Nashville Chattanooga & St. Louis had 325 of these USRA 2-bay hoppers. NC&St.L ran from Memphis east to Nashville, Chattanooga and Atlanta. For a time, they had a route to St. Louis by way of Evansville but in 1879, L&N bought a 55% stake in the NC&St.L and transferred that line to themselves. The NC&St.L finally merged into L&N in 1957.

These ready-to-run cars feature:

• Die Cast Slope Sheet-Hopper Bay-Center Sill Assembly
• Injection Molded Plastic Sides, Ends, and Hopper Doors
• Fully Molded Brake Tank, Valve and Air Lines
• Coal Load
• Lever-Style Hand Brake
• Cody Mounted Magnetically Operating Knuckle Couplers
• Close Coupling
• Metal Wheels

Bessemer & Lake Erie was known for loading iron ore from boats on Lake Erie for steel mills in southwestern Pennsylvania. They would then re-load the same hoppers from nearby coal mines and deliver them back to Lake Erie. However, B&LE used much larger hoppers for this work. These little 50-ton cars were loaded with coal for delivery to retail dealers and small and medium sized industries across the region. This is because these customers often had lightly built coal-dump trestles that would not withstand a 70 or 90 ton hopper. These are coming in 6 road numbers.

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