout tentatively named "Leiterenaire Industrial Supply".

[Rio Grandeous]

There is a museum in Amarillo, too, that has several on display. The Texas and Oklahoma panhandle as well as around Southwest Kansas has the world's largest helium fields. ATSF, FW&D and Rock Island were the big shippers out of there.

That's the info I needed for my excuse to have a couple on my layout!! 

[Rivet Miscounter]

There is a museum in Amarillo, too, that has several on display. The Texas and Oklahoma panhandle as well as around Southwest Kansas has the world's largest helium fields. ATSF, FW&D and Rock Island were the big shippers out of there.

This is quite a neat museum if anyone has an opportunity to visit.  Aside from the helium cars, there are the "White Train" cars (nuclear armament) as well as an operating Alco switcher.   We visited there as part of the BN convention several years ago and got to ride the Alco....very cool experience.   They also had a good start on what looked to be a great HO-scale model railroad at that time.

The helium cars were not uncommon on the line I modeled previously, (from Amarillo southeast to Fort Worth) even into the 90's.   I believe mid/late-90's is when they were wholly removed from service but I had to have one in the mix just because of their story and because it was mostly feasible for my late-90's/early 00's era.