Nostalgia & History > Pullman 'Imperial Bird' at Green River?

I have a few other shots with that distinctive background mesa. So I’m pretty sure this is Green River. But with my shameful deficiency* of general passenger knowledge someone will have to explain why a UP Pullman is in IC colors. TIA… :^/

1. UP Pullman car “Imperial Bird” rolling through Green River, WY in the 1950s(?)
Copy slide by Jack Pfeifer, from the late James W. Watson collection.

Thanks for looking back!
Lance Garrels
santafe199

*I really miss my late KS Gang bro John Arbuckle. He was the gang’s proverbial walking encyclopedia for any & all passenger information items!

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Here is the info for the car. Note H explains the IC paint and it says it was painted IC from Nov. 1957 to May 1959

Imperial series info 

Scott O'Dell

Yes, it's Green River, Wyoming. The car is an Imperial-series 4-4-2 sleeper, the very top of the Pullman hierarchy, with a mix entirely of the larger private rooms -  4 bedrooms, 4 compartments, 2 drawing rooms. No open sections or roomettes.

Don Strack records that it was built by P-S for UP in March 1942 and delivered in the two-tone gray paint, with some cars in its delivery group quickly going to yellow in 1947 for use on the City trains. Three Imperial series cars (Imperial Bird, Rock and Letter were repainted to IC brown-and-orange in 1957 for the Panama Limited, IC's legendary all-Pullman Chicago - New Orleans streamliner.

They came back to UP in May 1959 and were painted back to yellow-and-gray. Not mentioned is the nature of that service on the IC. My guess would be a temporary lease when UP had some extra equipment, and the IC was short. The higher-class accommodations were selling well in the postwar period, and the IC still had good traffic and quality service to New Orleans and the South, especially in winter. There would have been good demand for the higher-priced rooms in cars like this.

Link to info on Don Strack's marvelous Utah Rails site, scroll down to the listing of Imperial-series cars, and the notes following: https://utahrails.net/pass/named-lightweight-sleepers.php#sleeper-imperial-band

The paint is looking a little faded in the image, so my guess is that this is when the car returned to the UP after some serious service on the IC. The brown-and-orange could fade in the southern sun traveling down to the Gulf coast from Chicago. That would likely place this image in May, maybe June, 1959, just after the car returned to the UP. Uncle Pete didn't dawdle on repaints in those days, so it's probably not long after the car came back north and west. And the the car probably went right back into service on UP, probably on one of the City trains in this image - only they would have ranked to have an Imperial-series car.

And as such, a very special image capturing a unique moment in time for this car and UP passenger train history, and at an iconic location. Just marvelous - many thanks!

MC



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/10/26 11:55 by ironmtn.

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,5982429,5982433#msg-5982433

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,3992516,3992612#msg-3992612

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,3392732,3392732#msg-3392732


neat to see she is still with us

 

I remember this class of cars having open toilets I believe, in the bedrooms which was a drawback.  Did not some of them have small windows for the upper berths too?

Illionois Central was known to short term lease cars from other roads as their trains "high" season was winter with folks escaping the cold around Chicago/Milwaukee and heading down to New  Orleans.   Same pattern as on the East Coast.   The most famous cars were the NP sleeper domes that went back and forth.   I think they also used Missouri Pacific domes like this.   Each time IC would paint the cars into brown/orange and then return them repainted back to the owner road's colors.   That is what happened here.    I also knew John Arbuckle.

Richard Harris.   Out in SLO, CA.

Oh, and IC eventually bought the Missouri Pacific dome coaches.   Then blanked out half the windows.

Richard.

chicago rocks!