On the PRR Continuation Page 0:

On the PRR Continuation Page 1:

On PRR Continuation Page 2 page:

On this PRR Continuation Page 3 page:

On PRR Continuation Page 4:

On PRR Continuation Page 5:

On the PRR Bibliography Page:

On the PRR Track Charts:

On the Horseshoe Curve page:

On the Continuation Page 1:

On the Continuation Page 2:

On the Continuation Page 3:

On the other RR pages:

My own LIRR pages may be of interest, as well (the Pennsy owned the LIRR from 1904 to 1966, having bought it out to gain access to Sunnyside Yard for Pennsylvania Station, and see also the Steinway System).

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Visit these courtesy and official home pages:

Long Island Rail Road Historical Society

Long Island Sunrise - Trail Chapter
(National Railway Historical Society)

Sunrise Trail Division
(Northeastern Region)
(National Model Railroad Association)
(all new links)

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The PRRT&HS Philadelphia Chapter runs a fantastic PRR Discussion Forum.

[Fans of Pennsy relative NYNH&HRR will be pleased to hear that the New Haven Railroad Historical and Technical Association, Inc. (NHRHTA) now has "THE NHRHTA NEW HAVEN RAILROAD FORUM"

One site that really got me, however, is Rob Schoenberg's, on which he has a PRR station sign maker, which allows you to assemble a Pennsy-style station sign in color, letter by letter.  I'm trying to go Rob one better by adding a space, a hyphen, and an apostrophe.  He has since superimposed a keystone outline (ya gotta have a keystone to make it a REAL make-believe Pennsy station sign!).

Rob also has on his site most of the PRR Equipment Diagrams!  These are detailed below under PRR Links.

Also, for Pennsy fans with good imaginations (or strong stomachs), ya gotta see my Berlinerwerke Apocrypha page and its continuation page 2!

The rest of the links are at PRR Links.

The Prototype HORSESHOE CURVE Story

On 18 Oct 97, I saw a film of the Sat./Sun. 12-13 September 1970 runs of the High Iron Company's Nickel Plate Berkshire 2-8-4 #759 running up the Curve and back, unassisted, with 15 heavyweight passenger cars at speed!  Wow!  I was there, but time dims even the keenest memories.  Wow, again!  It WAS 15 cars, I counted them; NOT 17 or 18 as I remembered.

I've finally added the Continuation Page 1, with Dimensions of the Horseshoe Curve, a mile-by-mile and even foot-by-foot guide to the Curve with actual (1:1) and HO scale (1:87.1) dimensions, and now Dimensions of the Horseshoe Curve in N (1:160) and Z (1:220) Scales to my Horseshoe Curve Continuation Page 3.

Also, on the Continuation Page 2, you'll now find an UPDATE of the BERLINERWERKE (HO) Saga.

Hey, you Pennsy juice-jackers, think you know all about PRR pan practice, eh?  Have a look at my Electric Boxcabs page, at the upper "Big Liz" (FF1) photo and then the GN-Y1-cum-PRR-FF2 which follows!

PRR Class I1sa Decapod #4483, with

  Class 90F82 short-haul 8-wheel tender #4485 and

    Class 210F75A long-haul 16-wheel tender.

  {moved from main PRR page on 03 Feb 2003}

Here she is at Hamburg in Apr 2001, courtesy of photographer Scott Hawbaker and from the WNYRHS site by specific permission, in all her cosmetically-restored glory:

(Photo courtesy of and © 4/2001 S. M. P. Hawbaker/WNYRHS, by specific permission - all rights reserved to source)

The WNYRHS site has a separate page devoted to the Class 90F82 short-haul tender #4485 presently on the #4483 Dec.

The WNYRHS also owns a PRR "Coast-to-Coast" class 210F75A 16-wheel tender, removed from an M1 locomotive, which they believe to be one of the last long-haul tenders with 8-wheel trucks in existence and they intend to eventually hook her up to #4483.

Between Scott and me, we've doped out some of them; here's a first shot at it.  The tentative functions in plain text are the Chapter's, those in Italics are mine.  Blanks mean your guess is as good as ours, but we really do NOT want guesses.

