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The complete history of this unique, geared steam locomotive has been reissued with four additional pages of newly uncovered data. Its 110 pages (812" x 11") are of high quality book paper; the full-color frontispiece and over 100 photos and drawings are beautifully printed; the binding is cloth.

If you already prize a copy of CLIMAX and don't have the supplement, send a stamp for one. If you have still to own this full and fascinating story of the engine that handled logging, ore, and a few passenger trains on wood rails as well as steel from its birthplace in Pennsylvania to halfway round the world, ask your bookseller or send $6 to:

H. L. Tilton, Treasurer RAILROADIANS OF AMERICA, Inc. 761 West Inman Ave., Rahway, N. J.

can be loaded at the same time by arranging a drop-down platform which connects each auto-carrier, making a continuous flush deck from one to another.

RESEARCH PROJECT: British Railways is spending 3.5 million dollars on engineering laboratories at Derby - part of a large project to expand and reorganize the BR research department. The new plant will be equipped with modern apparatus for testing passenger and freight car underframes, bridge sections, reinforced concrete units, and other heavy railway equipment. Engineering, vehicle and track, metallurgy, and physics divisions will be combined and housed in the new buildings at Derby which will also become the headquarters of the Director of Research. The chemical laboratories are located in London and a new building housing them was opened last year. This latest development should be completed in 1963.

BEYOND THE PACIFIC

WILLIAM K. VIEKMAN

THOSE JAPANESE INTERURBANS: Trolley sparks are flying and air horns are echoing a distinct melody heralding the fact that Japan is reaching the peak of its interurban era. Three types of operations are very much in evidence:

1. Through service with streamlined equipment. This includes parlor, buffet, and observation facilities in, among others, the Romance Car of the Tobu Railway between Tokyo and Nikko [page 14, July TRAINS], the Vista Car of the Kinki Nippon Railway out of Osaka, and the brandnew Panorama Car, modeled after Italy's ETR250-class units, of the Nagoya Railroad Company. These luxurious electrics bring to mind the streamliners of the Illinois Terminal and the present Electroliner of the North Shore Line.

2. Commuter-type service with M.U. cars. A common occurrence around Japan's larger cities, these interurbans are reminiscent of the recently dead CA&E and the still-flourishing South Shore Line. In the Tokyo area such a network may be seen which includes the Tokyu Electric Express Railway, the Seibu Electric Railway, and many others. Service is frequent and expresses are scheduled as well as semi-expresses and locals. All cars, by the way, are of the platform-loading variety.

3. Street and private-right-of-way type local interurban service. These recall the old Hagerstown & Frederick trolleys in Maryland and some of the yet-popular Red Arrow Lines in western Philadelphia.

Such operations are to be found between Kamakura and Enoshima with seaside p/r/w on a peninsula south of Yokohama, and out of the city of Kofu, 85 miles west of Tokyo [page 12, May TRAINS]. Interurbans in categories 1 and 2, with little or no street running, are virtually booming. New equipment and extended services are everywhere evident. Category 3 is almost standing still, and in some cases, is losing out. This includes the picturesque trac tion orange interurbans in Kofu where the one electric railway line is owned by a massive bus company. Operations may cease at year's end in favor of a bus route. The reason that this is the exception rather than the rule: nationwide increases in passenger and freight traffic point to continuing interurban prosperity.

AUSTRALIA'S RDC "DAYLIGHT": Last spring the New South Wales Government Railways introduced into its timetable an airconditioned South Coast Daylight. The train consists of four RDC cars built under license with Budd at the Commonwealth Engineering Company in Sydney. Capable of 75 mph speeds, the stainlesssteel express is the only train of its type in New South Wales. Feature: a buffet service on "take-away tables placed be tween the seats." The 77 ft. cars are the longest on the system, have sealed double windows complete with glare-proof glass and noise-reducing fiber-glass insulation. With the introduction of this new equip ment the NSWGR now operates 23 airconditioned expresses-33 trips daily over its vast system.

ELSEWHERE: In the Philippines the Ma nila Railroad wants to order a few more diesels. This may endanger the remaining steam power now held in reserve for the yearly sugar rush. . . . The city of Cal cutta in India has purchased 60 of those nearly new trolley cars from Sydney, Australia [page 52, July TRAINS]. . . . . . Indonesia is ordering more new steam locomotives!

