418 to Long Beach
Jack Finn Collection
This vintage view depicts Pacific Electric interurban no. 418 and three PE conductors / motormen posed for a photograph somewhere on the Southern Division. The trailing destination board reads “Long Beach.”
Jack Finn Collection
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I could not find this elegant PE equipment in ‘Special 36’. It’s numbered 418, but could it have been re-numbered as an 800-series interurban later during it’s service life? However, I did see a chart on the 800-series cars in ‘Special 36’ that I couldn’t quite understand. From what I gather, 418 started out as 367 around the turn of the century, then became 418 in 1907. Then 844 in 1911. And scrapped as 1499 in 1940. This is what I concluded from looking at the chart.
418 in the crisp, black & white photo, above, looks beautiful and elegant. I like the stripes on the dash and side of the car.
I don’t believe there are any 800-series interurban cars (or similar cars) that survived the scrapper’s torch. I hope I’m wrong, but it’s unlikely that there are any survivors.
The only 800 that survived more or less intact succumbed to a disastrous fire while it was stored at Orange Empire back in the 1990s. It had been converted to Box Motor 1498 and was displayed for many years in Travel Town on the north side of Griffith Park in LA. The body of an 800 trailer (probably in the low 900s) became part of a restaurant in Hollywood, called the Formosa Cafe. It’s still in business, and was a movie location for “LA Confidential”.
The Formosa Cafe is the body of PE 913
Thanks, Ralph–I knew somebody would have the actual number. I checked and found that 913 was a motorized car with GE 222-C motors; the GE-equipped cars were a small sub-class. 418 became 844, and was one of five 800s converted to box motors in 1940, becoming 1499 and being scrapped in 1951, so I might have seen it going by my house as the westbound Glendora express run.
Ok, got it. 1499 was scrapped in 1951, not 1940 as I originally concluded. Now I know I misread the chart on 800-class cars in ‘Special 36’.