By Justin Franz 

The Nevada State Railroad Museum in Carson City has acquired a historic Virginia & Truckee combine passenger car. Car 20 returned home to Nevada for the first time in decades on December 12.  

The wooden car was built in 1907 by the Hicks Locomotive & Car Works of Chicago and was the last new passenger car purchased by the V&T. It is also one of only a handful of surviving Hicks products still in existence. The original V&T sold the car to MGM Studios in 1947.  It was featured in films such as “Cimarron” and “The Man Who Shot Liberty Vance.” Eventually, No. 20 was auctioned to John D. Bentley of Pasadena, Calif., in 1970. Later it was donated to the Orange Empire Railway Museum (now Southern California Railway Museum). 

V&T 25 backs Car 20 into the Carson City Shop on December 12. Photo by Adam Michalski.

The Nevada State Railroad Museum officially acquired the car on December 10 and loaded it on a truck for the trip home to Nevada. As luck would have it, when the car arrived in Carson City on December 12, V&T 4-6-0 25 was fired up and was used to switch car 20 into the shop; it was the first time since the 1940s that the locomotive and car had been together.

“Since it was one of the few remaining Virginia & Truckee pieces that was likely to be available for acquisition, it made sense to return No. 20 back to Nevada,” wrote NSRM Curator of History Adam Michalski. “The museum would like to thank SCRM, the Friends of the Nevada State Railroad Museum, and the Nevada Board of Museums and History for their assistance in returning No. 20 home to Nevada.”