General Pershing Zephyr
The General Pershing Zephyr was the ninth of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad's Zephyr streamliners, and the last built as an integrated streamliner rather than a train hauled by an EMD E-unit diesel locomotive. It was constructed in 1939 with bodywork and passenger cars by Budd and diesel engine, electric transmission, power truck, and other locomotive equipment by General Motors' Electro-Motive Division. Because its intended Kansas City, Missouri to St. Louis, Missouri route passed near the birthplace and boyhood home of famous World War I General John J. Pershing, the train was named after him. The power car was named Silver Charger, after Pershing's horse Charger, while the passenger cars were named after U.S. Army badges of rank—Silver Leaf, Silver Eagle, and Silver Star.
Unlike previous Zephyrs, the General Pershing Zephyr was completely non-articulated; each car was self-contained and joined to the next by couplers, rather than shared trucks. The inflexibility of the articulated layout had been recognised; it was hard to lengthen, shorten, or replace parts of the train.
The route did not require a high-capacity train nor a powerful locomotive, so the General Pershing Zephyr returned to the pattern of the first Pioneer Zephyr, being a power/baggage car and three trailers.
The power car, 9908 Silver Charger, was unique. It utilised the new EMD 567 V-12 engine developing 1,000 hp, like half of the contemporary EMD E3. It had one Martin Blomberg-designed E-unit A1A passenger truck at the front, driving the outer axles and with a center idler axle, and an unpowered trailing truck, giving it the unusual wheel arrangement of A1A-2.