This Chicago Tunnel Company car appeared after the tunnel flood of the Loop which started on April 13th, 1992. It was among the debris found and removed after the tunnel breach was closed in the months following the flood of many basements of major buildings in the Loop which once had service from the Chicago Tunnel Company’s system of subway like tunnels in the downtown Loop area. After railway service on this two-foot gauge underground system ended many of the tunnels continued to be used for communication lines.
This railway system was used to transport coal to the furnace rooms of many buildings and also remove ash from the same. The primary business was moving packages in “merchandise” cars from major stores to and from connections with standard railway company freight houses in the era of “loose car” railroading. After years of construction this operation started in 1906 and eventually expanded to 60 miles of tunnels but finally ended service in 1959 as trucks became the favored way to transport merchandise and building boilers were converted to burn natural gas.
Our car was among the debris removed during the repair of the tunnel system and was used as a temporary display at the Museum of Science and Industry about the system and the 1992 flood which was caused by a unintended breach of a tunnel portion crossing under the Chicago River at the Kinzie Street Bridge. After the MSI display was over the car was offered to the museum and was delivered to the site via a member’s small dump truck and was placed out behind the car barn and frankly forgotten about until July 26th, 2024, when a member, Ron Ruhl decided to take it home and restore it.
The dean of Tunnel Company history and museum member Bruce Moffat, confirms that the car was an ash and spoils car. There was virtually no wood left on the car and there is very little technical information on the Tunnel Company’s fleet of rolling stock. Some cars were constructed by Kilbourne and Jacobs while other stock was home-built in the tunnel company shop. The little 4-wheel electric locomotives that moved these cars were constructed by Jefferies Manufacturing Company, as a variation on the design of their underground mining locomotives and by Baldwin with Westinghouse Electric supplying the motors and control. All these little engines ran at 250 volts DC through overhead trolley wire system fastened to the ceiling of the tunnels.
The car was returned to the museum on Sunday September 15th, 2024, and placed on some light tramway track, also from the MSI display, that was constructed just east of the WAYNE shelter. No number was found on the car, so it was arbitrarily numbered 788 as the few other remaining Chicago Tunnel cars in existence are numbered in the 700’s. It has an open topped wooden body which has a floor that is hinged. The body would be lifted off its frame and then swung over a barge and the bottom tripped open to release its contents, usually ash but sometimes spoils from the tunneling process or construction of a new building’s sub basements. All the wood was replaced, and the metal work was treated and painted flat black. This is the only known Chicago Tunnel Company freight car that actually went through the 1992 flood as all the other equipment in existence was rescued in 1996 from a non-flooded tunnel that was discovered during the construction of a new building.
The museum is lucky to have this relic of an unseen transportation system that was forty feet below the streets of Chicago.
Author: Joseph Hazinski, Curator