The Night Express was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 named train of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad

Baltimore and Ohio Railroad

The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was one of the oldest railroads in the United States and the first common carrier railroad. It came into being mostly because the city of Baltimore wanted to compete with the newly constructed Erie Canal and another canal being proposed by Pennsylvania, which...

 (B&O) on its route between Detroit, Michigan

Detroit, Michigan

Detroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...

 and Louisville, Kentucky

Louisville, Kentucky

Louisville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kentucky, and the county seat of Jefferson County. Since 2003, the city's borders have been coterminous with those of the county because of a city-county merger. The city's population at the 2010 census was 741,096...

 with major station stops in Toledo, Ohio

Toledo, Ohio

Toledo is the fourth most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Lucas County. Toledo is in northwest Ohio, on the western end of Lake Erie, and borders the State of Michigan...

 and Cincinnati. The Night Express was numbered Train 57 southbound and Train 58 northbound. The service was provided in conjunction with the Pere Marquette Railroad from Detroit to Toledo and with the Louisville and Nashville from Cincinnati to Louisville with connections to New Orleans.

Schedule and equipment

In 1947, southbound Night Express Train # 57 operated on the following schedule (departure times at principal stops shown):

City	Departure time
Detroit (Michigan Central Station) Michigan Central Station Michigan Central Station , built in mid-1912 through 1913 for the Michigan Central Railroad, was Detroit, Michigan's passenger rail depot from its opening in 1913 after the previous Michigan Central Station burned, until the cessation of Amtrak service on January 6, 1988...	11:50 p.m. (via Pere Marquette Railway Pere Marquette Railway The Pere Marquette Railway was a railroad that operated in the Great Lakes region of the United States and Canada. The railroad had trackage in the states of Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and the Canadian province of Ontario. Its primary connections included Buffalo; Toledo; and Chicago.The company was... )
Toledo, Ohio	1:25 a.m.
Deschler, Ohio	2:20 a.m.
Lima, Ohio	3:15 a.m.
Dayton, Ohio	5:13 a.m.
Cincinnati (Union Terminal)	8:40 a.m.
Louisville, Ky.	9:55 a.m. (via Louisville and Nashville Railroad Louisville and Nashville Railroad The Louisville and Nashville Railroad was a Class I railroad that operated freight and passenger services in the southeast United States.Chartered by the state of Kentucky in 1850, the L&N, as it was generally known, grew into one of the great success stories of American business...
source: Baltimore and Ohio System Timetable, July 6, 1947

In the 1940s, the southbound Night Express consisted of two or three head-end cars, an RPO baggage car, 12 sleepers. Between Cincinnati and Louisville there was a dining-lounge car.