By Railfan & Railroad Staff

The Whippany Railway Museum will mark the 40th anniversary of the last run of the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western multiple unit electrics on September 8, with special excursions. 

For more than a half-century, the Lackawanna (and later Erie Lackawanna and NJ Transit) used multiple unit electrics, known simply as “MUs,” on suburban commuter service in New Jersey. The DL&W acquired 141 motorized MUs and 141 unmotorized trailers. The cars remained in service until August 1984. After the cars were retired, dozens of them would end up at tourist railroads and museums up and down the Eastern Seaboard; of course, few are actually preserved in the classic DL&W Pullman green. 

But one car that is preserved in its DL&W appearance is “Club Car” 2454, which also led one of the final MU excursions. Car 2454 was built in 1912 by Barney & Smith Car Co., in Dayton, Ohio, and later converted to an electrical propulsion MU car by American Car & Foundry Co. in 1930. During that conversion, it became a subscription club car, reserved for the railroad’s most exclusive commuters who paid an extra fare every month to ride it. In order to ride in the car, an individual had to be sponsored and voted in by the other members. The car was assigned to the Hoboken-to-Gladstone run, on a train known as “The Millionaire’s Express.”

After the car was retired in 1984, it was acquired by the United Railroad Historical Society of New Jersey. The car sat in storage for two decades before it was donated by URHS to the Whippany museum, which began an extensive restoration that was completed in 2021. 

On September 8, Club Car 2454 will lead special excursions out of Whippany and passengers will receive a commemorative “Lackawanna Electrics” keepsake (while supplies last). 

For more information and to buy tickets, visit www.WhippanyRailwayMuseum.net.