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Above and left, the New Braunfels
at the Gulf Coast
Railroad Museum.
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The New Braunfels is one of
six cars ordered
in late 1954 in Pullman Lot 6965 to Plan 7647 for the famous
streamlined
Texas
Special, "Glamour Train of the Southwest." The
Missouri-Kansas-Texas
Railroad (MKT or Katy) and St. Louis-San Francisco Railway (Frisco)
jointly
operated the red and silver streamliner between St. Louis and San
Antonio.
The train had received streamlined equipment in the late 1940s, but
additional
equipment was needed to fill out the three consists required to cover
the
schedule.
One car in the series was built for
the Frisco.
The other five, including the New Braunfels, were delivered in
July
1955 to the MKT. According to one report, on delivery to the MKT
at St. Louis, the car deadheaded on train No. 5, the Katy Flyer,
to Parsons, Kansas. Shortly thereafter, the New Braunfels
was spotted in service on the MKT's Bluebonnet at San
Antonio.
Could this have been a shakedown run for the new car?
The New Braunfels was one of the first
all-stainless steel cars
built by Pullman-Standard, which had been unable to build all-stainless
steel cars until the mid-1950s when certain patents held by rival Budd
Co. expired. The interior was configured as a divided coach, that
is, with a partition segregating white and colored passengers, and
separate
toilet facilities for each section.
Above, the New Braunfels in Dallas on June 26,
1965, shortly
before the car was delivered to
the NP for service between Chicago and the Pacific
Northwest.
Photo by John B. Charles.
After cessation of the Katy's passenger service in the
1960s, the New
Braunfels found a home on the Northern Pacific Railway (NP) as that
line's No. 530, and after NP was merged with other lines to form
Burlington
Northern (BN), the car became BN property. AMTRAK acquired the
car
from BN in 1971 and numbered it 6452. According to a former
AMTRAK
employee, the car operated in AMTRAK service between Chicago and
Houston
over the winter of 1976. In addition, he recalls that portions of
the original partition between the white and colored sections remained
in the car above the luggage racks at this time. However, these
items
were removed some time before the museum acquired the car.
Above, the New Braunfels as NP 530 in Amtrak
service.
Photo courtesy John Kuehl.
Originally assigned to AMTRAK service between Chicago and
Milwaukee,
the car received an overhaul sometime in the mid-1970s. This
cosmetic
refurbishment included bright orange paint in the vestibule and
corridors,
purple vinyl wall coverings in the restrooms, blue and red patterned
seat
upholstery and blue carpet on the walls and ceilings, covering the
original
"boomerang" formica. In the early 1980s, the New Braunfels
was leased to Metro North Commuter Railroad, seeing service on various
commuter lines out of New York City.
In July 1985, AMTRAK offered the New Braunfels for
sale at auction,
identifying it as a former BN/NP car. A sharp-eyed Gulf Coast
Railroad
Museum board member determined the car's full heritage and Texas
connection.
A museum representative traveled to Delaware to inspect the car, and
submitted
a bid. Two months later, the car arrived at the museum.
Below, the New Braunfels
in Amtrak guise
in storage at Bear, Delaware in 1985. Later on the day this
picture
was taken, Gulf Coast Chapter NRHS placed a bid for the car with
Amtrak,
and the New Braunfels became the first piece of equipment
acquired
by the Gulf Coast Railroad Museum through purchase. Photo by Tom
Marsh.
