UP Passenger Car Roster

Updates and Corrections

(Return To UP Passenger Cars Index Page)

[Most recent entry listed first.]

July 22, 2024

Pacific Island and Pacific View -- Updated the current status of named lightweight sleepers Pacific Island and Pacific View. (Thanks to Jack Deasey for the information)

January 18, 2024

Detector Car DC-3 -- Corrected an error in the renumber dates for Detector Car DC-3, showing the renumber date to UP 903000 as August 1961 (8/61) instead of June 1981 (6/81). This was found to be a typographical error in the source, which was Ralph Barger's UP Business Car book, page 190. (Thanks to Robert Tinkham for pointing out the fact that, based on photos, the DC-3 number was used much earlier.)

December 17, 2021

9000-series Dome Observation cars -- Added a brief note about five UP Dome Observation cars in the 9000-series being assigned to Union Pacific's Challenger passenger train, from their initial delivery in March and April 1955, until May 1955 when they were re-assigned to UP's City of St. Louis. (Thanks to Greg Jeanes for the heads-up that resulted in the needed additional research)

September 13, 2021

UP Postal Storage 5743 -- Updated the disposition of UP Postal Storage 5743, which was renumbered as Roadway Tool and Office Car 903012 in 1972, and retired in 1981. UP 5743 is in service on the Albany & Eastern as RFRX 1003, and used as part of A&E's Brunch Train, which operates between Lebanon and Sweet Home, Oregon. (2021 update from Sheldon Perry)

May 9, 2021

UP Club Lounge Cars -- Updated the roster listings for three UP Club Lounge cars. Research suggests that the three cars were renumbered in 1948 for reasons not yet known. UP 1550 became UP 1534 (2nd). UP 1556 became UP 1536 (2nd). UP 1557 became UP 1539 (2nd). Then in 1955, UP 1534 (2nd) was modernized as a Dormitory Club car for use by on-train crew members.

This information comes from David Seidel.

January 12, 2021

National Domain and National Element -- Updated the disposition of two lightweight sleeper cars to show that they are still in existence as part of the Aurora Express Bed & Breakfast near Fairbanks, Alaska.

October 2, 2020

OSL Business Car 1903 -- Updated the information for OSL Business Car 1903, currently displayed at the Holiday Inn in West Yellowstone, Montana.

April 27, 2020

CD 30 and CD 70 -- Updated the disposition for two former City of Denver cars previously shown as being scrapped in 1953, but which were actually sold to C&NW and used in maintenance of way service. Both cars are currently at the Illinois Railway Museum in Union, Illinois. I have also added a link to some photos of the cars at IRM.

The previous disposition that the cars were scrapped came from Randall's "Official Pullman Library" Vol. 13, as well as the portions from Randall's "Streamliners, Vol. 1, Pullman."

UP's Equipment Register book shows only that the cars were retired in 1953 as being "W.O.", which likely means " Worn Out."

CD 30 Roster Listing

CD 70 Roster Listing

January 15, 2020

UP 904850-904855 -- Updated the information for the six-car group of MW Dining Bunk cars.

July 18, 2019

UP-OWRR&N Medical Examiner Car -- Added a photo of OWRR&N 03160 Medical Examiner Car. Built in 1915 as OWRR&N Cafe Observation 1515; to OWRR&N Cafe Observation 1500 in 1932; to OWRR&N Chair Observation 1000 in 1943; to OWRR&N Medical Examiner Car 03160 in November 1946; to Rules Examination Car 202 (1st) in May 1956. Retired by UP in July 1970. Sold to Auto-Liner Corp., in October 1971; sold to Irvington Station Restaurant (Omaha, Nebraska.) in April 1972, later scrapped. Photo from the Jeff Cauthen collection.

UPP 5817 "Pony Express" (2nd) -- Added a new roster listing for the most recent addition to UP's Heritage Fleet, UPP 5817, "Pony Express" (2nd).

June 19, 2019

Hunters Point -- The confusion about which Pullman sleeper is at Travel Town in Los Angeles has been settled. During the restoration process by volunteers at Travel Town, it has been found that the doors are metal-stamped with "Hunters Point." This would have been done by Pullman personnel when the car was built, or when it was refurbished by Pullman at some point.

