General
Open sided bench type streetcars became popular in the 1890’s in North America as they provided a comfortable way to escape the heat of the summer. People boarded via the steps on the side of the car and the conductor passed along the running board to collect fares, ringing up each one on a fare resister mounted on the bulkhead via levers adjacent to each bench.
History
1719 was constructed in the shops of the Rio De Janeiro Tramway Light and Power Company, a Canadian firm which consolidated a number of early streetcar lines in the city of Rio. While the components such as controls, trucks, motors and air brake parts were made in North America by General Electric, Westinghouse Electric and Westinghouse Air Brake, the wood was native Brazilian hardwood which is very rot resistant and perfect for the climate in Brazil’s largest city. The cars had powerful motors to climb the hills and tow unpowered trailer cars and were known to carry a large number of passengers, many standing on the steps and hanging onto the sides of the “bondes” as they were called in Portugues. There were roughly 900 of these cars in service well into the early 1960’s when trackless trolley buses, motor buses and a new Metro subway system gradually supplanted them. In 1965 a consortium of North American trolley museums imported ten double truck 13 bench cars and two 4-wheel cars. They arrived in New York on the deck of a coffee ship where they craned off onto a barge and then lifted once again onto railroad flat cars to be shipped to the respective trolley museums who purchased them. Our predecessor organization, the Railway Equipment Leasing and Investment Company (RELIC), had a stockholder, Wendell Dillinger, who purchased 1719 and a 4-wheel car, 441 and leased them to the company. 441 was restored back to operation and painted in a red and white scheme that the open cars of the Fox River Line had been in. Our tickets have a tear-off coupon as that was the method used to determine how much revenue Mr. Dillinger’s enterprise would make from the use of his car. While 1719 was worked on at the RELIC Trolley Museum it never got to the point where it could be operated. While 441 was very popular, Wendell had always wanted his own short line railroad. 1974 he established the Middletown and Hummelstown Railroad in Pennsylvania on what had been a Reading Railroad branch line where he had ample freight service and established a tourist operation on it as well. By 1983 he had managed to construct a shop building, so he terminated his contract with RELIC, and the cars were trucked to Middletown. Over the years he collected many electric railway vehicles but never managed to erect the trolley wire to run them. He obtained a four-wheel generator car which could power 441, which made trips in Middletown where the railroad has a track in the street on special occasions. Mr. Dillinger lived his life’s dream for 47 years, passing away in 2024. Since he had no heirs, he willed the M&H to his employees. They were happy to continue the successful freight business and tourist train service but did not share his interest in electric railways except for little 441 and its power car. A well know “broker” in trolley cars was brought in to liquidate the traction assets and called upon the Fox River Trolley Museum to salvage the pieces of rolling stock that were beyond practical restoration by other trolley museums who did obtain a number of the cars. In “payment” for our efforts FRTM received 1719 and a lot of associated hardware Wendell had accumulated so 1719 arrived “again” by truck in South Elgin 0n March 18th, 2025, just as we were busy constructing our car barn extension. The current plan is to restore 1719 to approximately its appearance in Rio and once again give our visitors an opportunity to enjoy the breeze of a summer trolley ride. With the extension of the carbarn we will have the facilities to do this restoration.
Narrative
Whileopen cars were very popular with the public at the turn of the 20th century, they required the streetcar companies to have two fleets of cars, open cars for the summer and closed cars for the rest of the year. By the 1920’s the automobile was starting to syphon off ridership from the streetcar systems who started to operate their trolleys with an “operator” instead of a two-person crew of a conductor and motorman. Along with the safety considerations of increasing auto and truck traffic this rang the death knell for the open car except for a few eastern cities.
1719 is known as a “Narragansett” style open car as the lower step can be folded up for clearance on the blind side for double track street operation and allowed them to fit into older narrow car house and shop buildings. While Rio De Janeiro as a city is much older than the United States, it was large and hilly with a diverse population. It went through much the same pattern of development from omnibuses to horse cars to electric powered streetcars as in Europe and North America. The automobile came a little bit later as many had to be imported so the streetcar system was more viable longer than in the US. Today Rio has a modern three-line subway system along with several modern streetcar lines that supplement its surface bus system. They even have a heritage streetcar line that traverses over a very old aqueduct that for centuries has provided running water for the city. It is the museum’s hope to share the open car “breezer” experience that the Fox River Line once had with a nod to 1719’s history in Brazil’s largest city.
Author: Joe Hazinski, Curator