The Edwards Railway Motor Car Company began producing gasoline powered motor cars or doodlebugs in the early 1920s. A contemporary of Brill and EMC, the Edwards company produced motor carsor railroads in the U.S., Mexico, and Central and South America. From its humble beginnings in Sanford, North Carolina in the 1920s, when the first car was built utilizing a truck body and a chain and sprocket drive, to the flashy streamlined models of the 1930s and 1940s, Edwards, along with the Edwards company and the Edwards car, is examined in detail in: The Edwards Railway Motor Car Company - And its Visionary Founder, H.P. Edwards, "The Doctor of Sick Shortlines." H. P. Edwards led a fascinating life and his work as The doctor of sick shortlines is examined as well. Edwards s work with the Atlantic & Western; Atlanta & St. Andrews Bay (Bay Line); Marianna & Blountstown; Watauga & Yadkin River; Georgia, Florida & Alabama; Atlantic & East Carolina is all documented and brought to life with numerous photographs, maps, and locomotive rosters. Author Cary Franklin Poole doesn stop here, however. Owing to both a recent surge in nostalgia for Edwards motor cars and to a fundamental rethinking of modern transportation needs, the company was revived in 1998 as the Edwards Rail Car Company. Poole follows the Edwards cars up to the present day. Someday soon you may be riding in one. Wouldn t you like to know a little bit more about them first?
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Editorial Reviews
Review
I may state "positively" that [this] is a remarkable book - Louis A. Marre --Publisher
This small volume contains a treasure trove of information about a largely unknown Southern railroad pioneer who was, at once, an inventor, an international business man, and a railroad manager for nearly 55 years.... [I]t will provide hours of interesting reading and study on the man himself, the numerous products of his motor car company, and the many shortlines he rescued from financial peril. - J. Parker Lamb --Publisher
Cary Poole has unearthed a gold mine of history on the second largest builder of rail motor cars, or "doodlebugs." He has woven an interesting and fact-filled story of the Edwards Railway Motor Car Company with the history of the various sick short lines that he doctored to recovery. This book provides new insights into the history of branch-line and short-line railroading in which rail motor cars played a significant role. During the first half of the twentieth century, especially in the aftermath of the Great Depression, government regulations required railroads to continue providing passenger and mail service, even with steadily diminishing patronage as good roads and automobiles increased. Therefore, many light-density short lines and branch lines with light axle loadings were looking for less expensive operations. Because steam operation, with its worn and obsolete engines and facilities, was very costly, Harry Powell Edwards recognized the market potential for rail motor cars and offered them as attractive and economical alternatives to buying second-hand steam power, which the railroads knew couldn't last. Edwards' rail motor cars enabled many short-line and branch-line railroads to survive until the arrival of the post-World War II economy and affordable light-weight diesels. -Russell Tedder Railroad Historian and Author, and President (retired) of the Georgia-Pacific Short-Line Railroads --Publisher
This small volume contains a treasure trove of information about a largely unknown Southern railroad pioneer who was, at once, an inventor, an international business man, and a railroad manager for nearly 55 years.... [I]t will provide hours of interesting reading and study on the man himself, the numerous products of his motor car company, and the many shortlines he rescued from financial peril. - J. Parker Lamb --Publisher
Cary Poole has unearthed a gold mine of history on the second largest builder of rail motor cars, or "doodlebugs." He has woven an interesting and fact-filled story of the Edwards Railway Motor Car Company with the history of the various sick short lines that he doctored to recovery. This book provides new insights into the history of branch-line and short-line railroading in which rail motor cars played a significant role. During the first half of the twentieth century, especially in the aftermath of the Great Depression, government regulations required railroads to continue providing passenger and mail service, even with steadily diminishing patronage as good roads and automobiles increased. Therefore, many light-density short lines and branch lines with light axle loadings were looking for less expensive operations. Because steam operation, with its worn and obsolete engines and facilities, was very costly, Harry Powell Edwards recognized the market potential for rail motor cars and offered them as attractive and economical alternatives to buying second-hand steam power, which the railroads knew couldn't last. Edwards' rail motor cars enabled many short-line and branch-line railroads to survive until the arrival of the post-World War II economy and affordable light-weight diesels. -Russell Tedder Railroad Historian and Author, and President (retired) of the Georgia-Pacific Short-Line Railroads --Publisher
About the Author
The son of a railroader, Cary Franklin Poole has been a railfan for much of his adult life. He enjoys modeling the Southern and Central of Georgia railroads in N-Scale, concentrating on the 1950s steam/diesel transition period. He is an avid photographer, taking 35mm color slides, black and white medium-format negatives, and recently, digital photographs of railroading subjects. Cary is the author of The History of Railroading in Western North Carolina and CF7 Locomotives: From Cleburne to Everywhere. He is also working on two other projects, a corporate history of the Durham & Southern Railroad and a corporate history of RailTex, a San Antonio, Texas based railroad management company specializing in the operations of shortline and regional railroads. Poole lives with his wife, Carole, in Flower Mound, Texas, a suburb of the DFW metroplex. He currently serves as the Dean of Students at Texas Wesleyan University, located in Ft. Worth, Texas.
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