1051 – San Francisco Municipal Railway (1960s)
All of San Francisco’s vintage streetcars have interesting histories, but No. 1051 has been adding to its legacy in recent years.
All of San Francisco’s vintage streetcars have interesting histories, but No. 1051 has been adding to its legacy in recent years.
This streetcar is painted to commemorate Los Angeles Railway (LARy). Los Angeles ran PCC streetcars from 1937 to 1963. San Diego got California’s first PCCs, beating LARy by a few weeks, but LARy got bragging rights when Shirley Temple, then America’s biggest child star, unveiled its first PCCs on March 23, 1937. Here’s a link to rare newsreel film of that event.
This streetcar is painted to honor Brooklyn, which ran PCC streetcars from 1936 to 1956. Trolleys (as they were called there) were once such a part of the Brooklyn scene that the local baseball club was named the ‘Trolley Dodgers’, later shortened to, well…you know.
The ‘City of Brotherly Love’ first ran PCC streetcars in 1938 (Muni No. 1060 wears the original silver paint scheme).
This car is painted in tribute to Kansas City, which ran PCC streetcars from 1941 to 1957. Kansas City’s PCCs – 184 in all – were painted to emphasize their modern lines, with a black ‘swoosh’ on the sides to highlight the logo of Kansas City Public Service Company (KCPS), which featured Frederic Remington’s famed sculpture “The Scout” on a red heart.
This streetcar is painted to honor Cincinnati, which ran PCC streetcars from 1939 to 1951. Cincinnati was unique among North American streetcar systems in requiring two overhead wires for streetcars, one to supply electrical power, the other to provide a ground and complete the circuit. This arrangement grew from an early and (pardon the pun) groundless fear of electrocution from the standard streetcar practice of returning current through the tracks. (Trolley buses use two wires because they run on rubber tires, and have no metal tracks to use as ground.)
This streetcar is painted to honor Chicago, which ran PCC streetcars from 1936 to 1958. Chicago had the largest PCC fleet ever purchased new by one city–683 cars.
No U.S. city has had longer or more varied experience with PCC streetcars than Boston. From the delivery of its first streamliner in 1937 until the present day, PCCs have been a part of the Beantown scene. That single PCC was ordered by private operator Boston Elevated Railway Company (BERy) and was followed by 20 more in 1941. No. 1059 is painted in tribute to the BERy era of PCC operation in Boston.
This streetcar is an actual Philadelphia streetcar painted in that city’s original PCC livery, dating from 1938. Although Philadelphia Rapid Transit Co. (PRT) was the largest streetcar operator that was not a member of the coalition that designed the famous PCC streetcar, it was still an early buyer.
PCC streetcar interior. David Dugan photo.