Jamestown Street Railway Trolley Car #93 Restoration Project
PROGRESS 2016 PAGE 3
7/11/16 Word came down it was time to move the trolley to the other end of the bay to make way for the comedy center's walkway construction. One more time we enlisted our old trailer to do the job.
7/12/16 The old faithful trailer lined up and ready to roll, but we find that the extra weight of the mostly restored trolley is a little more than we can expect it to bear for future moves.
7/12/16 We met the deadline and made it to the other side.
7/25/16 Work still goes on. Joint effort here on the rear light. Quentin polished the aluminum, Bob sandblasted and painted the black rings, and Jim used epoxy and TLC to reconstruct the original somewhat cracked up rear lenses.
7/25/16 Another view of the rear lights on.
8/22/16 It took a while, but after consulting with various experts, we finally felt comfortable with our new trailer design. Jim starts cutting up some steel.
8/23/16 Jamestown Boiler comes through again big time. They donated all the steel for our new trailer and we start lining up the pieces for welding.
8/25/16 Boy did we get lucky. An upcoming wedding reception has this Ben guy asking if we can move the trolley back to the other side of the bay. We said sure, as soon as we can get our trailer welded up. Unfortunately our welder would be tied up for a few weeks. Ben lined up some welders for us and we were able to accomodate the wedding party's request. Jim A. Schettine with Meridien Energy in Randolph, NY donated a welding crew and materials to get the job done.
8/25/16 John and Doug with Meridian Energy did and excellent job of welding things up.
8/25/16 More than just a wedding deadline. Comedy center progress in the parking lot reminds us that we have to leave what has been our perfect home.
8/26/16 Other work still progresses. Tim Jones with Empire Upholstery delivers and installs the back bench. Thank you again to Mt. Moriah Lodge for their $1000 donation to cover the cost of the bench.
8/26/16 Nice!
8/26/16 More nice!
8/27/16 Trailer gets primed and then painted.
8/30/16 Ready to roll back, thanks to the two mobile home axels donated by Dave Straight with Riverview Communities, 61 Jacob Lane, Warren, PA 16365
8/31/16 With the trailer proven, we start to cut up our old faithful trailer, but we will reuse the axel.
8/31/16 Thanks to a great article by Dennis Phillips with the Jamestown Post Journal, we may have a few options for where we move to next.
9/12/16 With the great exodus from the train station looming, there is still work to be done Jim starts a little assembly line for the call buttons. Button castings courtesy of Jamestown Bronze, and thanks to Bill Stevenson, Classic Brass cleaned up and polished the castings.
8/31/Jim finishes up wiring the master control panel supplying power to lights and call buzzer.
8/31/16 Buttons up and working.
Buzzer sound video. CLICK ON THE CENTER TRIANGLE and wait a minute or so for the video to download.
10/6/16 Bob starts reassembling the destination sign.
10/6/16 Thanks to the parts donation and mechanical expertise of Bob Knobloch owner of Jamestown Bronze, we had the parts necessary to reassemble the failed mechanical parts of the original destination sign.
10/13/16 Lighting the way to Willard Street.
10/18/16 Batten down the hatches… Jim and Quentin make sure the catwalk on the roof gets firmly attached.
10/18/16 After a lot of monkeying around, we finally descide where the operator seat will go and Jim tests it out.
10/19/16 Jim pretends to be ready to just drive #93 out to our new location. Actually, it is just a photo showing that we are ready for our advertised leaving the train station open house.
10/22/16 Event preping for the open house. This photo shows what a great place the train station was for us. We thank all who have facilitated our working on the project there.
10/22/16 Thanks to help from the Post Journal's Dennis Phillips and Dennis Webster with WJTN Radio, we got the word out about our open house. The event was well attended and it was most gratifying to hear the comments from the visitors. This picture shows the first arrivers.
10/25/16 Time to get out, but not without special thanks to Argelis Maria, employee of the Gateway Train Station and now the Lucy Desi organization. Argelis has had our back since we first arrived, keeping us informed of the goings on, and helping us when we needed an extra hand. Even more so, he made sure visitors found their way to the trolley when the comedy center restricted access to the trolley. He also got pretty good at telling #93's story when Jim and I were'nt around. Thank you Argelis!
10/25/16 Always thought the trolley should stay right where it was. With nice comfy seats for 30 people, it would have made a nice little theater for a comedy display, and a glass garage door could have provided 24/7 viewing for visitors with local and historic transportation interests.
Even tried making it look like Lucille Ball actually road on #93.
10/25/16 All lined up and ready to go. Special thank you to Lee Harkness for inviting us to the train station in the first place. We would not have achieved this level of restoration without having the benefit of this venue. Thank you to the City staff and crews that have helped us through the years, especially Jamestown Mayor Sam Teresi and Department of Public Works / Parks Dept. Supervisor Jeff Lehman. Also thank you to the National Comedy Center organization for allowing us to stick around for a little longer while they were in the process of converting the train station into a comedy center.