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This
site is for the distribution and collecting of information about the Pullman
Shops in Richmond, California. The focus will be on a behind the scenes look at
the operation of The Pullman Company. The traveling public took for granted the
amount of work required to keep Pullman's sleeping cars up to rigid standards
of comfort and operation.
The
Pullman Company was a major factor in the transportation of the United States,
and for 50 years dominated like no other industry ever has. Thousands of
Pullman's sleeping cars crisscrossed the country every night moving tens of
thousand of people hundreds of thousands of miles.
Newspaper
Headlines announced whenever the name trains were re-equipped with the newest
and finest cars designed by Loewy, Dreyfuss or Kuhler. After all the fanfare
had died, it was up to the Pullman repair shops to keep the cars up to the
rigid standards Pullman had set and the public expected for the rest of a cars
life expectancy which could and did exceed 40 years for some cars. Every couple
of years the cars were brought into the shops, overhauled and sent back out on
the road good as new. Up until the late 1930's this also included a coat of
standard Pullman Green paint. But the coming of the Streamliners and the
diesels that pulled them brought with them a rainbow of colors the cars could
be painted as customization replaced standardization.
Pullman
operated six repair facilities throughout the U.S, and each supported the
railroads in the area they served. Calumet Illinois handled cars throughout the
midwest, St. Louis Missouri the railroads operating through that gateway.
Buffalo New York handled New York Central and Northeastern railroads.
Wilmington Delaware had responsibility for the Pennsylvania Railroad and
railroads in the New York City-Philadelphia-Washington area. Atlanta Georgia
handled the southern railroads and Richmond California the western railroads in
the San Francisco Zone. |
