About those unpainted wooden running boards . . .

[Jim Courtney]

Are we sure that house car wooden running boards were never painted, because of safety regulations??

[CM Auditor]

Folks,
Looking the Colorado Midland specs for box cars in both 1886 and 1890, the specification for running boards was the color of car mixed with 6 oz of find sand per gallon of paint used.

[Jim Courtney]

Makes one wonder whether the same sand/grit in paint treatment was used on metal Murphy roofs when the cars were new, like the C&S boxcars of 1908-1910.  

Conventional wisdom has it that C&S boxcar roofs were never painted, to avoid slippery wet surfaces, but perhaps that's just from observations of cars in the 1930s, when maintenance was deferred.

[Jeff Young]

While not C&S, that last picture appears to show a bunch of red reefers.  (At least judging by the doors; there are no ice hatches on top.)

(Great pictures, by the way.)

Cheers,
Jeff.

[Chris Walker]

Insulated Plug-door Boxcars were a class of Bunkerless Refrigerator Cars for perishible traffic not requiring refrigeration.

[Keith Hayes]

How peaky!