There have been several posts here recently about models of churches on our layouts. This made a connection in my mind with the Atlantic Coast Line providing a siding and two coaches to a local (Charleston, S.C.) congregation whose church building had burned to the ground. If I remember correctly this arrangement lasted more than a year. Does anyone out there have record or recollection of a similiar situation occuring in their area? It does sound like a good reason to have some coaches on an otherwise all-freight layout.
What about chapel cars? A couple of those still exist these days. Any from the ACL/SAL families? Boxcab E50
Boxcab E50 - I don't recall any chapel cars from either ACL or SAL. As far as I can recall those were denizens of the upper midwest and west of the Mississippi. However, I do seem to recall reading about a "church train" in either North Carolina or Florida - can't recall which. However, it would be well to remember that NC west of Charlotte and almost all of Florida were considered wild and isolated before the invention of air conditioning and yuppies.
I couldn't resist posting this quip made by an uncle of a friend of mine, Florida born and raised, who relayed this to me in an e-mail some time back. I guess that the old guy looked at his home state as being lost to the seasonal and then permanant migration from the North when he said that " it were air-conditioning, DDT, and screened wire that "ruint" Floridy". Each, in its own way made life easier for northerners to live there, heat and mosquito-free (as well as getting rid of other bugs). Bruce Gibbins
Having quite a few Florida "Cracker" relatives, that is not an isolated sentiment. But the "Crackers" are still there although now invisible living in the swamps in the "fly-over" territory twixt Punta Gorda and Boca Raton.