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SHORT LINES

WILLIAM S. YOUNG

GOOD-BY TO STEAM: The list of U.S. common carriers operating entirely with steam power has shrunk to about 20 names and is still shrinking. Most of the holdouts are in the South - but it is in the South that the latest surrenders to time have oc curred. The coal-hauling Alabama Central Railroad ceased in toto this spring with the expiration of a six-month extension on the tubes of its 2-8-0 No. 29. Elsewhere in Alabama, the 4-mile Sumter & Choctaw Railway acted quickly to dieselize when its last serviceable steamer, 2-8-2 No. 102, came down with really serious boiler trouble- a fracture. S&C, which serves an

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American Can Company lumber mill at Bellamy, borrowed a Southern Railway unit at first but is expected to buy its own diesel. Now comes this warning to photographers: Mississippi's Bonhomie & Hattiesburg Southern Railroad, which has been a firm and fondly regarded defender of the faith, is expected to go diesel.

HELLO TO STEAM?: With an assist from human nature, the steam locomotive appears about to travel the full circle. Now that there is so little steam remaining in daily revenue service on the common carriers, the list of various kinds of steampowered "museum lines" from Florida to Washington continues to grow, if any. thing, more rapidly than ever. Common carrier short lines, as they went diesel, provided motive power for some of the museum lines. But now two dieselized short lines in the populous East are actually looking for steam locomotives. Two other U. S. short lines - one with active steam, the other with a steamer in storage - are reported to be casting about for coaches. The common object: passenger excursions!

MODEST MERGERS: While the rail giants talk of mergers involving thousands of miles of track, each year an average of two to three short lines are quietly swallowed up by larger carriers. Sometimes the short line's good points attract a buyer; sometimes its owners simply want to get rid of it; sometimes the small road is subsidiary to the large one and loses independent status for the sake of corporate simplification.

Three short lines have been merged thus far in 1961. The sale of Potomac Edison Company's freight railroad at Frederick, Md., to the Pennsy early this year reflects a trend among electric utilities, which have been selling off their rail properties often as a result of anti-trust decisions. Most freight-hauling remnants from the interurban era have thus changed hands, although a number of utilities still hold short lines which carry coal for power plants.

Not in that category, although coal haulers, are two other merger properties. Merger of a subsidiary of long standing is reflected in Great Northern's recent bid for Pacific Coast Railroad, a 32-mile Washington line. Illinois Central, which acquired control of the well-endowed Peabody Short Line Railroad last year, went back to the I.C.C. recently for permission to absorb the 18-mile Illinois coal road.

PATHOS: Most short lines seem to be profitable and in their own small way better off than some of their big brothers. Although short lines have been disappearing, there are still more than 400 in the U. S., and some will surely be around as long as there are railroads. But bow your head a moment for Kansas City, Kaw Valley Railroad, 14-mile Kansas electric [April 1961 TRAINS]; for Columbia & Millstadt Railroad, 7-mile quarry line in Illinois; and for Atlantic & Western Railway, 24-mile North Carolina road which

CHRISTMAS SHOP NOW FOR YOUR R.R. FRIENDS

Detailed 10" x 14" Black and White reproductions of original water-color paintings.

$1 ea.; 3 for $2.50 or 4 for $3.25 ppd. (4) Burlington Hudson, Class S-4B, No. 4002 (3) B&O Class P-7, No. 5311, Pres. Fillmore (2) Magma Arizona RR. 2-8-0, No. 5 (1) C&NW (Illus. in Aug. ad) E-2a, No. 2908 Satisfied or money refunded. Mailed, in a tube. C. V. ZIMMER

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THE VIRGINIAN RAILWAY!

The surprise rail book of 1961 is H. Reid's

was wont to haul sand behind a diesel and bookstores

has a tumble-down engine shed with two rusty Consolidations inside. Kaw Valley and Columbia & Millstadt have permission to abandon, and Atlantic & Western has applied for it. I

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CITY, ZONE, STATE

or by mail

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rains Binders are a practical yet expensive way to keep your favorite agazines neat, orderly, and readily ailable. Rod-type binders hold 12 ues per binder in a cover that Dens flat, yet is loose-leaf in operaon; features include name stamped a cover and spine, vinyl saddle vering for longer life, heavy-duty nder's board. Manufactured to our n specifications, yet available postid each: $3.50

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No. 58 at Tunnel City

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