CB&Q 9903 Editors Pick!        
Chicago Burlington & Quincy Railroad 9903 at Saint Joseph, Missouri on an unknown day in June 1956, Kodachrome by Dick Rumbolz, Chuck Zeiler collection. Ordered in March 1935 and delivered in October, it was virtually a duplicate of the original Zephyr 9900, later renamed the Pioneer Zephyr. It was powered by a Winton eight cylinder in-line 600 horsepower Model 201A diesel power plant. It entered service on October 28, 1935 on the 442 mile daily round trip between Saint Louis, Missouri and Burlington, Iowa, the assignment for which it had been designed and built. The entire train was named after Mark Twain characters in keeping with the train's assignment location along the Mississippi River. The power unit, which also contained the RPO, was named "Injun Joe" , a homonym for "engine". Increased passenger loads added a fourth car, and the cars were named "Becky Thatcher", "Huck Finn" and "Tom Sawyer". This trainset, as the Mark Twain Zephyr and later as the Ozark State Zephyr and finally as the Mark Train Zephyr (again), spent its entire career in Missouri and Iowa, except one turn as the Advance Denver Zephyr on May 31, 1936. It was retired in May 1958, sold to Frank Dashner (to be used as a restaurant), who died, and his estate sold the train to Midwest Old Threshers Association. It was sold again to a Kansas City banker who planned to sell it to interests in Saudia Arabia, but the banker died and it was sold again. It continues to change hands as of this upload date, and remains unrestored and deteriorating.
Date: 6/1/1956 Location: Saint Joseph, MO   Map Show Saint Joseph on a rail map Views: 3430 Collection Of:   Chuck Zeiler
Locomotives: CBQ 9903(AA)    Author:  Dick Rumbolz
CB&Q 9903
Picture Categories: Yard This picture is part of album:  CB&Q Passenger Diesels
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User Comments
Name Type Comments Date
Russell Honey General Very nice shot and story to go with it. Hopefully someday it will be restored albeit cosmetically. 6/2/2011 12:18:41 PM
Russell Honey General Very nice shot and story to go with it. Hopefully someday it will be restored albeit cosmetically. 6/2/2011 12:18:53 PM
Randy Kotuby General Outstanding photo. 6/5/2011 12:23:09 PM
Jonelle DeFelice General The similar B&M Flying Yankee is being restored in New Hampshire, and I can't wait to see it on the rails! 6/6/2011 4:19:07 PM
John Matrow General http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Twain_Zephyr 6/18/2011 6:11:43 PM
Bernie Feltman General Nice photo 8/7/2011 3:35:28 PM
Gregg Bartley General Somewhere on this site is much later photo of this train in pieces, without wheels, sitting on flat cars. It's a very sad looking picture. This is much nicer. Man, that is a great quality photograph for 1956. 2/21/2013 3:31:50 PM

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