Bachmann Silver Series N 16859 Northeastern-Style Steel Cupola Caboose, Western Maryland #1863

The caboose was created out of the necessity for the railroad worker to have adequate accommodations while working on the railroad. The interior of the caboose afforded the railroad worker many amenities to bring their life on the rails to more livable standards. Benches to rest on, feather dusters, coal bins cast iron stoves, kerosene lamps and the lazy board where some of these items. The more modern caboose has become a rolling office, efficient and functional, vastly different from its forebears. The origin of the caboose is uncertain.

Cabooses were one of the last car types to change from mostly wood construction to all-steel construction. It was hard to justify replacing a perfectly good wood-bodied caboose with a safer steel body if it wasn't earning money for the company. Nevertheless, safety concerns and legislation had most wood cars replaced by steel by the 1960s. A few railroads, including some of the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe predecessors, used plywood-sheathed cabooses up through the 1970s.

NMRA profile wheels
Needle-point axles
Body-mounted E-Z Mate Mark II couplers