North American railroad history - main questions

[conductorchris]

POTUS = President of the United States
FLOTUS = First lady of the United States - in other words' the President's wife ("Lady Bird" Johnson was Lyndon Johnson's wife ... in the sixties)

D. Carleton is a passenger expert in his own right. (Or is that his brother? I get a little mixed up between you too). The brother I am thinking of, I met on one of Iowa Pacific's dome cars that came to Vermont for a Vermont Rail Action Network train.

Christopher

[Vazyuk]

While I was searching the materials for my research, I was found some material about consist of Milwaukee Road train Pioneer Limited - http://www.railwayclassics.com/milw02.htm Can someone explain what is "Bunkroom coach"?

Another question - among the various North American sleeping accomodations was very rare type of accomodation - "Chambrette", in the train Denver Zephyr was one sleeping car with 4 chambrettes and 4 roomettes, source is official CB&Q timetable: http://streamlinermemories.info/Zephyr/B51-5TT.pdf I would like to find information about chambrette.

[Keystoneaholic]

The following link goes to a page featuring an N scale model of one of the Milwaukee 'Bunkroom' cars. The numbers (4441 to 4448) follow on from the passenger cars built for the original Hiawatha service and have some seats which can be converted into 'bunks'for either passengers of crew members. Externally the cars are similar to the coach version but with a different window arrangement.

https://www.trovestar.com/generic/zoom.php?id=126435

The Burlington cars you mention had 4 Roomettes, 4 Chamberettes, 1 Drawing Room, 1 Compartment and 4 Double Bedrooms. The two cars were named 'Silver Slipper' and 'Silver Moon'. The link below shows a picture of the train from the rear, the car in question would be the one ahead of the tail end oservation. I would speculate that the Chamberette was similar to the smaller 'Roomettes' found in the post war Budd Slumbercoaches.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denver_Zephyr

Perhaps sombody else might be able to come up with more information.

[dcarleton]

While I was searching the materials for my research, I was found some material about consist of Milwaukee Road train Pioneer Limited - http://www.railwayclassics.com/milw02.htm Can someone explain what is "Bunkroom coach"?

That was a 56 seat coach with a dormitory area.

Another question - among the various North American sleeping accomodations was very rare type of accomodation - "Chambrette", in the train Denver Zephyr was one sleeping car with 4 chambrettes and 4 roomettes, source is official CB&Q timetable: http://streamlinermemories.info/Zephyr/B51-5TT.pdf I would like to find information about chambrette.

That was very similar to a regular Pullman Single Bedroom with one crosswise bunk that folded down from the wall, and one chair that folded down and could fit under the bunk. They were arraigned in pairs with a folding partition in between so that they could be sold "en-suite".

So why not just call them 'Single Bedrooms' if that's what they essentially were? The Burlington was in a dispute with the Pullman Company as to whether Pullman should operate cars that were not provided by Pullman. The resulting legal imbroglio proved to be the beginning of the end of the Pullman Company!

[conductorchris]

I did not know either answer so I passed your question on.

David Carlton (who is on this forum) said "The Milwaukee Road car was apparently a coach with a dormitory area."

Carl Fowler said "A Chambrette was a large roomette, with a toilet that could be
accessed with the bed down. Pullman (as opposed to Budd) called
these single bedrooms. The 1936 DZ when expanded got one care in
each set with Chambrette rooms."

Both of these men are real authorities who know more than me about passenger rail in the US. David is author or co-author of a string of books. Carl ran the Rail Travel Center, running group rail tours all over the world. He is retired now but is on the Vermont Rail Council.

Christopher