Hi,

In the past 2-3 months I saw a story somewhere where the PRR shops in Harrisburg PA had two A-B-A units that were draw bar connected so the three units carried the same number with different letters A, B and C for the unit designation.

The need was great to put another loco back into service. So the shop fellow took the parts of the two locos and reconnected them with the draw bars. So one A-B-A had two different numbers. The second set was repaired (also with mixed numbers).

A few months later, a tower man saw two different trans on the mainline side by side with the leading locomotive having the same number! It was not long after that that the A units and B units received couplers all around and were renumbered. The small A, B, C, etc were not with the locomotive numbers and tower operators could not see the small lettering in the day much less at night when this incident occurred.

I do not know if UP started out with drawbars but it could have happened on most any railroad that used drawbars.

Doug vV