Union Pacific Dome Coach #7015 "Challenger"

Union Pacific Dome Coach #7015, Challenger, was built by Pullman-Standard in November 1958 as part of Pullman-Standard's last group of dome cars: five for Union Pacific's City of St. Louis and one of the same design for the Wabash railroad. This was the last of the Union Pacific cars, and was originally assigned to service on the City of St. Louis, a train operated jointly with the Wabash (the one car built for Wabash was also assigned to this service). In June 1972, the car was sold to AutoTrain for use between Virginia and Florida, becoming AutoTrain #702. (It is rumored that before being sold to AutoTrain, it was accidentally shipped to Alaska with a group of cars that had been purchased by the Alaska Railroad, and had to be sent back, but this has not been verified) After AutoTrain shut down in April 1981, the car was sold to A. J. Daniels of Tulsa, Oklahoma in December 1981, and was subsequently sold to Kansas City Southern via Mid-America Car Company in 1982. The car was assigned KCS #22 and was intended for use on a revived Southern Belle passenger train that was aborted. The car remained in storage in AutoTrain paint at Mid-America Car Company in Kansas City until being re-purchased by Union Pacific via Northern Rail Car in October 1990. After being refurbished, the car was given the name Challenger, after Union Pacific's all-coach Challenger train that ran between Omaha, Nebraska and Los Angeles, California from May 1936 to April 1971.