Archiving Angeles (AA): The Maryland Special

By Jason Burns
September 25th, 2009 @ 2:42 PM History

marylandspecial

It was a special kind of streetcar. One whose sole purpose was to ferry passengers between the Maryland hotel in Pasadena, and Virginia hotel in Long Beach. It was the fastest car in the Pacific Electric fleet, clocking in at 109mph.

It was the Maryland Special. The year was 1900.


Photo from the USC Digital Library

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7 Comments so far

  1. Dave Share (daveshare) on September 25th, 2009 @ 3:07 pm

    109mph?!?! Holy deathwish Batman! I can’t imagine traveling that fast in something like that.


  2. gregbarnett on September 25th, 2009 @ 3:16 pm

    Would have been an awesome ride for sure!


  3. Archiving Angeles (AA): The Maryland Special Digital China (pingback) on September 25th, 2009 @ 3:18 pm

    [...] Archiving Angeles (AA): The Maryland Special By admin | category: Uncategorized | tags: authority, captures-crisp, description, [...]


  4. wilberfan on September 25th, 2009 @ 5:26 pm

    I don’t know…I’m having trouble believing that speed figure. Doesn’t make sense. Put my money down on “mistake”…


  5. Lucinda Michele (la_michele) on September 25th, 2009 @ 5:49 pm

    Maryland to Virginia. I love it. :)


  6. dj ernie pearl (unregistered) on September 25th, 2009 @ 7:35 pm

    yea, I’m having a prob too with the 100mph + and more cause it’s only 1900


  7. Matt Mason (mason) on September 27th, 2009 @ 4:54 pm

    I did a 15 second search for “rail car speed records.” What I found was that rail cars traveled as fast as 126 mph as early as 1903. So, assuming that info. is accurate, I think the figure cited here is plausible. What throws most people off is that the U.S. has a dilapidated rail system in which most trains poke along relatively speaking, using mostly the same old technology, so it’s no wonder that we can’t fathom trains many decades ago being able to travel almost as fast as they do today. Even the so-called high speed trains that Amtrak installed in the Northeast Corridor (DC->NY->BOS), which I have been on, can’t go anywhere near their potential speeds, because they operate on track that is many decades old.



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