A Train Thread

[kenb]

Rob, I think most all of the semaphores out here in the west are gone as well. Montana Rail Link still had some relatively recently...but I think those are gone know as well, and I haven't seen a wigwag around here for years, but I believe there is still one in Ashland, Oregon.

Single target block signals are disappearing here too; there are still a few around...but every year more of them disappear.

Germany, of all places still has hundreds of semaphores, and as recently as the 1980's still had kerosene lanterns as end markers on freight trains!

I haven't read the link you posted yet, but it sounds fascinating!

 

[kenb]

Mrx those are great videos, thank you for posting the links!

For anybody interested in steam, here is one of my favorites.

The sound of the whistle alone is enough to give me goosebumps...

 

[xyz]

My Brother is a big collector of train stuff. He works for Kansas City Southern (KCS) and has been there since about 1977. He has worked in about all capacities except for actually driving the train. Ironic that as a kid he always said he wanted to drive the damn thing when he grew up. Maybe someday he will get that chance. On the night shift as a brake inspector, he sometimes runs across hobos in the yard looking for a train to jump. Against policy, he always shares some snacks with them and gives them bottled water (company water) and sends them to the train they need to jump to get from Shreveport to New Orleans. He even explains top them the best and safest places to jump off after arriving into the city of New Orleans. I think that the life of a hobo would be interesting for a week or so till hunger set in.

 

[filter-flo_rob]

Dan's Wigwag site.

Hi All ... forgot about this site. I've been following it for years. Anyone interested in wigwag signals; run, don't walk to this site!

Rob.

http://www.trainweb.org/dansrailpix/WIG_WAG_PAGE1c.htm

 

[rp2813]

Ken, that was a great clip you linked. I've been catching glimpses the 4449 whenever it comes through town, ever since it was restored to pull the Freedom Train across the country over 30 years ago. I live near enough to the yard to hear the various steam trains that sometimes pass through here on special excursions. I sure would have loved to have been on that train in the clip!

I can still remember as a little kid in the late 50's being on the City of San Francisco and having a locomotive like the UP 844 pulling us along. Probably one of its last runs before being retired.

Interesting wigwag link. I will have to check them out in downtown Santa Cruz, as my partner and I are over there often. I recall that recently, perhaps in Pittsburgh, there was an effort by local townfolk and rail fans to thwart replacement of a beloved wigwag in that town. I don't know if they managed to sway the UP folks though.

Ralph

 

[rolls_rapide]

And here is one of our's!

Called the 'Tornado', the first newly built steam train for decades. This came from the Daily Mail.

 

[petek]

Ah.. that Tornado is gonna be gorgeous when it gets it green livery

 

[jbuscemi]

There is nothing like train travel comfortable and exceedingly pleasant. I only wish the crew in D.C would realize that We are one of the few world powers that has virtually written off passenger service. Sad indeed!

 

[beadsobleach]

New Haven Railroad

I was lucky to have rode the New Haven RR in the early 60's, my father was working in Greenwich Ct. and the family took the train from Boston to meet him. I remember the dining car with tablecloths and candles, wow, hard to believe. I ordered a hamburger.

 

[petek]

Funny the things you remember now that you mention the dining car. When I was really little, also in the late 50's early 60's I'd accompany my mom every few months on the train to Hamilton to go visit my nana, her mom. Well I wouldn't eat buttered toast at home, it was yukky, but I always ate it in the dining car (tablecloths, china etc) for breakfast because I liked how the black man made it. He was the waiter I guess thinking back now but I prolly figured he made it and growing up here in whitebread Sarnia where there were absolutely zero black people at that time and he was the only one I ever saw I guess it was special.

Anyways as we later find out and most Canadians don't care to admit it or pretend it wasn't that way here things were just as racially divided as they were in the states even though technically it was illegal here and if you were black up until the mid 60's you weren't going to be anything more than a porter, waiter or janitor on either the CP or the CN

 

[rp2813]

Yes, it was typical to have a black porter or waiter back in the "golden era" of train travel but they all seemed to really enjoy their work, like they had railroading in their blood (no underground pun intended).

We had a very accomplished black waiter on our recent excursion and he displayed the same qualities as his predecessors.

 

[dalangdon]

Pullman Porters had a tough row to hoe: Up to the 50's or so, they had to sleep in the men's room in their car, and used a different color blanket than the passengers so people would know they weren't getting a blanket that had been used by a black person. They also had to pay for any breakage or theft, on the part of the passengers.

The waiters and cooks on some roads slept in the dining car. In the trains with dorm cars, they slept in bunks three high.

Yet, they were held in high esteem by their communities, because they travelled about the country, and made a comparitively good income. Their mobility helped grow the civil rights movement, and these jobs lead to the beginnings of a black middle class.

When they tried to form a union, The Pullman Company and the railroads were ruthless in their opposition, and the largely white labor movement was indifferent. Since they could be fired for no reason, their wives did much of the preliminary legwork in forming the International Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, which was (I believe) the first black labor union.

There's a Porter museum in south Chicago. I've never been there, but I'd love to see it sometime.

 

[kenb]

Pullman Porters

I read and article earlier this year about Pullman Porters. Here is an excerpt:

"So much cultural meaning is packed into the figure of the Pullman porter -- racial pride and racial guilt, the faded glory of the American railroad, a level of customer service now extinct -- that it seems beyond mere mortals to inhabit the myth."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/25/AR2008022503163.html

 

[rp2813]

Nice article Ken. Thanks for posting the link.

