4977 At Morrisville
Penn Central E40 electric #4977 poses in the yard at Morrisville, PA, January 23, 1976. Conrail is less than four months away from taking over the Penn Central's rail operations and thus inheriting this and it's unwanted brothers which originally came from the New Haven Railroad upon the NH's absorption into PC. The E40's were originally classed EP5s by the New Haven when they arrived in 1955 from GE. They were intended for high speed passenger operation between New York City and New Haven, CT. Teething problems from the outset were solved within a year of arrival from GE-mainly the large screened filters on the carbody sides which helped in cooling the electric motors along with the automatic blowers. What caused their downfall was the McGinnis/Alpert regime's greatly reduced maintenance on these and almost all other locomotives the NH had. The damage had been done and unfortunately they fared no better under Penn Central ownership. By the early '70s all were out of service and one even scrapped but someone at PC felt the road should rebuild three of them for freight service and so the 4977 became one of the lucky three to survive into Conrail ownership. Sadly the three never turned a revenue wheel for Conrail as that road had a lot more on it's plate to deal with than three oddball electrics of questionable reliability. The final three E40s were scrapped in 1979. This is an Ektachrome 6x6 color transparency originally marketed as a Super Slide. The film frame was mounted in a cardboard mount which allowed for projection with the proper slide carrier mounted to a projector. Unfortunately this also allowed for the image to be scratched badly.
John Stroup original.
4977 At Morrisville
Penn Central E40 electric #4977 poses in the yard at Morrisville, PA, January 23, 1976. Conrail is less than four months away from taking over the Penn Central's rail operations and thus inheriting this and it's unwanted brothers which originally came from the New Haven Railroad upon the NH's absorption into PC. The E40's were originally classed EP5s by the New Haven when they arrived in 1955 from GE. They were intended for high speed passenger operation between New York City and New Haven, CT. Teething problems from the outset were solved within a year of arrival from GE-mainly the large screened filters on the carbody sides which helped in cooling the electric motors along with the automatic blowers. What caused their downfall was the McGinnis/Alpert regime's greatly reduced maintenance on these and almost all other locomotives the NH had. The damage had been done and unfortunately they fared no better under Penn Central ownership. By the early '70s all were out of service and one even scrapped but someone at PC felt the road should rebuild three of them for freight service and so the 4977 became one of the lucky three to survive into Conrail ownership. Sadly the three never turned a revenue wheel for Conrail as that road had a lot more on it's plate to deal with than three oddball electrics of questionable reliability. The final three E40s were scrapped in 1979. This is an Ektachrome 6x6 color transparency originally marketed as a Super Slide. The film frame was mounted in a cardboard mount which allowed for projection with the proper slide carrier mounted to a projector. Unfortunately this also allowed for the image to be scratched badly.
John Stroup original.