Hunters Point was a 4-4-2 Pullman sleeper built in July 1941 as part of the 10th Train (City of San Francisco); sold to C&NW on December 31, 1945, leased to Pullman for operation, remained in COSF service; C&NW operation of Chicago-Omaha "City" trains ended in October 1955, and car removed from COSF service; repainted by Pullman to two-tone gray in May 1956, car assigned to general Pullman pool; repainted to Illinois Central brown and orange in November 1957, car assigned to Panama Limited; lease ended on June 1, 1960 and returned to C&NW; retired by C&NW on December 27, 1960; sold to Hyman-Michaels Co. Hunters Point was sold in 1962 to Verl Thomson of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and used along with three other cars to create the Sioux Chief Traintel; the motel remained in business until 1975; the cars were moved to St. Louis in May 1990. Hunters Point was moved in 1992 to Travel Town in Griffith Park Los Angeles, California, and as of June 2019 is undergoing a complete restoration.

May 3, 2019

UP's Heritage Fleet -- Updated the roster web page for Union Pacific's Heritage Fleet passenger cars, to include the most recent Baggage car, UP 5752, with its displays of the building of the Union Pacific Railroad.

August 14, 2018

Corrected an error in the dispositions of UP 5662, 5663, and 6301, baggage cars sold to Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey. Previous information had UP 5662 becoming RBBX 60018; UP 5663 becoming RBBX 60016, and UP 6301 remaining with UP and being scrapped by UP. New information from Surface Transportation Board recordation files, along with information from RBBB itself, shows that UP 5662 was never sold to RBBB, and was scrapped by UP. UP 5663 became RBBX 60016, and UP 6301 became RBBX 60018.

(View the roster listing for UP 5662 and 5663)

(View the roster listing for UP 6301)

October 24, 2017

Updated the numbers of the ex-UP cars sold at auction by Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey in March 2017. RBBX 60006 (stock car, ex UP 6312), RBBX 63004 (stock car, ex UP 5764), and RBBX 63013 (power car, ex UP 5780)

(View the Ringling ex UP page)

June 12, 2017

Updated the information for Russian Hill, including comments by Jeff Koeller for the car's service between 1943 and 1947.

June 7, 2017

Updated the information for the UP 1530-1538 series of streamlined heavyweight cars, to include build dates, retirement dates and dates that the cars were modernized.

The update including removing UP 1505 (arch-roof heavyweight) as becoming Salt Lake Garfield & Western no. 711; it was actually one of the four unaccounted-for UP 1530-series cars (UP 1532, 1533, 1537 or 1538).

Changed the information for Salt Lake Garfield & Western passenger car no. 711. Previously shown as being the former UP 1505, which has been at the Oklahoma Railway Museum in Oklahoma City since 1987. (Thanks goes to Dave Wilkinson for pointing out the error.)

December 6, 2016

OSL 2314 -- Added a further disposition for OSL 2314, an arch-roof heavyweight Baggage Postal car that is now preserved at Boulder City, Nevada.

August 27, 2016

Updates from Jack Deasey of Dominion Rail Voyages LLC

Lightweight Sleepers

Lightweight Lounge Cars

March 11, 2015

Updated the 4600-series dining cars to separate the four cars (UP 4607, 4608, 4611, 4613) that were streamlined in the late 1940s and early 1950s, from the three cars (UP 4622, 4627, 4629) that remained as clerestory roof standard heavyweights.

Minor editing to Streamlined Heavyweight note.

December 12, 2014

Updated the dispositions for UP Baggage Dormitory 6009 and UP Sleeper 1209 "National Progress". Both cars have been at Los Angeles Live Steamers since April 1986.

