Nostalgia & History > Any Midland Valley RR Fans Around?

Another picture from the Dollar Box at my local hobby shop.

Midland Valley Motorcar No. M23. Most likely somewhere in Oklahoma.

Appreciate any information anyone might have.

Yardclerk

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Intresting to see a wood Doodlebug.

According to Stagner's Midland Valley - Rails for Coal, Cattle, and Crude, this car was built by GE in 1912 for the Missouri & North Arkansas as their 102. It went to MV in 1927 as their M7, then to the affiliated Kansas Oklahoma & Gulf in 1930 as their M23 (the big rectangle on the side of the car lists the three affiliated "Muskogee Roads," the KO&G, the MV, and the Oklahoma City - Ada - Atoka). The car was scrapped November 1954. More photos of M23 are here: http://www.cbu.edu/~mcondren/FSVB/Midland%20Valley/Passenger%20Trains.htm

Where are you seeing wood on M23? Some early doodlebugs had wood roofs, but M23 looks like steel all around.

I think he might be referencing the truss rods?

Evan_Werkema Wrote:
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> Looks to be a GE car. More photos of M23 are
> here:
> http://www.cbu.edu/~mcondren/FSVB/Midland%20Valley
> /Passenger%20Trains.htm
>
> Where are you seeing wood on M23? Some early
> doodlebugs had wood roofs, but M23 looks like
> steel all around.

wabash2800 Wrote:

> I think he might be referencing the truss rods?

If someone has the November 1973 TRAINS handy, there's an article in there on GE's railcars that might explain the truss rods. My copy is in deep storage, unfortunately. John McCall's The Doodlebugs is handy, and it says the Wason bodies on Santa Fe's two GE cars, built a year after the MN&A cars, were steel channel and I-beams reinforced by steel plates in the sides. The interior floor was wood, but with insulating felt and steel plate underneath. They too had truss rods, but I wonder if they were more vestigial than functional.

It turns out KO&G's predecessor, the *Missouri* Oklahoma & Gulf, DID have genuine wood-sheath body doodlebugs, half a dozen of them, built by Drake in 1912.

According to Keilty's Doodlebug Country, the history of the M23 pictured (the second M23) is a little more complicated than what Stagner's book suggested. The Muskogee Roads had quite a few GE cars, including at least three ex-MN&A cars. They originally had center entrances, which the truss-rods neatly framed. Around 1940, parts from several of the GE cars were "recycled" to produce three highly rebuilt cars without center entrances: second M8, M21, and M23.

Something I forgot to ask when posting this picture:

How common were open platforms on the rear of Motorcars?

yardclerk Wrote:

> How common were open platforms on the rear of
> Motorcars?

I'm getting closer to raiding the storage unit and finding that issue of TRAINS. Judging from photos in Keilty's book, open platforms were at least an option on the Wason Manufacturing Co. bodies used on GE railcars in the early teens. Santa Fe's pair didn't have them, but at least some GE cars rostered by IC, MP, PGE, SD&AE, SLSF, SP&S, and the Muskogee Roads did. Look through the photos at http://www.northeast.railfan.net/self_prop7.html and you'll find quite a few GE cars with open platforms.

Keilty's book also has a photo of GE's first railcar, D&H 1000 built in 1911, which was very different from the bullet-nosed cars built the following year. With wood sides, arch-windows, and a clerestory roof, it looks for all the world like a combine (or a pole-less interurban with a baggage section) with a lot of weird piping on the roof. It too had an open rear platform.

I can't find any photos of non-GE doodlebugs with open rear platforms.