A - Air Pump
B - Stoker
C - ?
D - Water Heater?
E -" my buddy says Steering Wheel ??? Why two handles?"#
F - Feed Pump?
G - ?
H - Generator
I - ?
J or R - Boiler Pressure Gauge?
K - ? Fireman's Boiler {Stoker?} Pressure Gauge?
L - ?
M - ?
N - ? {Low Water Alarm?}
O - ? Lever moves up and down, both crewmen have a handle
P - ? Water Gauge Level Manifold - 3 valves have a bleed off tube

Q = ?
R = ?
S - ? Not* the double needle Air Brake Gauge
T- ? Top and bottom of Water Level Site Glass?
U - ?
V - ? Injector blown down valve? Fireman's side floor
W - ?  3" pipes run up to injector
X - ?  3" pipes run up to feedwater pump
Y = ?
Z = ?

AA = ?
BB = high water level drain cock
CC = normal water level drain cock
DD = low water level drain cock
EE = ?

Notes:

I thought I'd be able to identify more, but it seemed too much like guesswork so I stopped.

Let's hear it from an awesome Altoona authority, a great Gallitzin guru, an estimable Eddystone expert, or a supreme Sodus seer, please.  If you think you have the answers, please document HOW you know.

# - It's odd, but both the "MR Cyclopedia - Steam" and the reprint of the '41 "Locomotive Cyclopedia" show keyed backhead photos and turret details, but they both depict the NYC 4-6-4 Hudson!  On that loco, the big valve handle in the center of the turret is for the Injector in the '41 but the "Turret main valve" (with a T-handle) in the MR!  ???

Scott's jumped 'way ahead and posted a page about the Decapod as it is being recreated virtually for Microsoft's Train Simulator, TRAIN SIMULATOR FOR #4483.  Here, thanks to Scott, is a sample photo of the backhead with the vertically-opening firedoors spread wide:

(Photo courtesy of and © 2003 S. M. P. Hawbaker/WNYRHS, by specific permission - all rights reserved to source)

Cabin Cars - the PRRT&HS Discussion Web has had a number of posts about the term "Cabin Car"; I opined that British practice has long been to call RR trackside structures (shanties, towers, and such) "cabins" and assumed that the practice came over here with the first locos and their operators.  Once you moved the function of the "office" (the "cabin") onto a RR car, it seems logical that it would then be a "cabin car".  Anyone out there know better?

John Sieber sent this in from the Port Royal (Pennsylvania) The Times of 10 Apr 1890:  "Hereafter the Pennsylvania road will have no cabooses; but trainmen will travel in 'cabin cars.'  The cabin car is a new style and it holds all conveniences of an ordinary boarding house.  It is 34 feet long, rests on two four-wheel trucks, and is so arranged that a brakeman can go to the top of his train without climbing up the sides or ends.  Large orders have been placed in the Pennsylvania shops for these cars."

Penn Station (NY) Electrical Service

Well, I got quite an extensive answer, far too much for the PRR page 2, so I posted it here (only edited for format):

"Up until the late 1970's, at least, Consolidated Edison still supplied power billable at their meter, depending on your location in NYC, at DC, 25 Hertz and 60 Hertz, in a variety of voltages.  At the turn of the {last} century {and} well until the 1940's both DC and 25 Hertz were fairly widely used as power for commercial stablishments; after all, Edison started the city off with a DC system.  Most of the Broadway theatres are fairly old houses (buildings), and some of them still use DC resistance dimmer control systems, for which Consolidated Edison supplies DC power directly.  The NYC subway also obtained power here and there at DC, mostly (I understand) for station lighting and station power (sump pumps and air compressors).  Due to high billing costs, the subway migrated as quickly as they could to 60 Hertz power supply, and used their own converters to supply DC.  One would have to check the current tariffs to see what is exactly the present situation; the power company may have decided by now that it is more economical for them to just supply 60 Hertz power, and let the customer foot the bill for any power conversion devices.

The PRR had a 25 Hertz power supply feed account established with Consolidated Edison in the 1930's when they strung catenary into NYC.  The interesting thing is that this was supplied and billed by Edison to the PRR at catenary voltage (11 kV at 25 Hertz), and not at 132 kV as done by the PRR's other 25 Hertz suppliers (Philadelphia Electric, Baltimore Gas & Electric, Public Service Electric & Gas, Safe Harbor Power Co., Potomac Electric, and Pennsylvania Power and Light, if I remembered them all).  The Consolidated Edison 25 Hertz supply generally was the highest cost power to the railroad, even well into the Amtrak era, and supplied the area generally between the Bergen phase break between Portal swing bridge and the west end of the North River tunnels, and the Harold phase break on the Long Island Rail Road west of Sunnyside Yard.  The New Haven took care of the NY Connecting Railroad over Hell Gate.  There are subfeeds mixed into this for the area's signal system (6600 V at 100 Hz from the railroad's own motor-alternator sets) that also power some of PATH's signals (going back to the days of PRR control of the H&M).  Amtrak installed their own 60/25 Hertz converter system a few years ago at Sunnyside Yard to power the NYC area, so by today I suspect that Consolidated Edison has discontinued their own supply of 25 Hertz power and canceled their tariffs.

