Jeff,
I was the person responsible for acquiring the "Lake Chamcook" for the WCRA.
The car never went into work service as it was sold in about 1979 direct to a
gentleman by the name of Mitch Taylor, a local restauantuer. Mitch had a
fascination with private cars that was never fulfilled. The car sat in the
Drake St. coach yard back tracks for quite a few years until Bob Swanson came
along and wanted to use it in the film "Natty Gann". Mitch agreed and the car
was outfitted with fake wood sides and a quick "tuscan" paint job. This covered
the original CPR paint and the gold leaf lettering, thus preserving it for a
while. I was the one who uncovered the gold leaf carefully using an artists
palette knife. The gold paint was painted directly over the gold leaf original.
Mitch sold the car to the WCRA for a very favourable price.
The car is on the list for restoration, but this may take a while. The interior
is intact,but will have to be completely replaced due to deterioration over
time. Wood floors and non-waterproof glue don't do these cars any favours.
Fortunately we have received some good advice from Cranbrook on restoration
methods.
If you saw the work being done to ex-CPR business car #8 (formerly the
restaurant from Gastown) you will realise what it takes to restore a
heavyweight. Nevertheless a labour of love.
Grant Ferguson,
----- Original Message -----
From: Jeff Pinchbeck
To: cpsig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Friday, July 14, 2006 7:46 PM
Subject: RE: [cpsig] gold leaf lettering etc
I had an opportunity to fit in an hour at the West Coast railway Association
museum up in Squamish yesterday afternoon, and took some photos of Lake
Chamcook, which according to their web page is a 1928 NSC Angus built
Sleeper/Buffet Lounge. While it is in need of repair and repaint, etc, I
noticed one thing of particular interest - the "work paint" is peeling off
over the gold leaf lettering. I'm surprised it went from passenger service
with gold leaf lettering to work paint without the original finnish being
Robert, this is an interesting find. Lake Chamcook was renumbered to
business car 32 in July 1962. So this means the car survived until the end
of its revenue service in gold leaf? This is much later than I would have
expected. Is there any indication that may be gold paint was painted
overtop of the gold leaf? It's hard to tell from the photos. What do you
think?
Jeff Pinchbeck
