Sam Houston Zephyr

Union demands, loss of mail contracts and the coming of the Eisenhower-Interstate Highway In the midst of the Great Depression three men collaborated on a project that brought new System didn't help things but, it was ultimately the economy of flight (when all things were energy, literally and figuratively, to America’s railroads. Ralph Budd, Charles Kettering and considered) and the speed of the airplane that prevailed. Even so, the sam houston zephyr lasted surprisingly long: More than ten years beyond the life of her twin competitors, the Edward G. Budd, Sr. conspired to change rail passenger travel for the better. They almost Sunbeam-Hustler, almost a year and a half past that of her running mate, the TWIN STAR single-handedly changed the primary mode of railroad locomotive power from steam to ROCKET (service of Houston-Dallas) and well into the Jet Age. diesel-electric. In so doing, standards were set for design and construction of locomotives By the early 1960's the train, as aggregated in 1945, began to "drift apart". It is esthetically and passenger cars; much of which last unto today. The protagonists of this wonderful fortunate that these changes were not well chronicled. A few photographs and some secondary-anecdotal source material survive. Those photographs and other materials clearly collaboration were the president of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad (Ralph Budd), show and describe a once proud and beautiful train in sad decline. Heavyweight coaches – the president of the Edward G. Budd Manufacturing Company (Edward G. Budd, Sr. – the including, from time to time, Pullman Green M-K-T heavyweights along with KATY – Frisco two unrelated) and the then Vice President of Research of General Motors (Charles W. Texas Special Pullman-built lightweights began showing up in the consist. silver bullet had lost her name and was regularly rotated with C&S E5's as well as leased Q E7 9927 A and Kettering – later GM’s legendary President.) Their collaboration produced, in a remarkably FW&D E8's #9981A & #9981B. In May 1964 - #3 and #4 were cut back to Houston-Dallas- short period of time, the 9900-pioneer zephyr. It made its debut at the Budd plant in Houston service only. The end was near for the sam. Philadelphia on April 7, 1934. Other “shovelnoses” were to rapidly follow. These articulated trainsets quickly set the standard for modernity and speed. From the outset, they were an After silver hours was taken off the service on February 7, 1965 the sam went into precipitous decline – no longer even approaching 1st Class. It's once proudly protected overwhelming commercial success with the traveling public. schedule was increasingly disrupted by continued poor track and shoddy equipment In 1936, CB&Q 9901 was assigned to the jointly held Texas subsidiary Burlington-Rock maintenance. This doesn't begin to address FW&D management's clear and understandable desire to be out of the passenger business. In Texas, the "West Wind" barely stirred. Island to serve the hotly competitive Dallas-Houston market as the sam houston zephyr . On August 29, 1937 the TEXAS ROCKET was put in service utilizing ROCK ISLAND TA #602 The final run of #3 – Dallas to Houston took place on January 26, 1966 and the final run of #4 – Houston to Dallas took place the following day. On January 27th the train consisted of E5 and its trainset. Both trains carried the B-RI moniker on the sides of their locomotives-power #9955 – nee silver arrow, CB&Q Havelock-built economy baggage #1021, C&S cars. The coming of these trains (including several "swaps and trades" in the years ahead) heavyweight #554, FW&D #400 – silver fox and #402 silver ore. At the end, not one piece revolutionized rail travel in the Lone Star State. The Southern Pacific-T&NO responded in of equipment which ran on January 13, 1945 was in the consist. Braniff went bankrupt during the 1980's. SOUTHWEST Airlines now has over thirty-five flights a day between Houston and the fall of 1937 with the full sized, Pullman Built, steam powered Sunbeam and in June, Dallas. BNSF high speed freight trains roar down the old Burlington-Rock Island Line hauling 1938, with streamlined equipment on the revitalized Hustler. On December 19, 1944, coal and grain out of the heartland of America to Houston and, through its sea port, the world. while running near Dacus, Texas, 9901 caught fire and was damaged beyond salvage.

Over a year in research, development and execution, your sam represents the absolute state of the art and science of fine scale, brass railroad modeling. Hundreds of photographs were taken of extant equipment in Illinois, Texas and Washington. Archives were searched and plans drawn. The pioneering work of Eagle in designing and having manufactured dies to press the major corrugations on the cars and locomotives as well as the use of scale, fully operating diaphragms will quickly appear industry wide. Your model is a "first". All this and more is EAGLE STANDARD and is clearly and proudly reflected in this registered-certified DALLAS – 1955 Roger Plummer Photograph – Gordon C. Basset Collection product masterfully built by AJIN PRECISION. The Q quickly replaced the 9901 trainset with an already planned full sized, non articulated ______Budd built five car train powered by a single EMC-EMD E5. Selected for this service was E5

9909 - silver bullet and the 72’ baggage car silver light, both then running as power and head-end car on the silver streak zephyr between Kansas City-Omaha-Lincoln. Three 52 COPYRIGHT © 2002 – Eagle Imports ™ seat chair cars – silver crown, silver chariot, silver trail were added to the “new”  consist. The stunning 89' carried the drumhead and marker lights. This train An Association of: Frank W. Dublin,SAM Jr., Cheryl HOUSTON and Jon Fleming ZEPHYR and Nicholas S. Muff, MD silver hours Distinguished railroad historian, curator and author, George C. Werner contributed to the historical and began service on January 13, 1945 in this configuration and remained as such well into the photographic research of this project. mid-1950's.

