Yes, it’s hokey but I’m building one anyway.
Here’s the story: in the ’30s California pumpkin and apple grower associations decided to team up to promote their products for Halloween in a new way. They decided to make up a train that would travel from town to town in their biggest market, southern California, for a few weeks in October. In each town, a grocery store would publicize the event and would have Halloween items to sell alongside the train when it arrived.
We don’t know for sure, but there’s a good chance that fellow who put it all together was a young man named P.J. Bresee. He talked the Pacific Fruit Express into loaning a ventilated reefer since the pumpkin growers were a good customer. He arranged to have a temporary sign attached that spelled out “Pumpkin Fun Express” while keeping the PFE reporting marks. He also had a couple of huge low-profile pumpkin shapes built of paper maché and nailed to the sides as attention getters. These changes could be easily removed without damaging the car when it was returned to the PFE.
The apple growers have a tanker decorated with a banner promoting apple cider.
When word of the promotion got around, a candy company offered to loan a billboard car with their name on it. This was about the time that the ICC declared that advertising on railroad cars had to end so this was probably the last time it would be seen before it got repainted.
P.J. talked the Santa Fe into providing a loco and crew as a goodwill gesture for both the shippers and the public who would see the train. The engine will have a large scary mask tied on the front of the smokebox. Getting into the spirit of things, the railroad also provided a condemned 1890s parlor observation car that was on its way to the scrappers because of its wood body. The derelict condition of the car was not a problem as it would be a haunted house on wheels to entertain those brave enough to enter it at the promotional stops. High school students along the way would be hired to wear costumes and man the car.
There might be a flat car, too, carrying California’s heaviest pumpkin award winner from the state fair and decorated with jack-o-lanterns, ghosts, goblins and some washtubs for kids to bob for apples.
See the train on the ’20s & ’30s layout at the Los Angeles Division/NMRA Fall Meet in Rancho Palos Verdes on October 25 and 26, 2008. For details about the show, download a flyer at http://www.ladiv-nmra.org/trainshow.pdf
Charley
2 Comments
October 14, 2008 at 6:23 am
[...] Getting into the spirit of things, the railroad also provided a condemned 1890s parlor observation car that was on its way to the scrappers because of its wood body. The derelict condition of the car was not a problem as it would be a …[Continue Reading] [...]
November 1, 2009 at 8:55 pm
Hello there, HAPPY HALOWEEN! A little late..!