For decades the Alaska Railroad has rostered many different types of hoppers for use to haul everything from coal, gravel, cement and ballast. For decades the majority of the hopper fleet hauled coal, and tons of it. Before hoppers were brought to Alaska, gondolas or flat cars with sides to haul coal or gravel. One ancient hopper resides on the grounds of the Museum of Transportation and Industry of Alaska in Wasilla. ARR 60432 is a two-bay hopper of unknown origins or build date. But from some research I can shed a little light. This particular car is a near match for a large class of USRA designed hoppers built by Pressed Steel Car. Co in the 1910s, and while this may be true, it’s unknown who built this hopper, but its design is USRA.

I wasn’t able to see any build dates but it’s safe to say anywhere from the 1910s to 1930s. This particular car is labeled for Healy Power Plant which meant that it was in dedicated service to haul coal from the Suntrana Tipple to the railroad’s own power plant in Healy. I don’t know how many of these cars the ARR had, but I know it wasn’t many, and I can’t say how many were in dedicated power plant service in Healy though I have heard there was two.

This car seemed to have made it into the early 1980s before it was retired with the last service date of 9/81 in Fairbanks. I would say it was retired by 1985. By the 1980s Healy wasn’t as big of a railroad town as it once was so bigger repairs were sent to Fairbanks. With a length of around 33 feet long it’s one of the shorter cars to have been used on the line.

Pictures taken 05/01/2021