The prototype locomotive, which the model with an overworked crew was different than the 283. mile "cake walk" of the sam between powering your EAGLE set depicts, was completed two terminals – Fort Worth and Houston which had ample facilities and well rested crews. The northbound ROCKET leaving Houston for Minneapolis-St. Paul at 4:45 PM – arriving at EMC (later to become Electro Motive Division – Dallas at 8:55 PM (quickly changed to 5:00 PM – 9:00 PM ) found the train clean and well GM) in March, 1940. The EMC-EMD E5 class was stocked but, still no match for her svelte running mate on the "double daily" schedule. the last large, "custom built" issue done at La In spite of its modernity, the sam was beset by numerous derailments and wrecks as it went Grange. It was distinguished by an all stainless about its swift occasions in Texas. The Burlington Bulletin - #19 contains Michael Spoor's and Hol Wagner's wonderful article, "Teague, Texas and the Boll Weevil". Therein is steel carbody with corrugations matching the discussed in detail the "plague" of wrecks on the B-RI caused by faulty track maintenance passenger cars of zephyr trains. They also had and collisions with automobiles and trucks. Spoor and Wagner count at least four serious "shorter" side panel windows than previous E 3-4 derailments where after such mishaps, all or parts of the train "hit the dirt". Historian George C. Werner describes sections of the track as "rough riding" - replete with spilled coffee from locomotives: This due to the 10.5" high half-filled cups in silver hours but not "bad and dangerous". Regardless, the derailments burlington letter board. Internally; mechanically and wrecks continued. and electrically, the E5 was identical to the E6. The prime movers were two 1,000 hp – 12 cylinder

DALLAS – 1953 Plummer Photo – Bassett Collection Winton 567 Diesel engines-generators powering GM built traction motors. The Q and its subsidiary lines, the Colorado & Southern and the Fort Worth & Denver, owned all of the E5's built. The Q locomotives (one of which was 9909) were geared for 117 mph while the C&S and FW&D

units were geared for 85 mph. A "biography" of silver bullet is included herein as well as the various particulars on the passenger cars making up the original full sized sam consist. For those interested, fulsome discussions of corporate history affected by Texas law can be FREESTONE,, TEXAS - 1950 Harry Hippel Photograph found in various works cited in the bibliography; particularly Reed and Spoor, et al. Fulcomer, In the days before automatic block signals and speed limits, conductors and engineers saw Goen and Holck, jointly studied, contain complete E5 dates and data. their task as, "Be on the advertised". Many were the remembered occasions when a tardy sam, running late out of Dallas because of a "late" #7, would hit speeds well in excess of Although the train ran on the Burlington-Rock Island, 110 mph as it ran down the Navarro Hill between Corsicana and Teague or the tangent the joint Texas subsidiary of the C&S and CRI&P – between Montgomery and Tomball. It wasn't until the early fifties that 115# rail – replacing leased to and operated by the FW&D, it was owned much of the 90# material from the 1927-30 "rebuild" – was installed on this "racetrack". by neither. The ownership of the locomotive and five About this same time, the Interstate Commerce Commission mandated a nationwide rail passenger cars remained Q which were in turn leased speed limit on ABS equipped lines, thus taming her down to 79 mph. This was more than to the operating Texas entity(s). This arrangement ample to maintain the mile a minute schedule between Houston and Dallas…if the schedule lasted until late 1955 when the locomotives began connections held. Increasingly, they didn't. losing their names and were "shuffled" between the FW&D and the Colorado and Southern with new By the early 1950's, Braniff Airways was in serious competition with Houston-Dallas rail numbers. lines with the introduction of CONVAIR 440's – supplanting the aging DOUGLAS DC-3. In the years following WWII, flying became increasingly cheap, placing the business traveler – The sam houston zephyr train #4 ran in the downtown Dallas to downtown Houston – in a bit more than 2 hours. By 1959, Braniff was morning Houston to Dallas thence to Fort Worth. The serving Dallas-Houston with a single BOEING 707 flight daily augmented with numerous afternoon schedule saw this reversed on #3. The CONVAIR and LOCKHEED Electra equipped flights. With the introduction of the tri-engined, sam's running mate was the Rock Island TWIN STAR BOEING 727 in 1962, the days of classy passenger rail travel between Texas' two largest ROCKET (powered originally by single units such as cities effectively ended. The Southern Pacific-T&NO had "thrown in the towel" much earlier, E3 #625 and including in its early consists cars from annulling its Hustler on August 11, 1954 and its once haughty Sunbeam on September 11, the TA powered TEXAS ROCKET.) This train was WAXAHACHIE – 1962 Steve Goen Collection 1955. placed in service on January 14, 1945. (For complete TSR data see Stout.) The timetable for January 1945 shows #4 leaving Houston at 9:00 AM and arriving Dallas at 1:05 PM. By November, 1948 the Houston departure time was advanced to 8:30 AM – 12:37 PM Dallas arrival. #3 back to Houston left Dallas at 5:00 PM and arrived the Bayou City four hours later. Technically – the two terminals for #3 and #4 were Fort Worth and Houston where both trains were serviced, turned and numbers changed but, the loads were Dallas-Houston-Dallas. By the late 1950's, the morning train from Dallas – TSR – seldom ran on schedule on its long trek from Minneapolis-St. Paul to the Gulf Coast of Texas. The sam was hands down the more elegant and better of the two. To be fair, trying to keep the ROCKET "swept out" at brief stops over a 1,368 mile marathon (the longest north-south single line rail route in the country)