Happy Birthday, Mr. Subway

Today I had the pleasure of riding one of the vintage trains that the MTA trotted out to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the subway system. I was not the only geek waiting sheepishly as several standard S trains pulled out of Times Square, a small knot of mostly middle-aged men with fancy cameras and subway-themed attire tipped me off to the track that the vintage cars would pull into. The shuttle train is always short, and this one had only three cars. One was from 1940s, I think, with wicker seats and a pretty foreign-looking subway map. The middle car looked kinda 50s, with teardrop-shaped hangers and linoleum tile floor; the last was baby blue and was probably from the 60s. The coolest part was reading the ads – all vintage. My favorites were a Kool ad from the 60s with a smoking penguin (!) and a movie poster pitching Marlon Brando in The Wild One.

Many passengers seemed to know what was going on (they were announcing the centennial in all the stations all day, and it’s been a news story for months now with various museums putting up exhibitions), but a fair number were visibly amazed/confused. A group of teenagers sitting next to me were giddy, yelling “Yo, man, this is what you call a throwback car!” to no one in particular. An older woman to my left mumbled, “This makes me think I’m drunk.” I think the MTA should run these puppies more often.