July 26, 2014

Added new information for Postal Storage 5704, to UP 24435; to UP 904235; sold to Ringling Bros. Reported as being scrapped by Ringling Bros., but instead the car was sold to Omni West at Minerva, Ohio, then (donated?) to Midwest Railway Preservation Society, Cleveland, Ohio; moved in late June 2014 to Cleveland. (update from Jerry LaBoda via email dated July 26, 2014)

July 8, 2014

Added new background information for UP business car no. 107, Overland, donated by UP in May 1971 to Meadowcroft Village museum in Western Pennsylvania. (UP 107 Overland at Avella)

Also updated the current status of OWRR&N business car no. 184, which has been restored and donated to the South Bay Railroad Historical Society at its former SP depot at Santa Clara, California. (OWRR&N 184, later OSL 125)

May 29, 2014

Updated all the roster listings for UP's named and numbered early Streamliner cars. (Named Early Streamliner Cars) (Numbered Early Streamliner Cars)

April 17, 2012

Yes, I'd like to see builder lot numbers. St. Louis Car and St. Charles Car/AC&F would be interesting. I can add them to the roster when I know them, and they give an indication (at least in UP's case) of multiple car orders spread across multiple railroads during the Harriman era of 1898-1913. Here is a page I did for St. Louis Car Co.

http://utahrails.net/pass/wooden-builders.php#stlouis

Having original car numbers is great, but like so many other cases of research, they at times muddy the waters a bit. Case in point, the three Mail cars in Pullman Lot C1717 were delivered in 1890 as OSL&UN 1168-1170. At the time, from 1887-1893, the OSL (and later OSL&UN) leased and controlled the Oregon Railway & Navigation Co. (ORy&N) as the agent for UP. They all went into bankruptcy with UP in 1893. ORy&N emerged as Oregon Railroad & Navigation Co. in 1896, and remained independent until 1899. Between 1896 and 1899, ORR&N was jointly owned by UP, GN, and NP, so there may or may not be cross references between the three roads in car builder records. In 1899, Harriman bought out the portions owned by GN and NP, and ORR&N became a UP property. It was combined with other Harriman-controlled railroads in 1910 to form the Oregon-Washington Railroad & Navigation Co. (OWRR&N).

In March 1897, OSL&UN was reorganized as the Oregon Short Line Railroad, and was independent from UP for 18 months. OSL&UN was headquartered in Salt Lake City, and the new OSLRR remained a Salt Lake City company. The management set about proving to creditors and potential investors that they were now an independent company, separated from the still-bankrupt UP. In October 1898, UP took control of OSL.

One of the new company's first acts after March 1897 was to renumber their locomotives and cars, and that's where the troubles start. This was covered to some degree and pride in local newspapers, with occasional reports of cars leaving the shops with new numbers and new paint jobs (the passenger cars became dark brown). By 1898, newspapers were referring to cars in their new number series as they entered service. A few (very few) reports even include an old number for the car (or locomotive). There is an OSL inventory for January 1900, but the car numbers are totally different from the earlier 1889-era numbers, which when OSL&UN was formed in 1889, had been assigned numbers within the series from UP's big 1885 systemwide renumbering. Unfortunately, the 1900 inventory does not include dates, so we have to depend on the 1926 equipment register. But the 1926 register could only be as good as existing records, and OSL's were massively incomplete because in September 1901, the OSL headquarters building in Salt Lake City was destroyed by a fire, taking all engineering and mechanical department records with it. Research continues...

November 7, 2011

Updated the listings for Chair Cars 5488-5507, adding build dates, retirement dates, and dispositions; the date information was extracted from UP's equipment record, and the Amtrak dispositions come from research by Jerry LaBoda and Mike Palmieri.

April 8, 2011

Updated the dispositions for UP 5008, UP 5547, and UP 5552, with all three being sold to Amtrak, then retired and sold in 1981-1982 to Providence & Worcester, and used as a diner (UP 5008) and as coaches (UP 5547 and 5552). All three cars are in the P&W's active excursion/business car fleet, and see service several times each year. (update from Joshua Moldover via email dated April 8, 2011)

March 4, 2011

Updated the dispositions of several UP and non-UP cars that were eventually sold to Mexico. (update from Randall Davidson via email dated February 8, 2011, based on information in Wayner's "The Cars That Went to Mexico")

August 12, 2010

Fixed a typographical error for Pacific Shore, and updated the disposition for Pacific Command, part of the group of 50 Budd lightweight sleepers. (Thanks to Joshua Coran for the update.)

