26 connected Norfolk, Virginia, and Cincinnati, Ohio, covering 676 miles (1,088 km) in about 15 hours and 45 minutes behind streamlined 4-8-4 class J steam locomotives.

[1] Amid the Great Depression of the 1930s, N&W leaders sought to offset declining ridership revenue by modernizing their passenger trains with streamlined designs.

[5][6] After World War II, N&W president Robert H. Smith and other executives were determined to keep passengers riding.

[7] On April 28, 1946, the railroad launched the Powhatan Arrow, a luxurious passenger train that ran between Norfolk and Cincinnati daily.

[8][9] Drawn by a class J locomotive, the six-car trains included five Pm-class coaches and a re-equipped De-class dining car—all painted in a Tuscan red with golden yellow stripes and letterings.

[8][10] The Powhatan Arrow was advertised as N&W's flagship passenger train and, despite its reuse of older equipment, as one of America's first new postwar streamliners.

[8][11] On November 24, 1946, the N&W suspended the Powhatan Arrow to comply with an order by the federal Office of Defense Transportation, which told railroads to temporarily cease use of 25% of their steam locomotives to alleviate a severe shortage of coal caused by a massive coal miners strike.

[12] In June 1947, the Powhatan Arrow consist was given additional tavern-lounge cars, which were rebuilds of the Pm-class coaches Nos.

[8][13] These cars were equipped with N&W-built mahogany furniture, ashtrays cast at the Roanoke Shops' foundry, and formica counter tops and tables.

[8][17] At Petersburg, trains connected to Richmond, Virginia, via Atlantic Coast Line; at Lynchburg, to Durham, North Carolina; at Roanoke, to Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and to the Southern Railway's (SOU) Birmingham Special and Tennessean passenger trains.

[18] In April 1946, the month of the Powhatan Arrow's debut, N&W ordered 18 new passenger cars for the train from Pullman-Standard for more than $2 million.

[20] The car company promised delivery in the second quarter of 1947, but missed the deadline by nearly two and a half years while it completed orders for other railroads.

25 train had nosed out the New York Central's James Whitcomb Riley train as the third-fastest American long-distance run, maintaining an average speed of 65.4 mph (105 km/h) on the N&W main line, running 58.9 miles (94.8 km) between Suffolk and Petersburg, Virginia.

[26] In 1955, the N&W sought to reduce the Powhatan Arrow's operating costs in the face of declining ridership by shortening the trains to just five cars: removing two P3 straight coaches and replacing the P1 locker coaches with combine cars that also handled a small amount of mail business.

[38][39] That year brought more changes: the connections with the Birmingham Special and Tennessean were no longer advertised on the Powhatan Arrow timetables,[19] and in October, train No.

[40] In late 1958, some of the class J locomotives briefly returned to passenger service, including the Powhatan Arrow, when the ACL recalled its E-units to handle heavy winter traffic in Florida.

[7][37] It was around that time that the connection to Richmond was discontinued and the passengers, disembarking at Petersburg, were advised to take the Greyhound bus.

25's departure time from Norfolk was set back to 6:10 a.m. with checked baggage service stops between Bluefield and Cincinnati, giving train No.

16-26 arriving in Norfolk at 4:45 a.m.[40][42] On October 28, 1967, the Powhatan Arrow ran its last RPO operations with the U.S. Post Office.

[42] In December of that same year, the Powhatan Arrow's dining cars were now operated between Roanoke and Clare Yard in Mariemont, Ohio on train No.

[40][43] Due to competition with airlines and road vehicles, passenger ridership on every railroads, including the N&W, started to decrease.

[45] It was saved from the scrap heap by Washington, D.C., lawyer W. Graham Claytor Jr., who convinced N&W that the locomotive remained in good condition after its 1956 accident.

514 was acquired by the Roanoke Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society (NRHS), which announced plans to restore it to its original Tuscan red livery.

[53] The D1 dining cars had 36 seats with a kitchen equipped with modern appliances such as an electric dishwasher and garbage disposal unit.