Bowser Mfg. O gauge Brill Trolley, What is this?

Neat. I know Industrial Rail and then later Atlas made something similar with less detail.

I researched these trolleys last winter. These were originally issued by Pittman in June 1949. It was one of the first trolley models available for the general market and found in hobby shops. The prototype were a small series of Laconia trolleys sold by Massachusetts Northestern Street Railway to the Reading Street Railway in the late 1920s. Several were rebuilt with a monitor roof, steel sheathing and retrucked and became #145-148.  By 1934 all were scrapped after the closure of some long suburban trolley lines.

 

I believe it was mentioned in Trolley Talk that Al Pittman died in the early 1960s and the trolley went out of production sometime after that. According to the Bowser company history in the tooling for the Pittman electric motors Bowser found "we found we had acquired the dies for the Pittman O Gauge Brill trolley". Bowser had  the Brill trolley back on the market by the first half of 1981. Bowser produced single and double truck versions. By 2011 reports surfaced that Bowser wanted to sell the dies for various product lines including the O gauge trolleys.

Bill, Interesting and thanks for the connection to the Pittman company.  I got a lot of hits that referenced Pittman- Bowser on google  so it appears your information is on the money.  Wonder how long Bowser continued?  This model appears to be 1988 and is modeling an 1888 unit, where did I get early 1900s?  Do you know if Bowser sold the dies?  I guess the moral to the story is the trolley market was small back then and maybe was not sustainable.  

 

I think this thing will run with a catenary connection too....

Hokie:

 

Indeed, Richmond, Virginia installed the first successful large electric street railway system in the US in 1888.  However, I don’t believe they had two-truck 8-wheel cars like the Bowser car in the posted photo way back then.  I’m not sure when the prototype of that Bowser car first ran, but the first electric 2-truck trolley cars anywhere didn't come until a few years later in the mid-1890’s.  It looks like that car was numbered “1888 & 1988” to commemorate the 100-year anniversary of the Richmond trolley system rather than the 100-year anniversary of that type of car.

  

Here’s a link to a Wikipedia article about Frank Sprague, an inventor who helped to develop the Richmond system and others.  Included in that article is a postcard which shows 8-wheel streetcars running in Richmond in 1923:      

Click here: Frank J. Sprague - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Those Bowser O gauge trolleys came decorated for many different systems and were available in 2-rail or 3-rail.  I used to see them often at train shows and Hobby Shops. There are several for sale on the bay right now.

 

HTH,

 

Bill

I believe these units were available with or without the motor and an e-unit was also an option. The motor was an open frame type. They were made in several colors - mine is red; I remember they also came in orange, yellow, green, and I don't recall what all else. They are kind of a pain to disassemble and a bigger pain to reassemble - there are a couple of things that are hard to keep aligned while you're assembling it. As I recall it's difficult to get the long screws that hold it together in place. 

 

Bowser also made a 4-wheel Birney trolley of very similar appearance and construction.

 

Here's a photo of one of the regular production ones on track. This one has an electronic e-unit. It's for sale if anybody's interested.

 

Yes, yes. The first streetcar line in America was built in 1888 by Frank Sprague. I recently made a poster about the invention of the streetcar. 

Bowser would sell the chassis and power train separately.  I visited them several times

during York trips, and picked up these components to power gas electrics, etc.

(now I am working on a gas electric powered by the chassis from an Industrial Rail

trolley, so I am not missing Bowser as much as I expected)

The Pittman trolleys have been around a long time and are relatively plentiful on the secondary market. They can be dressed up with a better roof and real trolley poles and one can add underbody details and even a Q-Car drive if the inclination strikes.  Very much the entry level trolley.

 

There was also a 4-wheel work motor and the LV express box motor as well as that basic coach.  Bowser produced the latter and the drive for the 4-wheel work motor for decades which also workable for powering the Birney.  Bowser did not produce the 4-wheel work motor and the LV express box motor and those parts went elsewhere.

 

Later versions of those drives used small can motors and were geared for rabbit-like speeds.

 

I've made kits in resin for at least 3 variations of the work motor to fit over that same drive.

 

Bob Trimble out in CA still sells the sides and roof for both the LV express motor and the 4-wheel work car on eBay.

 

I've got 2 sets of sides, roof , and resin ends for the LV express motor available if anyone is interested.

 

There also another guy on eBay selling resin versions of the 4-wheel work car on eBay.

These cars were built by Laconia Car Co. in 1902.

Another connected company was "Minitoys"

Apparently the Pittman Trolleys were sold as kits. Minitoys assembled and painted the trolleys. I have a yellow one lettered "102 Public Service 102". I don't know what other (if any) paint schemes were available. Here is a link to an OGR thread on the subject.

Yes.  Could not pull the name out of the memory.....

 

Sorry to disappoint, but that honor belongs to Scranton, PA.  Charles Van Depoele beat Sprague and Richmond to the punch in November of 1886. 

