"History" of These Maintenance Cars

In the early 1930's a small obscure railroad purchased 100 new 40 foot boxcars. They were painted gray with black dimensional data and road numbers. The railroad was going to paint their logo and slogan in it's own shops. However, the company went backrupt before this could be accomplished.

Aztec Manufacturing Co., builders of track maintenance equipment, purchased these cars at a great savings. They quickly turned them into rail enhancement cars. The road name and number, along with the dimi data on the left hand side of the door, were painted over with a brush because Aztec's shops were not completed at the time.

The high mountain desert sun of Nevada had already started to fade the prisitne gray boxcars. New dimi data and large M.W. were repainted in this area. A space between two horizontal lines below the M.E. was left blank for the new owner to stencil thier road number.

Over the years some of these cars have changed hands, but most are still in service today.

Photo by Jon Fox