 

[dalangdon]

Don't forget about the Zephyrettes!

There's a great website about the California Zephyr that has some personal accounts of women who worked as "Zephyrettes": Hostesses on this legendary train.

All of their stories are great, but I especially like the story about Nellie O'Grady.

(John worked as a "Service Chief" on the Amtrak version of the Zephyr for many years, and he says that his job was quite similar. He just didn't have to wear a straight skirt or medium heel ;-)

http://calzephyr.railfan.net/zephyrette/zephyrette.html

 

[rp2813]

"Don't forget about the Zephyrettes!"

No way Dan, I remember our Zephyrettes well. The California Zephyr was truly a special train and I feel fortunate to have experienced it more than once.

 

[jamiel]

I rode the train across Australia in 2001 when me, my college room mate (Dale)and his partner went over to Australia to celebrate Dale getting his FSA (actuary) designation. 3 nights...routing was Sydney--Adelaide--Perth. 500 miles or so in a straight line. Quite majestic and a good way to get over jet lag.

 

[whirlcool]

Did I mention I worked for Amtrak for a summer?
It was in the summer of 1971 and then again in 1972. The very beginning of Amtrak. The idea (as it was explained to me) was that the government was going to try to save the railroads by running them like an airline. They hired quite a number of ex-airline types in the beginning (including the first president, Roger Lewis).
I started out as a ticket agent at the CUS (Chicago Union Station). Later I upgraded to a Customer Service Rep (red coat). There was no training, you just worked with an old salty pre-Amtrak agent who showed you the ropes for three days and then you were on your own. Originally we didn't have computers at the station, we had a direct line to reservations where we'd call just the same as passengers would. Since I was going to school full time during the school year learning the airline industry I thought the railroad industry was very strange. There really was no such thing as a fare between places. If you wrote a ticket and the train went across several different RR companies tracks you had a separate fare segment and ticket segment for each of these companies. The trains going into the NE were the worst for this. The trains for the west we better. It was either, UP, BN or SF all the way on those.
I got to work up in reservations for a week that summer. I don't know what they called the first reservation system but it used these weird Sanders 720 computer terminals. Oh yes, I think it was called the ADR system for automated diagram retrieval system. Anyway all it did was display seats in each car showing you between what city pairs they were occupied. You could have a situation where seats were available but only on certain segments along the way. Then you'd mix and match seats to get people on the train. Agents used to have to write tickets with these changing seat assignments on them.
Right before I left they got something called the "ARTS III" system. It used the airline style PNR system for controlling reservations. A huge improvement. But I don't think that lasted very long before they went to something called "Arrow". I was long gone by that time.
The equipment was pitiful. Santa Fe and Burlington Northern seemed to have the best equipment, and Union Pacific stuff wasn't too bad, but the Penn Central and Illinois Central cars were in horrible condition. Every now and then you'd see a mock up sent by Amtrak WAS to us to see what the future would be like for Amtrak. Usually they were old cars with new carpeting and upholstery (pink and purple) added.
The air conditioning on most of the cars didn't work right. You could always tell when an a/c unit was going out when it was still cool in the car but the humidity was rising. This turned a lot of people away. Also the conductors were known to be very surly. As a red coat, I took the printed consist down to the train and gave it to the conductor who usually hurled insults at me about Amtrak. Those train crews were a very rough crowd.

I took a few trips on Amtrak.(1971) One was to Memphis on "The Panama Limited". It had a lot of college kids going to school in Champaign, IL and Carbondale, IL on it. But past that it was also loaded with a ton of little kids going down to Mississippi to live with Grandma for the summer.

I also took the Denver Zepyhr to Denver once with a group of other Amtrak agents. It was a fun time. Get on the train, have a few drinks, have dinner, go to bed. Wake up and have breakfast and then get off the train in Denver. The most relaxing trip of all!

I also took the Empire Builder to Glacier Park (1973) It was a nice trip. Nice clean train, no breakdowns.

I took a train from Chicago to Houston in later 1972. I had stocked up on non-rev tickets before I left!) It was the train trip from hell! All it had was two coach cars and a mixed sleeper car (I had a roomette) and a bar car which served prewrapped meals. I don't think that damned train went over 20 mph the entire trip. It took us 44 hours to make that trip. Nothing to look at, the bar car a/c went out and it was hotter than hell inside there. I read two books on this trip. I was bored out of my mind! I definitely found out that a train trip is much more fun when you go with a group of people than by yourself.
And believe it or not a few of the people I first met at Amtrak now work at Northwest! There is a Customer Service Agent at TPA that I first met as an Amtrak CSR. Another Amtrak CSR is now a NW F/A. Small world, isn't it?

 

[dalangdon]

John's mother was a group travel planner for Amtrak, who got hired away from Holiday Inn in the very early days of Amtrak. She worked out of the Santa Fe building in the beginning, and then out of another building in downtown Chicago later on. She also handled private car movements, so she knew a lot of interesting people.

John started with Amtrak in the late 70's as a summertime job right after high school, and ended up worked all through college as a station agent and sleeping car attendant. Later, he became a service chief. He has some pretty hillarious stories about the old-timers, as well as some fascinating stories about the lower levels of Grand Central, where they used to park the NYC-CHI trains overnight.

His secretary started with the Great Northern back in the late 60's. That company has a lot of people who have worked there forever.

 

[revvinkevin]

Having not read ANY of this thread....

I though I would ad a couple photos, since there are not nearly enough!