Micro-Trains - 518 00 810 - Reefer, Ice, Wood - North Western Refrigerator - 14404

Specific Item Information: This 40’ wood reefer is brown with yellow sides and runs on Bettendorf trucks. Built in the late 1920s, this car was decorated in 1934 for the Horvitz Brothers Wholesale Fruit and Produce Company of Chicago, and owned by North Western Refrigerator Line. Horvitz Brothers was a large distributor of onions and potatoes in the 1930s.

Series Name: Farm-To-Table

Prototype History: During the mid-19th century, attempts were made to ship agricultural products by rail. As early as 1842, the Western Railroad of Massachusetts was reported in the June 15 edition of the Boston Traveler to be experimenting with innovative freight car designs capable of carrying all types of perishable goods without spoilage. The first refrigerated boxcar entered service in June 1851, on the Northern Railroad (New York) (or NRNY, which later became part of the Rutland Railroad). This "icebox on wheels" was a limited success since it was only functional in cold weather. That same year, the Ogdensburg and Lake Champlain Railroad (O&LC) began shipping butter to Boston in purpose-built freight cars, utilizing ice for cooling.

The first consignment of dressed beef left the Chicago stock yards in 1857 in ordinary boxcars retrofitted with bins filled with ice. Placing meat directly against ice resulted in discoloration and affected the taste, proving to be impractical. During the same period Swift experimented by moving cut meat using a string of ten boxcars with their doors removed, and made a few test shipments to New York during the winter months over the Grand Trunk Railway (GTR). The method proved too limited to be practical.

The use of ice to refrigerate and preserve food dates back to prehistoric times. Through the ages, the seasonal harvesting of snow and ice was a regular practice of many cultures. China, Greece, and Rome stored ice and snow in caves, dugouts or ice houses lined with straw or other insulating materials. Rationing of the ice allowed the preservation of foods during hot periods, a practice that was successfully employed for centuries. For most of the 19th century, natural ice (harvested from ponds and lakes) was used to supply refrigerator cars. At high altitudes or northern latitudes, one foot tanks were often filled with water and allowed to freeze. Ice was typically cut into blocks during the winter and stored in insulated warehouses for later use, with sawdust and hay packed around the ice blocks to provide additional insulation. A late-19th century wood-bodied reefer required re-icing every 250 miles (400 km) to 400 miles (640 km).

From Wikipedia

Road Name History: The North Western Refrigerator Line (NWX) was a Chicago, Illinois-based private refrigerator car line established in 1924, one of the last such companies to be formed. Between 1924 and 1940 the company acquired more than 3,000 new wood refrigerator cars originally built by the American Car and Foundry Company, and leased the former Ringling Brothers Circus railroad car plant in Baraboo, Wisconsin to serve as a car shop.

The NWX was closely allied with the Chicago and North Western Railway as several officials also held positions at the C&NW. In 1946 the North American Car Company purchased the NWX, though all cars continued to carry the NWX reporting marks. During the 1950s the fleet was rebuilt at North American's Green Bay, Hudson, and Baraboo facilities. North American closed the Baraboo shops in December 1963 as new mechanical reefers were being purchased, and refurbishment of wood cars was no longer required. By 1978, only 25 NWX cars were left in service. When North American was taken over by General Electric Railcar in 1984, the few remaining cars were stored, and dismantled soon thereafter.

From Wikipedia

Brand/Importer Information: Micro-Trains Line split off from Kadee Quality Products in 1990. Kadee Quality Products originally got involved in N-Scale by producing a scaled-down version of their successful HO Magne-Matic knuckle coupler system. This coupler was superior to the ubiquitous 'Rapido' style coupler due to two primary factors: superior realistic appearance and the ability to automatically uncouple when stopped over a magnet embedded in a section of track. The success of these couplers in N-Scale quickly translated to the production of trucks, wheels and in 1972 a release of ready-to-run box cars.

Micro-Trains Line Co. split off from Kadee in 1990 to form a completely independent company. For this reason, products from this company can appear with labels from both enterprises. Due to the nature of production idiosyncrasies and various random factors, the rolling stock from Micro-Trains can have all sorts of interesting variations in both their packaging as well as the products themselves. When acquiring an MTL product it is very important to understand these important production variations that can greatly enhance (or decrease) the value of your purchase.