| Burlington Northern Railroad SD9 6138 at Clyde, Illinois on an unknown day in January 1981, Kodachrome by Chuck Zeiler. Built in March 1954 as CB&Q SD9 336 (c/n 18995) on EMD Order 5313, it became BN 6138 and was retired in April 1983. There is an interesting story written by Grant V. W. Roth (one of the early designers) about the development of the Mars light in the November 1990 issue of Mainline Modeler Magazine. Briefly, the concept of the oscillating warning light was the idea of a Chicago fireman, Jerry Kennelly, who around 1919 manually wiggled a spotlight on his fire truck to attract the attention of motorists to get them to move out of the way. Later he added a windshield motor to move the spotlight. After some experimentation with the light mounted on a confiscated Al Capone "whiskey running" Packard Eight Sedan owned by the Village of Oak Park (Mr. Kennelly was now an Oak Park Motorcycle Patrolman), a prototype was built and displayed at an AAR show, attracting the attention of Charles Longham, the Safety Officer of the C&NW. Another prototype was built and installed on a C&NW 4-6-2 (#2908), but was destroyed due to excess vibration. By 1936 more tests were run, this time in Proviso Yard at night, but the tests were soon curtailed due to backed up traffic by curious motorists wondering about the strange blue light (originally, a blue lens was used). During road tests, a large bird struck the light, and a clear lens was obtained at a Milwaukee paint shop. Officer Kennelly met Frank Mars (of Mars Candy Company) after a near-fatal shooting as the officer pursued bank robbers in Oak Park, wounding him in the jaw and causing hearing loss on his left side, and resulting in his retirement and a disability pension. Samples were produced in the Mars Candy Company's machine shop, and Mr. Kennelly applied for a patent for his figure 8 moving beam warning light, and assigned the design to Mars Light Company. |