SILK TRAINS

[NP Eddie]

ALL:

I know very little about the Silk Trains that were run between Seattle and the east.

Am I correct to assume that the Great Northern handled most of them? In the various NP history, I don't find any that were routed via the NP.

Did the GN baggage cars to through to the east coast and did one of the eastern roads contribute cars to that pool?

Did other roads handle silk trains and when was the last of the silk traffic?

Ed Burns

Happily Retired NP-BN-BNSF Clerk from Minneapolis.

[DSchmitt]

Don'y know if silk trains ran on the NP, But I did find this:

The Bull Section section of th March 1965 Model Railroader has some information about the handling of silk trains.  It states that the information presented was obtained from an article in the January 1927 Union Pacific Magazine. 

In the February 1965 Model Railroader the "Dollar Model" article is for the construction of a Southern Pacific silk car. In this article it states that silk train ran from "San Francisco, Seattle, or Vancouver". 

A online index search found several references to slik trains out of Vancouver BC.

[daveklepper]

As far as I  know, they were mostly on the NP, in refrigerated or insulated express cars witih the trains run at passenger speed behind passenger locomotives.  Other railroads did participate, however.

[henry6]

The histories and historical societies of those roads can give you all the information you want...I believe, too, there was a book soley about the silk trade.  Freeman Hubbard used to like to present stories and information on the silk trains and tribulations when he was Editor of Railroad Magazine......

[daveklepper]

Ii am  reasonabllly certain that the NP synbol, Ying and Yang, was also widely used  iin China and still is!   Which country ooriginated it may be diffiecult to determine.

[DSchmitt]

Sone books about Silk Trains found at ABEBOOKS:

http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=10102648700

 

SILK TRAINS THE ROMANCE OF CANADIAN SILK TRAINS OR "THE SILKS"Webber, Bernard    

      Synopsis:

Fascinating history of how the Canadian Pacific, through its ocean liners to China, and crack trains across the continent, was able to capture the lucrative silk trade that shipped raw silk from China to the mills of New York and New Jersey.

 

http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=1217124127

Silk Trains & Other Commerce on Hill's Road   Robert H. Shober, Martin Evoy

Description:

29 cm. 24 pages. This is the Society's Reference Sheet No. 264, September, 1998. A history of the Great Northern's intersection of Pacific Shipping with the continental railroad. Several photographs of ships and cargo owned by the Northern Pacific. Bookseller Inventory # 002678

 

    

[efftenxrfe]

SP silk trains....any mention of them from the Port of San Francisco didn't exist, and I fired for one engineer who hired out in 1919 and another couple hiring out in the late 'twentys, who had no trouble recalling banana trains from China Basin...Mission Bay yard.....

More logical ports for the deliveries from Asia, Great Circle Route-wise, would be Seattle, Prince Rupert and Vancouver, British Columbia and  maybe Portland.....

That SP used cars that were suitable for bananas may hint that the silkworm cocoons probably needed the same environment as bananas, no cold , no hot, might indicate the cars were, when obtained, were snaired for silk trains. Nothing here but theorizing.

The IC ran from the Gulf to the Midwest,  banana trains, which were so hot they were almost molten.  That's true,  i read it in TRA....

Our trains......The one I fired, at least in the early '60's.....well, it became a prime railfan version of the keystone cops.....

Very late call on a Saturday night when i expectet a call for a daylight goat (switchengine on duty between 0630 and 0759 hrs.)

First time changing ends on ATS equipped GP9s and going from an experimental blended (heavy weight oil akin to bunker C fuel engine to a straight diesel which had died cause my scew-ups changing the air brakes encumbered by the ATS and Dual-Fuel equipment. The PCS, pneumatic control switch, which stopped the diesel engines, was connected to the air brake system of the train, so by causing screwed up sequences of commands to the PCS and having no idea that I'd done that,  the engines were stopped and we were due out of town.  PCS actuation killed the fuel pumps until pneumatic reset of the PCS, at this time.

It happened we left Mission Bay, HOT, Hot,  hot.... 

A few cars to set out at LUCKY STORES distribution csnter......a commute to follow us 40 minutes to catch us. Miilbrae had a RR grid, a commercial layout of industrial/distributer's  spurs that looked like acrossword puzzle grid.

We went in.to it, one of us thought he knew how to get to the  Lucky's Stores'spur.  After a couple of, a few  tries we went back to gather up the train and get out of the way of the following commute train we'd stabbed, gored for that matter.

I heard later that the banana shippers flamed. We who were called probably shoul'd have indepently made trips over all the tracks of the Coast and Westrn Divisions. 

But....ain't no way

 

[narig01]

Thought I would poke around the web and found these:

http://collections.mnhs.org/MNHistoryMagazine/articles/54/v54i01p016-031.pdf

http://www.albertarailwaymuseum.com/uploads/6/2/6/6/6266307/stonadraft8.pdf

Rgds IGN

[DSchmitt]

narig01

Thought I would poke around the web and found these:

http://collections.mnhs.org/MNHistoryMagazine/articles/54/v54i01p016-031.pdf

http://www.albertarailwaymuseum.com/uploads/6/2/6/6/6266307/stonadraft8.pdf

Rgds IGN

 

Great find!  the second link to "Silk Trains of North America"  gives a good overall view or the business.

Number of bales imported to west coast ports (Tables from Silk Trains of North America):

 

 

 

[henry6]

The NP and GN were most noted for the silk trains as were the Canadian roads because of the proximity of their west coast ports to Japan...shorter ship trip meant faster delivery to east coast spinners in New England and NY and NJ.  SF and LA were longer trips from Japan and China, more days at sea, so Seattle and Vancouver became the favored ports of entry.

[DSchmitt]

The northern railroads are/were definitely better known for silk trains.

Seattle was by far the leading port. The ocean leg of the trip was one day shorter to Seattle or to Vancouver than to San Francisco.

The numbers show that San Francisco and Vancouver were actually pretty close to equal with San Francisco beating Vancouver in some years. I wonder if the need to cross the International boarder to get to New York  is the reason Vancouvers numbers were not higher.

 

 

[narig01]

I thought I'd throw my 2 cents worth in but looks like you found some gold!

Thx IGN

[aricat]

A railfan friend of mine's Mom grew up in Willmar Minnesota in the 1920's and 30's and told us about the silk trains. They were the hottest thing on the GN including the Empire Builder. They had priority over everything else and they ran them fast. She told us that GN passenger schedules in the 1930's had extensive shipping information about Trans Pacific shipping sailings from Seattle. CP had similiar  information about Trans Pacific services from Vancouver in its schedules before World War II. She thought the last silk trains ran in 1941 on the GN.

[wjstix]

aricat

 She thought the last silk trains ran in 1941 on the GN.

Makes sense, after December 7, 1941 US-Japanese trade dropped off quite a bit....

[henry6]

Traffic was dropping before 12/7/41 in fact. Dupont had discovered nylon with was fast displacing silk as being much cheaper to produce the same type of fabric...