A photo column by Ken Murdock features railroad scenes of the past, a look back into railroading’s history.
Named trains were popular on color postcards. This one shows ACL’s
Champion E3A 500 with the train’s name lettered on the locomotive.
This practice was soon dropped to allow for more flexibility in locomotive
assignments. This new Budd built, 7-car, New York to Miami
streamliner was inaugurated on December 1, 1939 to compete with
SAL’s Budd built Silver Meteor placed in service 10-months earlier. This
Florida scene would have been somewhere on the FEC main line. -
CFRHS collection
This color postcard shows the Illinois Central Railroad’s City of Miami
streamliner in Florida on the FEC, en route to America’s Vacationland,
Miami. Inaugurated on December 18, 1940, this all-coach train was
operated jointly by the IC, C of G, ACL and the FEC. It operated over
the IC from Chicago to Birmingham, the C of G to Albany, the ACL to
Jax and the FEC to Miami. The IC power ran thru to Jax where FEC
power took over. This paint scheme wasn’t as attractive as IC’s later
orange and chocolate brown. - CFRHS collection
This color postcard shows a pair of SAL Orange Blossom Special, EMD
streamlined diesels in the famous citrus paint scheme, racing down
their Florida mainline side by side. Inaugurated on November 21, 1925,
this winter-only, New York to Miami, all-Pullman, heavyweight train
received diesel power for the 1938 season but never received lightweight
cars. It’s doubtful that this scene actually happened. Even if the
OBS ran in two sections, they wouldn’t have run side by side very long
since SAL’s Florida mainline was almost entirely single track. - CFRHS
collection
This article originally appeared in the June, 2020 Flatwheel Newsletter