CERA’s April Zoom Programs

Friday, April 11, 2025, at 7:00 p.m. CT

Zoom Presentation

https://tinyurl.com/CERAthe2ndFriday

Easy Link to Zoom

Meeting Number 814 9251 7167  Passcode  880028

Harvey Laner

West Penn Railways

Run Time: 1h05m

At its peak, West Penn Railways had 237 miles of electric railway trackage. It operated in the well populated coal mining and coking region of rugged, mountainous western Pennsylvania. West Penn Railways was a vibrant transportation system playing a key role in the pre-automobile, unpaved, poor road era, and was an important factor in the Coking region's economy.

This program combines Harvey Laner’s West Penn Railways video files of railfans Ed Miller and Gene Schmidt’s movies with Harvey’s conversational narration with West Penn Railways historian Ed Lybarger. Ed meticulously describes the route as Ed Millers’ movies take us from Uniontown to Greensburg. Ed Lybarger details West Penn’s LCL freight service, an in-depth description of the Companies passenger and work car equipment, a whimsical look at West Penn’s creative advertising program and an overview of the management people that guided the Company through thegood and the difficult years.

This complete story of West Penn Railways includes a look at the web of public utilities that connect it to West Virginia’s Monongahela & West Penn and Wheeling Traction Company properties as well as the Hagerstown & Frederick Railway in Maryland. Historic movie scenes of those traction properties are also included in this far reaching, comprehensive program.

We will also have a short newscast preceding the regular program.

This program is open to all CERA members and guests. Mark this date on your calendar!

Let us know by email if you have questions at:

For more railfan programming listings, visit:
http://www.railcc.org/events.html