The Mountaineer Limited

The New York, Ontario and Western's Crack 'Mountaineer' passenger train slows for its stop at Bear Mountain along the Hudson River on its inaugural run on June 24, 1938.

The NY, O & W Railway was a lesser known Class 1 railroad operating from Weehawken, NJ, across the Hudson River from Manhattan to the northern reaches of New York State.

A sizeable portion of the railroad's income was was derived from a summer parade of New Yorkers trekking to the popular Catskill Mountain resorts.

In 1937, just into bankruptcy, the railroad retained noted industrial designer Otto Kuhler its dowdy 'Mountaineer' on a budget of just $10,000. He worked with the railroad shop forces to create a miracle and turned the 1913 cars into a sleek modern train.

Unfortunately, the cars were slowly dismantled during World War II for badly needed scrap. The advent of diesel locomotives forced the 'Old and Weary,' the railroad's well earned nickname, to sell the Mountaineer's steam locomotive and many others for scrap in 1948.

Nine years later, the railroad collapsed in financial ruin.