The Oyster Bay Railroad Museum

Information on this car courtesy of Grover White.

The Long Island Rail Road donated two of their recently retired 2900 series coaches to us.  These coaches, numbers 2935 & 2956 were built by Pullman Standard in 1955 and 1956 respectively and were classified as P72.  As built, they were steam heated and used batteries for lighting but were rebuilt in the early 1970's with under car diesel generator sets to provide power for lighting, heating and air conditioning.  2956 seats 123 people and 2935 seats 118 but provides a toilet.  They currently wear the last paint scheme the LIRR used for these cars, but originally wore charcoal grey sides and ends and a dark green roof.  They will be returned to these colors when they are restored.

Even though they entered service the year #35 was retired, the history of these cars will always be linked with our locomotive.  At the end of steam ceremony held on October 8, 1955, two steam locomotives each pulled a single 2900 series coach (#35 from the West and #39 from the East) to Hicksville where a new diesel locomotive took over for the return trip.
  

Since they are in fairly good shape, work at this point will be mostly cleaning them up and repairing some small areas of rot.  Long term plans will see them repainted and the interiors brought back to the way they looked as built.

A Pennsylvania Railroad built class N5 number 2, this is what comes to mind when you think of a caboose, with an (almost) centrally mounted cupola. The history of this car is not clear, except for the fact that is was bought second hand from the PRR. We are searching for its identity so we can determine its age and former PRR number.

This car is in rough shape with much rusting having taken place over the years.  All of its side windows have been plated over, as had the interior of the cupola. The worst part is that it suffers from serious rot.  Much sheet metal work will have to be done to replace rusted out sections, and the metal of the frame is quite thin. The current plan is to restore this car cosmetically, as a lot of work will have to be done to make it road worthy again. Externally, the car has been painted and lettered and looks much better than it has in years.

In the early 1920's the LIRR ordered a fleet of wood bodied, steel framed cabin cars to bring up the rear of its freight trains. Built by American Car & Foundry, these cars served well for many years. Most were not retired until the late 1950's. At that point, a few were sold to private individuals and moved off of Long Island. One of these cars, #12 built in 1927 for a cost of $17,880, found its way to the Shore Line Trolley Museum in Connecticut where it was used for sleeping quarters by their volunteers. With alternate sleeping accommodations available in the area, the trolley museum had little need for a caboose in their collection. They had offered to sell the car to us so we could return it to Long Island where its historic significance would be realized.

 The trolley museum was serious about wanting to return #12 to its proper home, and even turned down offers from groups wanting to use it for other purposes. At the same time, they could not afford to give the car away, so we started a fund raising campaign to purchase and transport it home.
 

On June 26, 2002 after years of fundraising and hard work by our volunteers, #12 returned home to Long Island.  

Caboose number 50 is an N22 class built by International Railway Car Co. in 1958. It is not your typical cabin car, because it has neither a cupola or a bay window.  In fact, it looks more like a short boxcar with end platforms and windows.  C-50 has been fully restored to its as-delivered paint scheme of orange and black. The interior has been restored and painted and a new oak floor has been installed and finished.

This 40' boxcar was made for the New York, New Have & Hartford (NYNH&H) railroad, better know as the New Haven, by the Pullman-Standard corporation in 1944. It was part of an order of 2000 cars numbered 31000-32999. As the LIRR had an interchange with the New Haven, cars of this type would often have been found on LIRR freight trains.
 

The car wound up being used bythe LIRR's shop forces for storage at their Morris Park facility for many years, renumbered as LIRR SHOP 100. Now donated to us, we will use it in a similar fashion in Oyster Bay where it will serve as a shop/storage area as well an historic example of mid-century freight railroading. Although it looks a bit rough, the car is actually in fairly good condition and will be restored to its original New Haven livery.