Trolleyology: PCC: Amazing Streamlined Streetcar

Join PTM staff, volunteers, members, and friends of the Museum for our Zoom series, Trolleyology! These programs feature Pennsylvania transit history topics and tales of our collection that you can experience from home. Registration is required but free of charge. Donations are welcome and encouraged. Limited space is available!

“A Thing of Beauty is a Joy Forever.”

So proclaimed a mid-1930’s Westinghouse ad featuring the new PCCs then arriving at transit systems all over North America.  Back when the poet Keats penned those words in the early 1800’s, he obviously did not have the PCC car in mind.  But the words nevertheless remain appropriate in reference to the PCC, even today.  The PCC car was a technological and esthetic triumph that was intended to assure the long future of the traditional electric street railway industry.  That goal was successfully achieved, but only for a while. 

Just 20 years after the debut of the PCC it had become apparent that the traditional streetcar systems in North America were slowly rolling toward eventual extinction.  Happily, that extinction never occurred, though it came all too close.  Indeed, the PCC car was a major factor in keeping the streetcar industry alive just long enough to reach the light at the end of the tunnel—light rail and modern streetcar.  Let’s go back and take a ride through PCC history!

A Question & Answer session and discussion will follow the program.

For the best experience, we recommend downloading Zoom in advance.