Interesting show on History Channel

[slimster99]

I just caught " Cities Of The Underworld: 08 - New York" on the History Channel.  They had a lot of coverage of railroad related  locations under NYC.  Grand Central's power station [and it's importance to WW2], a secret RR station under the Waldorf Astoria built for FDR, an armored railroad car supposedly used by FDR [still hidden in the underground station] and the new addition to Grand Central for the LIRR to access it.

Pretty interesting stuff.

John

[3rdrail]

Yes, I've seen that, and it is just so much bullfeathers! The spur to the Waldorf Astoria was not built for FDR, but for any patron of the hotel that had a private car. It antedated Roosevelt's presidency.  The Magellan, FDR's armored private railroad car, then owned by the US government, is now at the Gold Coast Railroad Museum in Miami, not under the hotel. The power center under GCT worked the underrunning third rail from there to Harmon, NY on the NYC and Mott Haven in the Bronx borough of New York City on the New Haven. The Power Director at Penn Station, OTOH, was connected to catenary to Washington, and Harrisburg, PA, on the PRR, and New Haven, CT, on the New Haven, plus the Long Island's overrunning third rail.

That's why I refer to it as the "Histerical" Channel! :

[Chris333]

http://www.columbia.edu/~brennan/abandoned/gct61.html

[up1950s]

Speaking of

[Robbman]

Message deleted

[ljudice]

Hysterical indeed!!!

Oddly this whole nonsense was debunked about a year ago when the Fox NYC station ran a similar, breathless strory about finding this amazing FDR branchline and abandonned car.

The car, BTW is just a tool car and those mystery reporting marks are the pre-1980 MNCR Maintenance of Way reporting marks which conflicted with Minnesota Corn Processors and were later changed.

Lou

[Chris333]

And the siding was there before the Hotel was to serve the power plant  :

[slimster99]

The fact that the reporting marks on the car were MNCX and said MW under it was pretty blatant that it was a work car.  And one of the 2 guys narrating supposedly works for MetroNorth.  And the car didn't look like anything other than a normal baggage car, but they said it is "heavily armored" and has trucks designed for a heavy load and they looked normal.

[3rdrail]

That's why I refer to it as the "Histerical" Channel! :

At least they can spell

Guess some folks lack a sense of humor...if you combine history with hysterics, you get "histerical".  :

[wm3798]

Don't fret, Gregg... I got the gag.  But then, I was an English major... well, for a year anyway...

Lee

[Nato]

  This Thursday June 28th on the History Channel either on Satellite Dish Network or Cable  a program on Railroad Graveyards, old yards full of abandoned stuff and the reuse of some of these cars and other artifacts off the tracks. If I recall correctly the time is 9 Eastern. Nate Goodman (Nato).Salt Lake, Utah.

[Mark5]

  This Thursday June 28th on the History Channel either on Satellite Dish Network or Cable  a program on Railroad Graveyards, old yards full of abandoned stuff and the reuse of some of these cars and other artifacts off the tracks. If I recall correctly the time is 9 Eastern. Nate Goodman (Nato).Salt Lake, Utah.

thanks - I was gonna post that.  ;D

[up1950s]

Just a bump , 'cause tonites the nite .

[3rdrail]

Just watched it. Fairly interesting. But, my word, where do they get some of the "facts"? Did you know, for example, that Diesel-electric locomotives were invented in 1949?  The Rarus Railway was shown and it was mentioned that it converted from steam to Diesel in the 1950's. WRONG!!  The Rarus is the old Butte, Anaconda & Pacific, which converted from steam to electric prior to World War I and took down the wires in the late 1960's.

There was a fair sized segment on the Beech Grove Shops, used by Amtrak, but no mention was made of the builder, the New York Central. The show made it sound like Amtrak was around in 1903...

Some good stuff, though, especially the last part about Colorado Railcar.

[bobcat]

Did anyone notice at the test site in Peublo, 2 of the lead locomotives looked like the WP bicentennial set of GP40s? Could that be?