When MT released its 70' 2-door baggage car in B&O "blue and gray" paint scheme, some of us were dismayed at how the lettering for "Baltimore and Ohio" was placed on the car. It was started between the two doors, spanning one and run to one end of the car, instead of being centered on the car, between the two doors. The only prototype picture that looked remotely like that was for a 3-door car with the lettering spanning the middle door, but still contained between the end doors. Nevertheless, posters seeming to speak for MTL challenged us to show them a picture of a 2-door baggage car in the B&O "blue and gray" paint scheme that had the lettering "Baltimore and Ohio" contained between the two doors instead of spanning one. That is not so easy, for several reasons, including that most photos from the period are in black and white and not making baggage cars their intended subject. However, I have now found two photos that meet the challenge. They are in "Baltimore & Ohio Passenger Service, 1945-1971 - Volume 1, the Route of The National Limited." Specifically, they are middle photo on page 92 and the bottom photo on page 102. These photos are respectively credited to William H. McKenzie and F. R. Kern, Jay Potter Collection. So, with that challenge now met, how about a second release of the 2-door MTL baggage car in B&O "blue and gray" paint with the lettering for "Baltimore and Ohio" between the doors and a different number than the 490 on the first release? Since these were the cars that kept passenger service going financially for the decade following WW-II, they are important elements of a model railroad. I would like to have a train of them. During that decade, the B&O ran big mail/express trains with as many as 40 cars, many of them 2-door baggage cars, assigning locomotives as light as 4-6-2 Pacifics, more typically 4-8-2 Mountains, and occassionally even the powerful 2-8-8-4 EM-1s when the trains were particularly long and heavy. Sometime there was just a rider coach on the end, and sometimes there were coaches, a lounge car, and even some through sleeper cars, but it was the baggage and express cars that created the revenue that kept those trains going.
I contained MTL via Joe D'Amato about the first car and they used a photo of a car with the lettering placed as it was on the first B&O baggage car release. His reply in part: "We went with this scheme http://www.railpixs.com/chessie/B&O%20baggage%20car%20Kent%20Ohio_Dec%2080.jpg given the door spacing better suited for our proto. " I told him, my point of reference is Craig T. Bossler's book B&O Color Guide to Freight and Passenger Equipment. He includes a photo of B&O 662; it shows the Baltimore and Ohio lettering between the two doors. It has been my understanding since I had that exchange with Joe that MTL does plan to produce another B&O baggage car with lettering in the location most of us anticipated it would appear. Before the baggage car was released in November 2015, I used the B'mann 7627 and set up an express train with it pulling several of my MTL cars; I created a YouTube video.
Photo on page 76 in "Trackside Along the B&O 1957-1957 with Edward P. Griffith" by Walter A. Appel also shows a baggage car with the full name contained between the two doors.
This Youtube video appears to show B&O baggage cars with the full name contained between the two doors.
