The Caribou Creek served as the Alaska Railroad's business car until 1972 when it was replaced by the Denali. Today, the Caribou Creek resides in Elbe, Washington as part of the Mt. Rainier Scenic Railroad.

Caribou Creek was built by American Car and Foundry in 1917 as US Bureau of Mines safety car #1. It was rebuilt by International Railway Car and Equipment Company. The Alaska Railroad purchased and reconfigured it in October 1947 to business car Caribou Creek. They retired it in 1980. It was purchased by the Mount Ranier Scenic Railroad acquired and renamed Chehalis River, later renamed Nisqually River.

Anchorage, September 1976
Photographer unknown

John Taubeneck update 10/18/09: The Caribou Creek is now the Mount Rainier Scenic Nisqually River. It has been out of service for about 5 years and is stored inside. Here is some information from John Henderson:

Henderson's Newsletter August 9, 1983

Former Alaska Railroad business observation "Caribou Creek" has been acquired from the Purdy Company, Chehalis, WA, and is presently the ticket office and book store for the Mount Rainier Scenic RR at Elbe. The interior has been stripped out and replaced with particle board.

Henderson's Newsletter September 29, 1986

The consist was the cut down "buffalo hunting car", two former SP commuter coaches and the former Alaska Railroad "Caribou Creek" renamed "Deschutes River". The "Deschutes River" was seeing its first service on the Mount Rainier Scenic and your editor noted that the gold stripes were not completed when I photographed it in Tacoma prior to the start of the trip but were completed when photographed when enrout to Centralia.

Steve Drassler update 1/14/19: Anchorage-based T&E employees who were at the bottom of the seniority list for their craft often got "force-assigned" to Fairbanks. When this happened, the railroad provided free lodging to those employees in the old business car "Caribou Creek," parked next to the Fairbanks diesel shop. The car did have electricity, but it had no running water, showers or toilet facilities (those amenities were available next door at the shop, at no extra charge(. The car was heated by steam heat, but it didn't get turned on until about the end of September, when there was quite a chill in the air. I'll bet quite a few remember "camping out" in the Caribou Creek.

There were a couple of bedrooms on the rear then bunks the further back you went.