Livestock Operations on Model Railroadswith an emphasis on the ATSFFebruary 12, 2012 |
| Drover Cars Through the years Santa Fe had 71 drover cars.
D918 currently resides at the Orange Empire Railway Museum in Perris, CA. It was built in 1929 at Topeka from scrap materials. It operated into the 60s and was donated to OERM in 1969. Click for more photos.
D932 is now preserved at the Mojave River Valley Museum in Barstow, CA. This 40' steel car was built by ATSF in 1931 and operated through the 60s. Click for more photos. It's sister, D938, was converted to a coach, baggage & caboose 2312 in 1942. Several of its class were then redesignated as drover cars. The D938 now resides at the Great Plains Transportation Museum in Wichita, KS. D932 and D938 were modeled (inaccurately) by Hallmark in brass. Old coaches and waycars were also converted to drover work. Lee Berglund wrote an excellent article on these "Cowboy Pullmans" in Frank Ellington's Caboose Cars of the Santa Fe Railway. He reported that the drover car was placed directly behind the locomotive and just in front of the stock cars. This placement made for a smoother ride and allowed them to stay in front of their odiferous cargo. These cars had bunks for the cowboys, but they were encouraged to sleep with their feet toward the engine in case of an emergency stop. After the end of stock movements by rail, some drover cars ended up as cabooses. Drovers cars were used as waycars (not in stock service) on the mine run between Hurley and Santa Rita NM. From in service photos they appeared unmodified from their drovers configuration. They served behind the little 2-10-2s as well as RSD4/5 2100 class diesels. They would pass through the rotary car dumper at Hurley where a cupola caboose would not. (John Moore) A number of the steel drover cars were rebuilt into combines for use on branch lines. One of these has been preserved at in Wichita, KS, and another was in a farmer's field near Americus, KS. (2012) See Ellington's book for drawings, photos, and rosters. Another excellent source is John McCall's Coach, Cabbage and Caboose. Hallmark produced two cars in brass, the drover version and the coach, baggage, caboose version. W & R Enterprises in 1988 offered three versions, the two above plus MOW car 190201 as pictured in Ellington, p. 71. Key Imports did a model of the D918 that is located in Perris, CA. In researching to paint a pair of Hallmark models of the Steel Drover cars for 1950-53, the following were discovered: Reference works listed
below are: Metal Drover Windows pattern: <o oooo OOOOOO>& <o OOOOOOoooo>. By way of correction, both Hallmark cars have a misplaced window on one side. The correct place for the end small window is opposite the side where the stove would have been. If you have a window under a smokejack, it is at the wrong end of the car. For the sake of
photo identification, the A side will have the sleeping area (large windows) on
the right, the B side will have them on the left. Cars in
service 1950-53:
The Hallmark model, with tall stack, needs to have the side window corrected and it can be numbered for D930 or D947. Since I have not seen a photo of D931, I can not give an opinion on that. See this page for a corrected model. Brian Banks built a 1.5" scale model for the Comanche and Indian Gap. See details here. Coach, Baggage & Caboose conversion: There are two
window versions, some with tool box, some without. The toolbox was on side A: Cars in service 1950-53:
The Hallmark model is an incorrect 4 window car, with W/C window wrong on the A side. It is a 4 window version with underbody box centered on the last panel before the baggage door. The underbody details are crude. It can be corrected for 2312 or 2314 by changing the window, creating a short stack, and removing or relocating the underbody box. I have not found photo evidence for 2310, 2311, or 2313, which are the other 4 window cars. See this page for a corrected model. |