Then again, on August 16, 1886 the Appleton Electric Street Railway Company in Wisconsin started operations.....and then again on April 15, 1886 Montgomery AL started operations...but then again.......

The specifics come down to the technology and whether or not the line was commercially successful, as in it was not just an experimental line or a non-revenue service.  All of the pieces came together in Scranton in 1886.  South Bend was unsuccessful and Montgomery was a partially converted horse cart line.  Scranton’s system was purpose-built to be all electric and a commercial venture from day one.  It may also be the longest continually running line in the US as it did not cease operations until December of 1954.  If you want to argue the use of a trolley pole vs a troller or traveler, Van Depoele had developed the pole in 1885 and wanted to implement it in Scranton but the owner of the Scranton Railway Co. initially opted for the traveler instead. 

Before posting the comment above I certainly didn’t rely solely on the often unreliable Wikipedia.  I had also referred to my copy of the 1967 book “The Time of the Trolley” by the noted railway author William D. Middleton which says in the caption of its photo of Frank Sprague on page 66 “His electrification of the Richmond Union Passenger Railway Company in 1887-1888 was the first wholly successful installation of any consequence and set in motion a wholesale conversion of America’s street railway systems to electric power.”   That was the basis for my comment.

 

Although Middleton’s book discusses Charles Van Depoele’s pioneering developments including experimental, demonstrator or short lines in many cities plus as Middleton called it the “far short of perfection” system in Montgomery there is NO mention of the Scranton system at all anywhere in this 435 page book.  This is obviously a serious omission whether or not the Scranton system met all of the same technology and size criteria and was in operation before the Richmond system.    

 

Bill

I read somewhere that the Pittman/Bowser trolley was a bit tall, to fit the original motor. Anybody have better info?

Not sure that it was - I made an unpowered trailer coach with an interior once and did not notice anything regarding excess height.

I am always amazed at the level of knowledge of the folks on this forum. I have learned a ton about both toy trolleys and the real systems.

 

Richmond was bigger but they were not first.  Both cities claim the same distinction, which is that they were the first commercially successful electric streetcar system.  So first we must agree that while there were earlier “experiments” conducted, that these systems did not meet the criteria of either Richmond or Scranton, both of which were purpose built and operated regularly in order to generate revenue. 

 

So with this in mind, I can find no substantial improvement from Van Depoele in 1886 to Sprague in 1888 that would cause me to hand the title over the Sprague other than the size of the Richmond system.   I am sure that the success of the operation in Scranton played a significant role in determining the size of the Richmond system anyway, as it was now proven in November of 1886 to be not only a viable means of transportation but one that could generate a profit. 

 

Keep in mind that Scranton was also the first to light a street car by electricity, and they even added sanders following the first days of operation to make up for icy rail conditions.  If you want to argue usefulness, the Scranton system was there as well, reducing the average travel time to nearby Dunmore from 50-70 minutes by horse cart to 16 minutes by trolley. 

 

If you can determine a significant reason as to why Richmond had a superior road I would like to hear it.  In fact I will argue the opposite, especially after reading that horses had to be strapped to the Richmond cars in order to make the steepest grades.  Not so in Scranton. 

 

I think that Sprague did improve the technology as time went on, and I know he did have continued involvement in traction and elevated rail systems, so his contributions over time may have indeed surpassed those of Van Depoele.  But that doesn’t change the fact that it happened first in Scranton, more than a year before Sprague turned a wheel in Richmond.  Why Middleton omitted this from his book, I do not know, but his obituary does list the University of Virginia as an employer, and Frank Sprague as one of his heroes...

 

Conrad Baut makes a replacement railroad style roof for these trolleys from resin--

Here's a shot of a static display i built using an old Pittman kit bought on e-bay. Trucks are from Q company, and the background buildings are from Big Indoor Trains with many thanks. Its painted like an old CSA trolly but still needs some pin stripes and the undercarriage parts from Q. Nice easy kit to build. Don't have room to run things around in this place.

Geo.

A better roof will go a long ways to improve the appearance.

 

Is that the guy on eBay?

If you mean the background buildings, no he's not on e-bay that i know. Google his site at "big indoor trains" He has a lot of individual building front photos as well as brick patterns, that can be printed on your printer free of charge. The roof stays since its very much like Chicago's #1532 from way back when. Same rounded roof and walking steps at each end. There's a picture attached.

Geo

 

 

 

 

The two Minitoy trolleys were labeled Public Service and Rapid Transit.  These trolleys are

often found with paint flaking especially around the screws which held the body to the frame. The trolleys featured a clunky E unit reverse mechanism and roller pick ups that often were unhappy going through switches.Here is  a photo of Rapid Transit together with a Western Hobbycraft Philadelphia trolley and an Atlas (ex Industrial Rail) trolley.

 

lewrail