Back to the Futura

I spent part of today helping Charlie Strong uncover and trace original lettering from the 451, which is in Barn 4 for some basic repair work and survey of condition. As delivered from St. Louis Car Company, cars 451-460 had modern Futura lettering, similar or identical to what the Union Pacific has used for the past 70+ years. When they went through the Wheaton paint shop at the age of about five years they were repainted with standard CA&E Railroad Roman lettering. While plans of exactly how to paint 451 and 460 have not been finalized, work is being done to record both types of lettering before all of the paint is stripped off. Below left, Charlie (right) shows Adam Robillard, who stopped by between Track Department jobs, the 451's original Futura number; below right the 1950's Roman number has been highlighted in marker prior to tracing.











During breaks from this job to go into the shop and warm up, I also helped with some work on the 319. Buzz Morisette was working on the car too - at left he is seen installing new glass in one of the side windows (a new pane of glass was also installed in one of the drop sash windows - Frank Sirinek did the glass cutting for both).


The hardest-working man in the department on Sunday was Jon Fenlaciki, who spent the entire day wire-wheeling and then cleaning and priming the step wells for the 409. Below left he is seen during a break in the action; below right the step wells are shown after completion of painting, with which Jon was helped by Greg Kepka.