mlaughlinnyc Since we are wandering off topic I will Keep this to a minimum. From Goolsby's Atlanta, Birmingham & Coast:
"One adjustment was to increase passenger train productivity by routinely adding freight cars to their consists, usually priority boxcar loads or reefers and ventilated boxcars carrying perishables."
"Most of the additional freight cars were placed on the Atlanta-Waycross Trains 1-2 and their night counterparts 3-4, Northbound, this traffic was largely perishables from the ACL at Waycross that did not make connections with time freight 56 or which exceeded No. 56's tonnage capacity."
He goes on to describe how the trains would leave the passenger terminal and then stop at the freight yard to have the freight cars added. TOFC apparently received similar treatment in later years. One picture of train 4 from 1946 shows four reefers which were placed between the engine and the head end cars. Unfortunately I cannot make out whether those head end cars include one of the AB&Cs RPOs. In another from 1942 train 1 is shown with five boxcars between its engine and RPO. As I said not every road was the UP, SP or Santa Fe.
