GM&O 58150, was captured in Baldwin, Florida, on January 12, 1969 by Matt Ferguson, courtesy of RRPA.
Paper and forest products within the southeastern United States became a profitable source of revenue traffic for railroads large and small during the 1960s. I recently began researching boxcars dedicated to the paper and forest products traffic as these were frequently found throughout Florida servicing major warehouses and packaging suppliers such as Union Camp, Rayonier, International Paper and others.
Rayonier paper plant, Fernandina, Florida, as it appears in 1947. Photo courtesy of the Florida Memory Project
Kraft paper traffic increased throughout the southeast, and was one of the reasons why railroads began ordering specialized equipment. Seaboard Air Line ordered 60' Thrall boxcars, and many Pullman-Standard PS-1 boxcars dubbed "Green Hornets, while Atlantic Coast Line Railroad also dedicated hundreds of black and yellow cushioned PS-1 boxcars to this same commodity. In 1967, successor Seaboard Coast Line inherited a modern fleet dedicated to paper traffic and it continued throughout the late 1960s with numerous orders of Waffleside boxcars.
Other major railroads such as GM&O, IC, SLSF, L&N, and Southern Railway also ordered thousands of specialized boxcars to service the many plants and industries which used these commodities. A brief departure from all things SCL, lead me to order a 3D Central / Bridge Line Design Illinois Central PS-1 combination door PS-1 boxcar. The decals for the project were sourced from Dan Kohlberg's excellent wares at http://www.icgdecals.com/ and that is where this project began.
While reviewing the numerous HO scale decal sets, a series of remembrances and past kits in hand lead me to order yet more decals than I needed, but also lead to several weeks of interesting research. The GM&O decal sets were ordered and Dan's recommendation of using the prototypically accurate Kadee PS-1 kits lead to yet more purchases of trucks, doors, decals, brake wheels, and the IC/GM&O color guide.
The result is this document which is meant to assist other modelers out there with an interest in paper movements. The detailing guide provides current kit numbers, product numbers, ICG decal sets, etc. The roster information was developed through a review of various sources and while not fully inclusive of every nut and bolt, it will give others insight into accurately modeling the 3,752 Pullman-Standard built PS-1 boxcars for GM&O.
Pullman-Standard 56700, Pullman-Standard Photograph, Jim Kinkaid collection
The research and interest in this project will yield several scale models, and hopefully increase interest in many other cars being released by Bridge Line Design (https://3dcentraltrains.com/).
