Equipment Information

“Pawnee” is the very last traditional heavyweight private car Pullman ever built new. Pullman built it in 1930 for Harry Payne Bingham, who named the car for the U.S.S. Pawnee, an 1860 sloop of war aboard which Bingham’s grandfather had served during the Civil War. Bingham sold the car in 1938 to Western Union Telegraph Company, which used it as their president’s car. It also served as a “communications car” in President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s funeral train in 1945 and saw use during President Harry S. Truman’s 1948 campaign train. In 1965, Lewis J. Ort, the owner of Ort Brothers Bakery in Maryland, purchased the car from Western Union.

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Builder: Pullman/Pullman-Standard
Year Built: 1930
Description: Observation Private Car
Arrived: 2019
Condition: Complete / restored / operational

Read more about the history of this car in Rail & Wire #263

Pullman “Pawnee” Ownership History

1930-1938 – Harry Payne Bingham “Pawnee”
1938-1965 – Western Union Telegraph Company #100
1965-1975 – Lewis J. Ort #100
1975-1977 – Miami Chapter, National Railway Historical Society, Hialeah, FL
1977-2019 – John Blair “Pawnee”
2019-present – Illinois Railway Museum, Union, IL

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