June 13, 2010

Updated the information for the River Series lounge cars, numbered UP 6200-6208; added renumber and retirement dates from UP's equipment record. (based on information furnished by Jack Deasy of Dominion Rail Voyages via email dated June 3, 2010)

May 23, 2010

Rearranged and updated the information for the Budd-built "Pacific" series of 10-6 sleepers. (Thanks goes to Daniel Hodel for the update for Pacific Sands)

March 30, 2010

Added new UPP Index Page for the current Heritage Fleet, after realizing that the current fleet was too hard to find among all of the other roster listings.

December 23, 2009

Updated the dispositions for LA&SL (UP) business car 110, and UP dome 8009, adding their pending assignment to service for Kansas City Southern de Mexico.

October 24, 2009

Updated the notes for Pullman sleeper "American Navy", to include its sale to Spokane Fire and Rail Museum, Spokane, Washington (email from Robert Lawrence, dated October 23, 2009)

Added disposition for "American Lake", wrecked on November 12, 1951 at Wyuta, Utah and retired in December 1951. (UP mechanical department records)

August 22, 2009

Rearranged several pages for the Business car fleet, and the Heritage Fleet to focus the roster on car numbers instead of car names, to end the need to maintain two separate rosters.

Added new page to show cross reference from Business car and Heritage fleet car names to car numbers.

June 20, 2009

Fixed spelling error for UP Chair Car 5306, changing "City of Pineville" to "City of Prineville" (Sheldon Perry, email dated June 20, 2009)

October 8, 2008

Added new page about UP's Streamliner train sets, a listing of the Union Pacific Streamliner train sets, 1st Train through 10th Train, plus Train of Tomorrow and Aerotrain.

September 4, 2008

Added new page for UP's three classes of Express Boxcars.

May 11, 2008

Updated the information about the three water cars, UPP 809 and 814, and UP 907853, 907856, and 907857, used with UP's steam locomotives, and moved them to their own roster page.

April 10, 2008

Pullman Standard lightweight sleeper "Imperial Flower" converted to M of W Bunk Car, along with a modernized heavyweight diner that were assigned to the Salt Lake City wreck train, were moved to Ogden earlier last year to the scrapper. When last seen, they were spotted in Durbano's spur awaiting the torch upon resolution of the bill of sale. This equipment had sat unused for about five years and it was time for them to go. They still might be there as there were three baggage cars on that spur also, two from the same wreck train (now tool cars) and one that had already been there for a while. Car numbers are not available at this time. (Rich Castagna, email dated April 10, 2008)

September 24, 2007

Of the 18 passenger cars "preserved" by the Promontory Chapter, National Railway Historical Society, most were not operational beyond the occasional low-speed excursion on the Salt Lake Garfield & Western short line. The only one still remaining at Salt Lake City is the "Janice L" which is used as a clubhouse for the chapter.

There was a lot of passenger equipment stored on the SLG&W in the 1980s which has since disappeared and I'm honestly not sure what was owned by the chapter, and what was owned by SLG&W.

Following is an abbreviated list, as provided by "davew833" on Trainorders.com:

September 13, 2007

Added numerous updates and corrections from David Varilek of Empire Builder Private Cars of Fremont, Nebraska, for the following cars:

May 30, 2007

Rearranged UP passenger car rosters to breakout the non-UP cars that were painted yellow and gray. Previously, these were part and parcel of the UP listings.

September 9, 2006

Added 1950 UP Passenger Train Consists as part of a larger project of adding other train consists as they become available.

August 4, 2006

Work on UP Passenger Cars roster resumed after a major data source became available.

Added updates to Harriman car listings.

July 9, 2006

Work on the passenger car rosters is stalled, pending preparation of some important source material.

April 23, 2006

Lots of minor editing on UP's passenger cars, mostly to bring all groups into a common format. Work continues on building the linked main index listings for the numbered cars and the other large groups, including the Heritage fleet and the business cars.

I just retuned from my two week business trip to Cheyenne. Each evening, I spent tapping away on my laptop, doing lots and lots of cleanup on the UP passenger car roster. I took all the diagram books with me, as well as the images on DVD of pages from the UP equipment register. Also, I took along the two SP books, and was able to do some learning about the Harriman cars. I discovered a couple orders from the time before the UP-SP unmerger that Barger did not have in his summary. I also did some updates to the Harriman summary that was based on Barger's list from his clinic at Naperville in October [2005]. My list is getting farther and farther away from Barger's original list.