As to the original Pennsylvania Station power supplies, I will take a guess and say that they likely received both utility commercial DC (for some larger loads like the elevators, pumps and the like) and 60 Hertz AC for other building use, since I have never come across any accounts of the station electrical systems needing to be rewired for a change in frequency.

As an aside, the electric utility serving LA operated for many years in isolation from the outside world at 50 Hertz.  When they finally connected to the outside grid, they had a major effort to rewind their customers motors for 60 Hertz, similar to what you experienced growing up."

Enola - all Pennsy fan(atic)s KNOW that Enola was named by the lonely section hand stationed there before the yard was built - "Alone", spelled backwards.  Enola (where my sister lived) has its own little library but the township has a large, new central library in adjacent Camp Hill, the Cleve J. Fredricksen Library, replete with historical stained glass windows, one of which depicts Enola Yard; the accompanying historical brochure states that the PRR bought the riverfront property for the yard in 1905 from one Wesley Miller and offered him the right to name the yard.  His first two suggestions were rejected but his third was accepted; the yard is named after his (then) four-year-old daughter, Enola.

Northumberland Yard Photos

(Ca. 1964 photo by, and courtesy of, P. B. Pettit, by specific permission - all rights reserved)
[Thumbnailed image - click on photo for larger image]

(Ca. 1964 photo by, and courtesy of, P. B. Pettit, by specific permission - all rights reserved)
[Thumbnailed image - click on photo for larger image]

(Ca. 1964 photo by, and courtesy of, P. B. Pettit, by specific permission - all rights reserved)
[Thumbnailed image - click on photo for larger image]

(Ca. 1964 photo by, and courtesy of, P. B. Pettit, by specific permission - all rights reserved)
[Thumbnailed image - click on photo for larger image]

Incidentally, Paul advised that he "was sent to Stamford, CT, in 1969, as shop manager after the merger" but "did not see a good future so I left and became a superintendent on the NYC transit"; he "retired from there as a general superintendent in 1990 after 49 years of rail service".  Quite a record, eh?

John C. La Rue, Jr., has a collection of almost 30,000 RR photos in his collection, of which some 1,500 are of the PRR (see a photo of PRR boxcab A6 #3905 from his collection on my PRR boxcabs page); he can be reached at:

PENN ROMAN Type Font
(Continued from PRR Continuation page 1)

Just for example (from my head, without looking it up) there are different drawings for lettering used on steam tenders, steam cab side numbers, steam number plates, number boards, pilot deck codes, tender rears, plus diesels, passenger car letterboards, freight car PRR name, freight car type, freight car data, building signs, station signs, RoW signage, and so on, ad infinitum.

If that isn't bad enough, there were different drawings for different font sizes in many, if not each, category, as well.

There are two options available to you; one is the buy copies of the PRR drawings from the PRRT&HS at their Web site; the other is to get a computer font from Benn Coifman (links and more to follow).

More to follow.

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For tall tales of the Berlinerwerke and its equipment and such (much of which is PRR or PRR-ish,
visit the Berlinerwerke Apocrypha page, et seq.

You will specially appreciate (or hate)
  the PRR Class Z6s Arctic 4-2-2,
  the PRR Class V Rocky 4-14-2,
  the PRR Genesis Engine (unlikely!), and
  the PRR Centipede Engine 4-D-D-4 (even more unlikely, but oh, 'tis true, 'tis true!).

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Because of former page size limitations, this page is now continued on PRR Continuation Pages 4, et seq.

You may wish to visit the Railroad Page, et seq.

of this series of Pennsylvania Railroad pages.

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LEGACY

  What happens to all this when I DIE or (heaven forfend!) lose interest?  See LEGACY.

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

See Copyright Notice on primary home page.

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© Copyright S. Berliner, III - 1999, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2011  - all rights reserved.