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| Last updated on August 8, 2025
Northern Pacific 84300 is one of 22 double-deck, 86-foot “Big Pig Palace” cars built for NP by Ortner Freight Car in 1966. Ortner also built 61 similar cars for three private firms. They were among the last stock cars built in America.
Ortner Freight Car photo
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Living in Cincinnati and belonging to the Cincinnati Railroad Club allowed me to go on tours with the group. My Dad was secretary of the club at the time, and one of the club members was chief engineer for Ortner. He arranged for a tour of the Covington KY plant at 21st and Augustine Sts. They were building and painting a group of these cars at the time, and somewhere I have pictures of the tour.
My Dad was self-employed and Ortner asked him if he could make epoxy-potted silicon diode switches for their patented Rapid Discharge hopper cars that could be operated electrically. He made a plexiglass model, they accepted it and he went on to make over 12,000 of them over the next 20 years, until Ortner was bought by Trinity Railcar