Chesapeake & Ohio
Baggage Passenger Combine 409

Built in 1900 by the Pullman Company for the Hocking Valley Railway and was numbered 44. In 1930, the Hocking Valley Railway merged with the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, and this combined was renumbered to 551. It was upgraded with a steel frame and would be set up to separate seating, with one end being for African Americans. Around this time, this combine was renumbered 409. Railroads at the time were the most commonly used mode of intercity transportation. In some states, the Jim Crow law required racial segregation on rail transportation. Separate seating would be used on trains and in stations. If a train traveled into a Jim Crow state, passengers would be humiliated by the requirement of being reseated. By the time this combination retired, the United States Supreme Court decided to outlaw segregation, as well as the United States Congress in 1964. Railroads would still commit to racial segregation up until the late 1960s. This Combine would be used on traveling exhibition trains. Today, it is on display inside the roundhouse at the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Museum.