would be correct also! However, did you know that many of your children or grandchildren may well see these old cars every time they are in the school yard.
For many railroads to help with their taxes, they opted to donate a car in many towns and city schools around the country. Not only did the railroad find an inventive way of disposing these old cars, but our local schools benefited with receiving a free storage room. While a good share of these cars ended up
at High Schools and Junior High Schools, some made their way to the Elementary Schools and local town parks as well.
The schools usage of many of these cars range from
storage of school supplies and desks, to track and field equipment.
Safety is always a concern for school officials in protecting students from injury, so almost all cars had the roof walks, grab irons and ladders removed. This prevented curious students from climbing on the cars and hurting themselves.
Here's a partial list of just some of the cars in the Treasure
Valley:
1. Double door auto box car located at Middleton Junior High in Middleton, ID
2. Emmett Junior High sports a fightinghuskies on a 50' plug door boxcar in Emmett, ID
3. Vale High School has another 50' plug door boxcar in Vale, OR
4. Meridian Junior High is fortunate enough to have two cars for storage in Meridian, ID
5. Lowell Scott Junior High has an attractive converted grain car in Boise, ID
6. Ontario's Junior High "Fighting Tiger Cubs" PS-1 Boxcar in Ontario, OR
7. Borah's Lions 40' PS-1 box car is used for track and field equipment in Boise, ID
These are just a small sampling of what
type of cars are located in our schools. If you
know more about any other cars in the Treasure
Valley not listed, please add it to the list!
Not exactly in the Treasure Valley, but this car was photographedby your editor in Cascade back in 1980.
colors. Many schools will use the school colors for painting their cars. Lettering of the schools name or logo is then stenciled or painted on. Usually the schools art department will paint the schools team mascot to finish the car. Graphics is usually painted on one side of the car, which faces the school yard. The other side is kept plain looking.
These would be a simple model to make for almost any layout. You would only need to remove the trucks, handrails, grab irons roof walks and coupler. Then you just paint the model to your liking, along with any graphics. It's not a prerequisite that you have a school on your layout in order to build one of these cars. By just setting one of these cars at the edge or the back of the layout will give the illusion that you have a school in your town.
By Tom Waters
At the last Mini-Meet I tried to make this point and I’m not sure I came across as well as I wanted. So here is another try.
Over the past number of months, a year or so, maybe more, there has been a lot of visiting between various homes. Some of these visits have consisted of little more than conversation.
Also trucks, couplers and brake parts were removed, leaving behind such items as the coupler pocket, tack boards and doors in place. Doors of course would be locked at all times with a pad lock.
What sets these cars apart from each other is the various colors used along with graphics that is applied to the cars. While some schools will paint only a solid color on them and leave them at that, others will have multi-colors with school mascots painted on them to show their school spirit.
With the help of local civic groups and donations from hardware and paint stores, teachers along with students paint right over the old railroad
