Re: RGS Passenger service

RGS story 12 page 130, has an excerpt from a letter to F.C. Krause from Forest White date April 10, 1936.

"B-21 has been painted and garnished. We will not have to purchase any mineral red or black paint for cabooses, the only paint that will have to be purchased will be for coaches, the balance will all be red."

Sounds to me that they have all the red they need, but not what is used on coaches. Does not say what color they need but I would venture it is green. This is 1936 well into the goose era, so it would seem they kept some coaches in reserve. Not all of them being pressed into work service as soon as geese came along. Now at this time motor 7 was likely being built, after it entered service they may have felt that they had enough motors to cover all passenger service and then started to retire coaches to work service. Yes I know by this time several coaches had already been put into work service.

Additionally there is a photo on page 258 of coach 252 not 0252, dated August 15, 1939. The car appears unaltered and still a coach. You can see into the windows and see the windows on the other side. Of course I cant tell the color but I would bet it is green.

As Bill said RICO was found to have a layer of green paint, found by sanding through the paint.
I know B-20(EDNA) was green, I have seen a color photo taken before the Rocky club painted it.

D&RGW coaches 306, and 320 were used on several of the RGS excursions. So was 311 once and a baggage car. Having seen every video(DVD or tape) of RGS excursions and looked at many photos of the same I can say that the EDNA appears to have been the only RGS passenger car used on those excursions.

Jeff Taylor
CRRM curator of equipment and rolling stock.