I learned that Ralph Barger does not want to help in my project. He says because he has put too much work into his projects to simply give them away, and I, too, should not be giving away all my hard work. But I have never seen my hobby as a potential revenue stream. The money has been nice, but I really don't see any potential market for an all-time UP steel and Streamliner passenger car roster. Dave Seidel's book is great as a basic listing, but he has not been able to delve into the subject as deeply as it really needs to be done. Cross-referencing the ORER data with the folio diagrams, with UP's own equipment register, with all the other sources so many guys have so graciously shared with me, has really allowed me to build a pretty comprehensive listing.

There is still a group of cars that UP itself cannot agree on, concerning who built them. In the diagram book, it says built by AC&F, but in the equipment reigister, they show built by Pullman. The groups are LA&SL 4450, 4451, and LA&SL 4550-4555, all built in 1921. But by whom? Barger has them as both, which screws up his totals.

Also, I discovered the group of 12 arch roof Chair cars (UP 1237-1248) that were remodeled in 1955 as Streamlined Baggage cars (UP 3086-3097). Boy, talk about a rebuild, from all-windows to no-windows. I first noticed this group in Seidel's book, but was a bit leary of it. But the rebuild is supported by both the diagram sheet for the 3000 series cars, and by the equipment register sheets for both the 1200 series and the 3000 series cars.

After perusing the two SP books, I will start using the "Arch Roof" term for what almost everybody is calling "Harriman" cars. So, the two types of heavyweight cars are Arch Roof Heavyweight and Standard Heavyweight, or maybe Clerestory Roof Heavyweight. But, what holds me back is that HHW for Harriman Heavyweight is very descriptive, and the "Harriman" term is so well known and well used. Maybe a simple explanation in my glossary as to what HHW means, and that, yes, I know that not all arch roof cars are true Harriman cars, meaning cars ordered and delivered under the Harriman-era Associated Lines Common Standard designs. I need to keep in mind that, as much as the correct "Arch Roof" term applies, the "Harriman" term is what is well known and well used. It may be one of those trivia things, like Promontory Point versus the more correct Promontory Summit.

I decided to change my "Date Retired" to "Date Vacated" to match UP's own wording. On some cars, they show a vacated date, with a renumber to a new number, but over in the resulting car's page, they use a slightly later date for the actual renumbering, "converted from". They did the same thing on the F3s that EMD rebuilt to F9s: UP retired "vacated" the F3, then about 3-4 months later, on the new sheet for the new F9 units, they "converted from" the F3 to the F9.

I need to dig into the microfilm again for the numbers (and former numbers) of MofW flat cars that were rebuilt from retired 3000 series HHW baggage cars in 1968-1969.

While in Cheyenne, I visted Steve Lee and got the numbers of the retired baggage cars he has set (or will be setting) on the ground to serve as warehouses, including two for UPHS. So far, there are eight of them, with another five or so yet to be done. I took photos of all the UPP cars I could see, and all the other passenger cars in the vicinity - mostly as a record of the car number and the body style, since none of the photos are really publishing quality.

Still lots and lots of work to do yet, but I'm slowly making progress.

March 1, 2006

For the past three weeks, work has been progressing to add a complete roster of Union Pacific Steel and Streamliner Passenger Cars. This remains a work in progress, with lots of work still to be done. But at least the basics are there...

July 14, 2005

Work is progressing on building an on-line version of an all-time roster of Union Pacific’s steel and Streamliner passenger cars, from the Harriman-style cars beginning in 1909, through to the newest lightweight cars of the 1960s, along with UP’s current Heritage fleet.

November 25, 2004

Still working on Union Pacific passenger cars. Like any project, this one is turning out to be bigger than I initially thought.

September 24, 2004

My time for the past three weeks, and likely for at least the next month or so, is being taken by work on a roster of UP’s steel passenger cars, including the heavyweights, the Harriman cars, the train set cars of 1934-1937, and all the lightweight cars after that. If anyone can help, contact me (in the menu at top).

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