Nostalgia & History > Freight Car Friday-SOU/NS 85' Excess Height Box Cars

Southern Railway rostered some unique Classes of Excess Height Box Cars. SOU 9640-9739 were 85' Excess Height Box Cars Class BS-20 built by Pullman Standard in March 1965. They had 10,000 Cu.Ft. Capacity  with an Internal Height of 12' 6". Originally designed to haul Tobacco, they were also used to transport Cotton Bales,Appliances,Furniture and Tires.  SOU 9740-9769 was another 85' variety Class BS-21 built at the Southern's Coster Shops from 11-62 to 1-63. These were called Tobacco Hogshead Cars also known as Big Boy Box Cars. I was lucky enough to run into a few of these unique cars over the years. Top shot of SOU 9738 Class BS-20 at Portland,PA on 2/2/2002. Next shot of NS (ex-SOU) 9646 Class BS-20 at Portland,PA. on 2/2/2002. Last shot of SOU 9744 Class BS-21 in "Southern Gives A Green Light To Innovations" Super Cushion Service scheme. taken at Newport,PA. on 1/2/93.

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Thanks for posting this great set of SOU box cars, especially pic #3 with that great overhead shot of the "Big Boy" box.  On my favorite local - the Gaffney (SC) Switcher, we used a lot of the "Big Boy" boxes.  A company called Chemstrand loaded them to the peaked roof with rolls of polyester cloth.   Later on, the Big Boys were used to haul truck tires out of Danville VA, Goodyear I believe.  Some of the SOU conventional roofed big boxes hauled bra padding to a California bra plant, Vanity Fair I think.  They were  good cars from a time when Southern Railway wanted to "innovate" and "go after the lion's share of the freight".  On our employee side, we had the phrase - "jobs follow the freight".  At Southern we tried to keep these cars loaded and moving.

Super series and info thanks for sharing, those cars are money!  

Thanks for these fine shots of Southern Railway boxcars.  The Southern was an industry leader in innovation and pursued many markets ignored by other railroads.  Southern even had an equipment design group, with representatives from the commercial and mechanical sides of the company, which worked together to design freight cars and car appurtenances to meet the needs of customers and minimize loss and damage claims, and NS continued this after the merger.  In my time with NS, I heard some of the ex-Southern guys refer to the tobacco hogshead cars as "tobacco barns".  The problem with designing a car for a specific commodity or customer is that the railroad can get stuck making a large investment in a fleet of cars that doesn't work well in more general service.  That was always a consideration the railroad managers had to take into account, how readily a special design could be adapted to other markets if the intended business did not materialize as planned.  

Steve Salamon
Valley City, OH      



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/22 05:27 by cr7998.