Freight
The A&Y did not have any freight revenue equipment according to the ICC
annual reports. They did own/lease some MoW cars, and cabs from the Southern Railway, but I can find no
evidence indicating that the A&Y
owned any freight cars. Those cars seen on the line were most likely Southern flat
cars for the granite quarry or boxcars (lots of boxcars given the era!), hoppers, and pulpwood cars from various
interchange roads. The Southern, N&W, old Norfolk Southern, ACL, and the SAL
interchanged with the A&Y at Rural Hall, Stokesdale, Greensboro, Cumnock and Sanford.
I would expect that any of these roads' cars would predominate on the A&Y,
though I have seen photographic evidence of interchange freight cars from much more
distant lines on the A&Y.
Passenger
Although the A&Y did lease passenger cars from the parent Southern Railway, I have no
evidence that these cars were lettered for the A&Y. In fact, everyone
I've spoke to who rode or lived alongside the A&Y states that the cars were
lettered for the Southern Railway. The CF&YV did own it's
own passenger cars, but it is not clear that any of these made it to the A&Y or were
lettered for the later road. Passenger service ceased in 1939 and, sadly, the road
has seen freight only trains ever since.
The typical passenger train for the "Shoefly" as it was nicknamed,
would have been a baggage car and two coaches pulled by one of the Ten-Wheeler
passenger locomotives. The cars were wooden cars, probably many with truss
rods underneath. There are a couple of photographs of the Shoefly
available which I hope to add here soon.
Non-revenue
The A&Y did have Maintenance of Way (MoW) equipment lettered for its own
use. A photograph from the family of Sandy Isley shows a MoW car clearly
lettered for the Atlantic & Yadkin in the background at Belews Creek.
Although there are other photos of MoW equipment operating on A&Y track,
e.g., Jordan spreader photographed near Battleground in Greensboro, this Belews Creek
photo is the only one known with A&Y lettering clearly evident on the
equipment. Go to the Belews
Creek page to see this photo.