J. Chris Allan Wrote:
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> Now we know 'The rest of the story".


To Chris and especially, the secretive "Dr.Zarkoff" .. I stand by my original post. At least I can produce documentation and eyewitness testimony--can YOU ??

Per Chris Allan's hint, let's indeed tell the ENTIRE story...

Regarding the Market Street Railway streetcar that was painted white and referred to by MSR as the "School Car" and nicknamed "San Francisco" :

Because of World War II school trips were ended. After the Muni takeover in 1944 of the Market Street Railway, the "San Francisco" was placed, by 1946, in storage behind a tarp curtain at the rear of the Geneva car house. The final time the "San Francisco" ran was on December 12, 1948, as part of a Bay Area Electric Railroad Association (BAERA) charter that also included the then new double-ended PCC car No. 1015.
Shortly afterwards the City sold the famed white parlor car to Joe Levine, a scrap metal dealer for $137, despite an all-out effort by the BAERA to save the car. The "San Francisco" was then the only parlor streetcar left in the entire county owned by a street railway. BAERA members then offered Levine $200 for the car "as is." His answer was that the car would only be sold for $1,000! Muni was willing to substitute another car, but Levine again said "no."
Addison Laflin, the editor of the BAERA's Review wrote in the January 29, 1949 edition that "Friday, January 14, will go down as the blackest day in San Francisco electric railroading, for on that day Joe Levine took the 'San Francisco' off its trucks, placed on a flat bed truck and carted it off to his Third Street junk yard." Soon Levine sold all the metal under gear for scrap and the body for $750 to be used as a hotdog stand in El Verano in Sonoma county. Fortunately, as a hot dog stand the body was not altered.
As part of San Francisco's Maritime Museum ill-fated Project X to create a transportation museum in the Haslett Warehouse, the body was purchased by the Maritime Museum and moved to the Kortum ranch in Penngrove, Sonoma County. After the failure of Project X, the Maritime Museum gifted the San Francisco's body to BAERA. It arrived at Rio Vista Junction circa-1980 and was placed in storage in carbarn number two. Today the "San Francisco" rests on the trucks of former Market Street Railway car No. 974.
Mrs. Kahn Gardner, the daughter of MSR VP, later Pres, Samuel Kahn-- during her May 2005 visit to the Western Railway Museum visited the "San Francisco." It was not as she remembered. A century plus has taken its toll on the wooden body. Perhaps, someday the "San Francisco" will be rebuilt to carry passengers on the mainline of the Museum.
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Ok folks-- put THAT story in your brain file, and let's return to "Traction Meadows" at BELLOTA, on the stub of the Stockton, Terminal and Eastern RR.. How would a MSR streetcar wind up in the Stockton area ??
Gets more interesting ...

Executive Vice President of the Market Street Railway in San Francisco, as of November-1925 ,was “Samuel Kahn”… At one time, Mr. Kahn and his family lived in Stockton, CA.
Regardless of Mr. Kahn’s high position with the Market Street Railway, he remained half owner of the "Stocton, Terminal & Eastern Railroad" until at least 1950...

The individual alluded to by Dr.Zarkoff for getting the traction cars placed out there in that location, was probably "Howard T. Wolfe", retired transmission engineer for Pacific Bell.
Lovingly referred to by all as "Uncle Howie" ...
Howard was always purchasing and storing rail cars, parts and misc bric-a-brac. His home in Richmond,CA resembles a WALMART for "traction parts"..
When the Key System abandoned service in 1958, two Bridge Units were saved as well as a Lehigh-type streetcar # 271. KEY Unit 186 was donated by the Toll Bridge Authority to BAERA.
KEY Unit 182 was donated to the "Key Route Railway Association". Various individual pieces of KEY "Work Equipment" and "Maintenance of Way Equipment" was either donated to BAERA or purchased outright by "Uncle Howie".. One of Howie's rail purchases was KEY Line Car # 1218.
So you can readily see that the KAHN family and Uncle Howie played some pivotal role in getting traction equipment to the boondocks of BELLOTA...

Regarding MSR # 974 in particular... It is quite ironic that the current Market Street Railway would like to restore sister car # 978 for the big Muni celebration in 2012..
Here is what "Garrett C. Garnes" states about that possibility :

"From what I have been reading, the major step preventing MSR #978 from being put back in service is a lack of trucks for the car. I recall, however, that the Western Railway Museum still has the trucks from sister car #974, which was unfortunately lost to vandals before it could be relocated to the museum site.

Can the trucks from #974 be used on #978? It would seem appropriate, using parts from a car that didn’t make it, to help restore a car that survives, especially sister cars from the same company.

Cheers to all and especially to the good Doctor..

KRK
Garrett C, Garnes