State of Maine Express

The State of Maine was an overnight passenger train between New York City and Portland, Maine. Connections were available at Portland for Maine Central Railroad trains to most Maine locations, and at Grand Central Terminal for trains to the western and southern United States. Travel was over the New Haven Railroad (now Amtrak's Northeast Corridor) into Connecticut where trains left the Northeast Corridor to reach the Boston and Maine Railroad in Worcester, Massachusetts. Trains continued over the Boston & Maine to Portland. Service initiated in 1913 used the Boston and Albany Railroad between Springfield, Massachusetts and Worcester; but New Haven routing from Groton, Connecticut was used after the mid-1920s and trains were routed through Providence, Rhode Island after World War II.^[1]

Equipment

The core service was through sleeping cars between New York and Portland. One of these sleeping cars was sometimes carried on connecting Maine Central trains to or from Bangor, Maine. The State of Maine also carried through sleeping cars between New York and Concord, New Hampshire until 1958. Coaches were also carried. As the last Maine passenger train with connections south of Boston, the State of Maine carried increasing numbers of express and mail cars during the declining years of passenger service.^[1] From delivery of stainless steel sleeping cars to Boston & Maine and New Haven in 1954 until service ended on October 29, 1960, the train north of Worcester typically required a pair of Boston & Maine or Maine Central EMD E7s to pull a long string of head-end cars followed by a single stainless steel New Haven coach and a single stainless steel sleeping car. Many of the head-end cars were former troop sleepers converted to baggage cars.^[2] Most were New Haven and Boston & Maine cars, with a few from the Pennsylvania Railroad and the New York Central Railroad. Many resort owners operated both a summer resort in Maine and a winter resort in Florida. These individuals required newspapers from each location; and those newspapers were often carried in baggage cars of the Maine Central, Atlantic Coast Line Railroad or Florida East Coast Railroad.^[3]

References