Puget Sound Electric Railway car 523 operated between Seattle and Tacoma from 1908 until 1928. This early mass transit allowed commuters on “Limited” trains to travel from downtown to downtown in just 1 hour and 15 minutes. The 523 is the sole surviving car from this once proud fleet and is the newest Snoqualmie property listed on the King County and City of Snoqualmie Landmarks Register.
523 was first preserved in 1963 when it was purchased by preservationist Paul Class. It had been repurposed as a home in Federal Way sometime prior to WW II, and the property owner was ready to build a larger house. So Mr. Class purchased the car and moved it to Oregon where he had started what today is known as the Oregon Electric Railway Historical Society. There were several ill-fated restoration attempts on the 523, but only when the car was donated to the Northwest Railway Museum was a formal plan prepared.
When 523 was adaptively reused first as an outbuilding and then as a home, the wheels and motors were no longer needed; they were sold for scrap circa 1930. So replacements of at least similar vintage were needed. This month new trucks (wheels and motors) for the 523 arrived in Snoqualmie. This was the result of a culmination of more than a year of effort and is being made possible with support from the Schwab Fund for Charitable Giving and 4Culture’s Building for Equity program.
The “new” trucks are actually from an electric car order built for the Chicago Elevated and delivered in the early 1920s. The trucks were built by Baldwin (same builder of the Museum’s locomotives 4012 & 4024), but are a decade newer than the trucks that would have been found under the 523 circa 1914. The front truck is powered with two GE traction motors and the rear truck is unpowered.
The Streetcar Investment Company purchased the trucks from a scrap car some years ago and the components had been in storage at their California yard. An industrial motor shop in the Bay Area overhauled the two GE 243 traction motors, and the Streetcar Investment folks reassembled everything. They arrived on a Gerlock Heavy Haul tow truck, the same rig that delivered 523 to the Museum more than two years ago.
The trucks are not ready for installation. It was important to acquire and move the trucks so that all the variables between the carbody and the trucks were correctly defined. Until they are installed, the trucks will remain in storage inside the Museum in Snoqualmie.
