Green Diamond - Equipment Used

Equipment Used

The train's fixed consist was:

1. Power car including driving cab, 1,200 hp (890 kW) Winton 201-A 16-cylinder engine and generator, auxiliary generator, and train heating boiler. Below the floor, the first truck was powered, but the second, articulated with the second car, was not. A 725 US gal (604 imp gal; 2,740 l) fuel tank was also mounted between the trucks.
2. Storage, Baggage and Mail car of which approximately half was the mail compartment.
3. Coach including conductor's office, seating 56.
4. Coach including restrooms, seating 60.
5. Diner-Lounge-Observation including restrooms, kitchen, dining area seating 8, and observation lounge seating 20.

All passenger-carrying cars were air-conditioned, with radio communication between them. Full width rubber diaphragms joined the cars, and all cars were articulated (sharing a truck with the neighboring car).

In service, the Green Diamond began each morning with an 8:55 departure as Train 50 from St. Louis Union Station, arriving at IC's Central Station in Chicago at 1:50 . The train was then turned and serviced, for a 5:00 return as Train 51, arriving back in St. Louis by 9:55 . Seven stops were made en route, and the train ran to a 4 hour 55 minute schedule, being far the fastest of IC's three trains on that route. Wartime in 1943 added an extra 15 minutes to the schedule to cope with traffic congestion, but the train was otherwise unchanged.

On September 29, 1946, with the full dieselization of all Chicago-St.Louis passenger service, the Green Diamond was changed to train Nos. 20 and 21, the reservation requirement was dropped, and the timetable no longer referred to the train as a distinct trainset. Unsurprisingly, the trainset was withdrawn from service on February 28, 1947, being replaced by a new Green Diamond, an E-unit-hauled streamliner with regular lightweight cars.

The trainset was shipped to the ICRR's shops at Paducah, Kentucky, for a complete overhaul, which took two months. The train emerged still in two-tone green, but with the Green Diamond names completely removed. It re-entered service on April 27, 1947, as the Miss-Lou (MISSissippi-LOUisiana) between Jackson, Mississippi, and New Orleans, Louisiana, operating as Trains 27 and 28. It left Jackson at 6:20, arriving in New Orleans at 10:20 ; the return journey left at 6:20 and arrived in Jackson at 10:20 .

The trainset was finally retired on August 8, 1950, and sold for scrap.

The historic Green Diamond name continued as the premier passenger train on the Illinois Central's Chicago-St. Louis route until May 1968. On May 19, 1968, the Green Diamond made its final trip into and out of St. Louis, following the decision to discontinue passenger train service south of Springfield. The surviving truncated service between Chicago and Springfield was renamed the Governor's Special, and the Green Diamond name was retired.