Spoke yesterday with Howard Noble, past Pres. & GM of the C&LC. Talked at some length. Some of the conversation was how the C&LC acquired its equipment.

The C&LC began operations on June 1, 1964. In 1968, Howard was in Cadillac and noticed three pieces of equipment parked on the AA's freight house side track. One was an ex-Wabash ice car, no roof hatches, which was used to store ice for the M&LS car ferry operation. All black, it had no number. The second was M&LS #10, a wooden Russell snowplow which was on the Ann Arbor and transferred to the M&LS in 1953, according to the web. Howard thought the plow was ex-DT&I. The third car was the sole survivor of four AA cafe-lounge cars. Howard said it was all wood, I suspect it may have started out that way but it was common for wooden bodies to be set on steel underframes with truss rods as the cars were upgraded. The agent said the equipment was headed to Owassoo to be scrapped after the M&LS shut down. The Agent didn't know why they had been set out. Howard asked if the cars were for sale. The agent made a call to Owasso. The cafe lounge was spoken for by a M-of-W supervisor for the work train. Does anyone know what became of it?

The agent was told to move the two remaining cars over to the then Penn Central RR for delivery to the C&LC at Missaukee Junction. There wasn't any waybill issued. Howard said, "Back then, you could do things like that."

Some time later, a bill for the two cars, described as scrap material for a total of $300 came in the mail. Howard said, "We immediately cut a check.

I believe after the railroad was shut down in 1972 on the orders of the Federal bankruptcy judge in Grand Rapids, the ice car was scrapped in Lake City, There is an internet report that the Russell plow was moved to the Upper Peninsula where it was damaged in a fire. Howard was out of the are by the time the C&LC was wrapped up and doesn't know what became of either car.

Does anyone on the list know? As a recent subscriber to the weekly Missaukee Sentinel, Missaukee County's paper of record, ($28/yr), Caroline MacGregor, staff writer, contacted me about the C&LC for an evergreen story.

I know where the locomotives ended up and most of the passenger equipment.

Any help would be appreciated. I suspect the only history of the C&LC will be in the Sentinel.

Alex Huff, ex-C&LC dining car waiter