Illinois Central’s Green Diamond, 1947-1968

 

Fred Klein, 2013, 2016

The Green Diamond was Illinois Central’s primary train from Chicago to Saint Louis. Saint Louis was not on IC’s mainline to New Orleans, but the Greed Diamond made one round-trip each day between these major cities. The original green diamond train was a unique, articulated streamliner in special green paint, also known as the “tobacco worm”. This articulated trainset was made by Pullman Standard and started service as the first Green Diamond train in 1936. The 1936 train is like a green Midwestern version of Union Pacific’s articulated and bulb-nosed M10000 train. The conventional streamlined trains with a separate locomotive and cars started on this route after the war in 1947.

 

The Green Diamond modeled here is based on what was in service in the early 1960’s. The Green Diamond train is a smaller version of the late 1940s version of the coach service City of New Orleans (see web page). This 1960s train has an E8 locomotive and wheel-less trailers on flat cars for carrying mail and express cars that were more typical in the 1960s.

 

Pullman Standard completed the coach cars for the train in 1947 after the war. The remainder of the Green Diamond cars (baggage-express, diner and parlor) were rebuilt by IC in their own shops from heavyweight cars, also in 1947. The cars were rebuilt with smooth sides and looked very similar to the lightweight cars, but had slightly higher roofs (the clerestories were covered), should have been shorter (80’ vs. the 85’ typical of lightweight cars), and had 6-wheel heavyweight trucks.

 

The prototype consist is from Wayner’s Passenger train consists 1923-1973, page 81, of the train as it arrived in Saint Louis on October 4, 1963.

 

 

 

The coaches of the Green Diamond are easy to model in N scale because the Con-cor “generic” coach in IC orange and brown colors is close to the prototype and easy to obtain. Pullman Standard built coaches for both IC (56 seat) and Great Northern (60 seat, on which the Con-cor model is based) in 1947. The Con-cor model has an extra small window at each end for the ladies and men’s lounges, compared to the IC coach. The Intermountain diner is a similar design from the same era but the windows do not match exactly. Specialty cars like the parlor car have not been made in N scale and I substitute a coach. Life-like has made the E6, E7 and E8 diesels in IC colors. One can then make a prototypical mix of E units for any time during the 40s, 50s and 60s. I use a concor trailer-on-flatcar (with the wheels and supports removed) as a flexivan substitute. Flexivans, which are not made in N-scale, have a side door for convenient unloading. It is unlikely that IC ever used a rear-door trailer in passenger service.

 

The Green Diamond in Chicago in September 1960. An old E6A and E8B power a baggage car and RPO ahead of the coaches. There are no flexivans on flat cars on this train.

 

This view of The Land O’Corn in May 1967 shows an IC train making heavy use of Flexivans for mail storage and express.

 

Power and mail storage cars

 

Two E diesels (the E8 introduced in 1953 and E7 introduced in 1946) are appropriate and prototypical for this era train. These are factory-painted Life-like models. Mail storage cars and express cars were typical for the Green Diamond. The model train above has a 72’ Pullman Standard baggage car made by Walthers.

 

Mail storage cars and RPO

 

­

Illinois Central trains needing extra mail storage space used flexivans on flat cars. Flexivans had a single side door like a box car for loading mail. In place of model flexivans, I use concor trailers with the wheels removed on concor-made flat cars. The railway post office car with its 60’ RPO compartment and 25’ mail storage section is typical for the Green Diamond, which relied heavily on the post office for income. The RPO car is a Centralia Car Shops-Intermountain model.

 

 

Coaches, diner and parlor cars

 

The two 85’ coaches are Concor models, which are similar to the IC prototype but have a couple of extra small windows for the lavatories. The coaches are 1947 56-seat coaches, similar to the prototype for the concor models. The prototype diner car was a heavyweight rebuild done by the IC in its own shops. The model is an “eastern diner” from Centralia Car Shops, which I use as a beautiful substitute car. The parlor car after the diner was rebuilt from a heavyweight car by the IC shops in 1947, and was not ordered new from PS like the coaches. I use a concor model for the parlor car, and for the final coach.

 

   

 

References

Heimburger, Donald, Illinois Central: Mainline of Mid-America, Heimburger House Publishing, 1995.

Kinkaid, James, IC/GM&O Color Guide to Freight and Passenger Equipment, Morning Sun Books. [I do not own this book, but it has numerous good color photos of passenger cars].

Lind, Alan, Limiteds along the lakefront: The Illinois Central in Chicago, Transposrt History Press, 1986.

Randall, David, From Zephyr to Amtrak, Prototype Publications, 1972.

Schafer, Mike, and Joe Welsh, Classic American Streamliners, Motorbooks International, 1997.

Somers, Paul, Illinois Central streamliners, TLC Publishing, 1995.

Stagner, Lloyd, Illinois Central in Color, Morning Sun Books, 1996.

 

BACK TO THE PAGE OF PASSENGER TRAINS