in for third-rail shoes, and doors were added to accommodate the high-level platforms of Red Arrow. The cars were dubbed “Liberty Liners.”.
The cars, while not ill-suited for work on the Norristown line, were a bit like fish out of water. Designed to run fast on flat track, the sets now had to stop every two miles or less at the numerous stations dotting their new home. Still, the cars were popular. The galley was retained, and Red Arrow even obtained a liquor license to make them bar cars, a rarity on interurban lines. Their time on Red Arrow was short-
lived, however. While no one is quite sure when the last trips were, the pair of cars were retired by 1976, although they could still be occasionally seen running under their own power around Upper Darby. By 1981 Red Arrow had become a part of SEPTA, and the two Liberty Lin- er sets were put up for auction.
RIGHT: Conductor Stephen Goehring delivers paperwork to the cab of Independence Hall at the Blacklog Narrows station. The muse- um trackage is built on the former Shade Gap Branch of the East Broad Top Railroad. BELOW: The Liberty Liner passes Philadelphia & West- ern snowplow No.10, built by Wason in 1915. The P&W later became Red Arrow Lines, and No. 10 and Independence Hall served there to- gether from 1963 until 1976.
All was not lost for the Liberty Liners, however. Two museums stepped forward as successful bidders for the sets. Nos. 801-802 (Valley Forge) went to the Illi- nois Railway Museum in Union, repaint- ed into North Shore colors. Nos. 803-804 (Independence Hall) went to the Rockhill Trolley Museum in Pennsylvania. Independence Hall was operated oc- casionally until 1996, when mechanical issues finally sidelined it. In 2011, an
anonymous donor stepped in and paid for mechanical work needed on the car, and it returned to service on Members’ Day in 2011. Today, the Independence Hall is still quite the novelty at the Rockhill Trolley Museum. While it uses a lot of power as it makes the three-mile outbound run on museum trackage, it uses almost no power on the return trip; it’s all downhill from the end of track to the museum and
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