ATDTDA (17): A.H. Express (465.13)

[Tim Strzechowski]

" ... Frank ran into the Reverend Moss Gatlin driving a strange-looking horseless trolley car, with a miniature steeple and working church bells on the back end, and over the front window, where the destination sign usually was, the lighted-up words ANARCHIST HEAVEN.  Moss was busy picking up every vagrant, ankle-biter, opium fiend, down-and-outer, brakebeam stiff, in fact any citizen looking even a little helpless -- and loading them on board his A.H. Express" (p. 465).
 

Given Gatlin's position as a man of the cloth, the "A.H." suggest both "Allelujah" and "Hallelujah" (Latin and Hebrew spellings for "Let us praise the Lord"), as well as the initials for the vehicle's manifest.
 
[...] The next improvement was the electric trolley car, which was extended from Denver into Littleton in 1907. The line came down south Broadway, went cross-country at Big Dry Creek to enter the town on Prince Avenue and then turned onto Main. Eventually, the line was extended across the South Platte River, south of Bowles Avenue. For a time, the Littleton route included the famous "Cherrelyn" street car on south Broadway, where a horse assisted the motors going up a steep grade, then climbed aboard and rode on the car during the descent. The streetcar line was abandoned in 1926 in favor of cheaper to run and more flexible buses. [...]

http://www.littletongov.org/history/othertopics/transportation.asp

http://www.ausbcomp.com/~bbott/cars/carhist.htm


And perhaps in this description Pynchon is also having a bit of fun here with echoes of Ken Kesey gathering his Merry Pranksters aboard the bus:

http://tinyurl.com/2lrenf