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Cable cars were one invention and these first were introduced in hilly San Francisco, whose steep grades made some routes impossible for horses. Andrew M. Hallidie demonstrated his rope railway in 1873, and soon the system was in use across the city by several companies, on flatland services as well as on the famous hills that kept some cable routes going well into the electric era. Although periodic efforts were made to abolish the last surviving lines following World War II, the cable cars became a symbol of San Francisco, and some $70 million in public and private funds were spent to refurbish the system and the cars in 1984. Cable cars had become untouchable icons, and laws were passed forbidding sale or scrapping of any more cars; some that had gone to other uses were returned to San Francisco and rebuilt, though a 1994 policy reversal, arguing that it had become less costly to build more or less authentic cars brand new, led to the auctioning away of some of the very cars which had been returned earlier.
Back in 1955, during a final spate of contraction of the cable system, when the cars were still deemed expendable, Monsieur Joseph Gest, a well known Montreal antique auto enthusiast, purchased a car and moved it to Canada. After M. Gest retired to Arizona, part of his collection went to contractor Herbert J. O'Connell. Financial adversities led to transfer of the collection to M. Paul Bienvenu, another collector. Various commercial interests sought to obtain the car for such purposes as a novelty fast food outlet, but Mr. Bienvenu was reluctant to see something that historic put to such a use, and contacted Seashore. Museum members quickly raised the necessary funds to purchase this traction jewel and transport it to Maine. Seashore's No. 48 is a 1906 classic built by San Francisco's local Holman Car Company to replace an earlier car of the same number that had been destroyed in a fire that followed the 1906 Earthquake. Car No. 48 served the California Street Cable Railroad Co., last of several independent companies. Part of its Hyde Street line, on which No. 48 ran, is one of the three cable routes still operated by the San Francisco Municipal Railway.
History from Historic Cars: The National Collection at the Seashore Trolley Museum by Ben Minnich
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