Long Island Rail Road
Heavyweight Parlor Cars
"The Blue Ribbon Fleet"

"The Route of the Weekend Chief."

A New York tradition. All seats reserved. Premium fare. Premium service. An exclusive club on wheels. The most relaxing and enjoyable way to travel between New York City and the east end of Long Island. The biggest heavyiest rolling bar in the Empire State on any Friday afternoon in the summertime.

The Cannonball, The Advance Cannonball, The East Ender, The Weekender, The Advance Weekender, The Beachcomber, The Ebb Tide, The Sundowner, The Twilighter, The Wall Street Special, and The Shelter Island Express.

In 1957, Walter F. McNamara came to the LIRR to expand the railroad's traditional parlor car service. Between 1958 and 1964, LIRR acquired 37 heavweight cars for this service. As the decade of the 1960s draw to a close, almost all of this heavyweight fleet has come to the end of its economic service life. Almost all of the heavyweight parlor cars are retired after the 1968 summer season. LIRR upgrades this venerable institution (parlor car service) with lightweight equipment - primarily sleeping cars - acquired from other railroads downsizing their fleet of long distance trains.

LIRR Parlor Car East brochure for 1967.
Courtesy of R. F. Makse

ROSTER

Although it was not a revenue car, the crew dormitory at Montauk Yard is worthy of inclusion here. LIRR bought heavyweight sleeper CENTHILL from PRR (built by Pullman in 1928, lot 6205, plan 3979A with 8 sections, 1 drawing room and 2 compartments; sold to PRR and leased back to Pullman 12/31/1948; withdrawn from lease 3/13/1956), assigned it number W37 and spotted it on track 4 at Montauk.  The sleeper was used by parlor and bar attendants who laid over between runs at Montauk.  It was placed behind a bumper block to keep it from being accidently coupled into the consist of an outbound train. It was eventually renumbered W3.  It was painted into MTA colors and finally scrapped in 1975.

The primary reference sources for this roster table are:

(1) "The Pullman Project" database by Thomas C. Madden. An authoritative online reference on Pullman cars derived from countless hours of research into Pullman Company records now in the collection of the Newberry Library in Chicago IL..

(2) "The Route of the Weekend Chief", by Mike Boland, published in the Autumn 1995 issue of The Keystone (journal of the Pennsylvania Railroad Technical & Historical Society). Copy provided by Ed Frye.

(3) "Steel Cars of the Sunrise Trail", a roster compiled by E. M. Koehler, Jr. sometime in the 1970s. Copy provided by Tim Darnell.

(4) An article on the Long Island Rail Road's roster, written by Sy Reich, printed in the April 1963 issue of Railroad magazine.

(5) For 2038 SETAUKET, later W-99 and (2nd) 99 (2nd) JAMAICA: Nevada Northern Railway passenger equipment roster at the Nevada Northern and railroads of White Pine County website created/maintained by Keith Albrandt.

(6) "Parlor Car East" by H. Stafford Bryant Jr., published in May 1968 issue of Trains. The article contains a roster. Copy provided by Ed Frye.

(7) Lehigh Valley Railroad Modeler website, edited by the late Ed Schaller, now hosted by the Antracite Railroads Historical Society, Inc. This website includes a roster of LV passenger equipment that provided information on LV 1000, which later became LIRR 2037 TUSCARORA CLUB.

Updated on 9/29/2014