RME Fascinating that the official typescript of an order this significant has a period after the S in the President's signature.
Fascinating that the official typescript of an order this significant has a period after the S in the President's signature.
The S in Harry's name was given to honor his grandfathers, even in his youth he was very consious to include the period. Harry became an interest when in the Army I was chosen to be a military escort for his state funeral. Called "OP PLAN MISSOURI", us Army guys called it "Operation Bury Harry". Quite an honor for me during that Vietnam era thing. Harry proved to be quite the man, history has treated him well.
I hope this comment won't upset Schlimm, but I must comment that Harry is regarded by Israelis as the USA President most friendly.
Ben Gurion is reported to have said to Harry something like "We do not know how history in generaly will treat you, but we in Israel wil always revere your name."l
Dave- Eddie Jacobson was the catalyst that brought it all together. I'm curious as to how is he remembered in Israel?
His long time personal friendship and unfettered access at any time to the White House and persistence and finally convincing that President Truman meet with Chaim Weizmann was the keystone that put things in motion.
Secretary of State George Marshall was not too happy about the whole thing.
Funny how happenstance plays such a huge role in so many historical events.
Eddie was going to take, then out of office, Harry Truman to Israel, to which he agreed, but sadly Eddie died before he could do so.
There was even a suggestion from Chaim Weizmann and support for Eddie Jacobson to become the President of Israel to which Harry said " Israel couldn't nominate a better man...I sincerely hope you won't take it".
Excerpt from The Last Salute http://www.history.army.mil/books/Last_Salute/ch29.htm
In preparation for ceremonies at Union Station, a joint street honor cordon, composed of two officers and sixty-two enlisted men from each of the services, was stationed along Delaware Avenue from Constitution Avenue to the station's semicircular plaza. The cordon then stretched around the southeast arc of the plaza to the east entrance of the station. Each service manned a separate segment of the route. In a nearby parking lot the Army Band was in formation while the 3d Infantry saluting battery waited on grounds west of Delaware Avenue. At the east entrance a national color detail, personal flag bearer, and joint body bearer team were at hand to take General Eisenhower's casket to the train in procession. A joint honor cordon of 1 officer and 135 enlisted men lined both sides of the route that the procession would take to the funeral car on Track 17.
The cortege arrived at Union Station about 1800, via Constitution Avenue and turning left onto Delaware Avenue to pass through the joint street honor cordon. As the hearse entered Delaware Avenue, the 3d Infantry battery began firing a 21-gun salute, spacing the rounds so that the last was fired as the hearse stopped at the east entrance of the station. To assist in the timing of the salute, a vehicle carrying a representative of the battery escorted the cortege over Delaware Avenue and established the proper pace. As the procession moved through the street cordon, each cordon member presented arms when the hearse was within twelve steps of his position and ordered arms after the last vehicle had passed.
At the station, all cortege vehicles except the limousine carrying Mrs. Eisenhower were directed to parking places outside the east entrance. Her car was driven to the diplomat's entrance near the parking lot at the far east end of the station and proceeded through the concourse to Track 17. There Mrs. Eisenhower left the car to await the procession.
The other participants who had arrived with the cortege were guided from their vehicles to positions for the departure ceremony. The body bearer team, at the same time, marched to the rear of the hearse. The honor cordon lining the way to the train presented arms, and the band sounded ruffles and flourishes and played "Hail to the Chief" and "Army Blue." During the last selection, the body bearers removed the casket from the hearse and placed it on a movable bier. The procession then formed for the march to the train.
Leading the way was the escort commander, General O'Malley. Behind him were the special honor guard, national color detail, clergy, body bearers with the casket, personal flag bearer, honorary pallbearers, members of the Eisenhower family, President Nixon and his party, and other mourners. Arriving at Track 17, the procession stopped on the platform at the side entrance of the funeral car and the casket was lifted inside.
The funeral train was made up of a three-unit diesel locomotive and ten cars. The car that would carry the body of General Eisenhower to Kansas was a baggage car, specially prepared for the purpose. There were two crew cars, a car for ceremonial troops making the trip to Abilene, a business car, dining car, lounge car, and three cars for the Eisenhower family and friends. Mrs. Eisenhower rode in the last car, the Santa Fe, which had often been used by General Eisenhower when he was President. Besides the Eisenhower family and close friends, some two dozen persons boarded the train to accompany the general's body to Abilene: railway officials, secret service men, and military officials from the Military District of Washington and the Fifth Army. Ceremonial troops consisted of one officer, eight body bearers, a national color detail of three, and a personal flag bearer; during the journey these troops would act as a guard of honor at the casket.
All passengers were aboard by 1840 and the train left Washington a few minutes later. Using Chesapeake and Ohio, Baltimore and Ohio, Norfolk and Western, and Union Pacific tracks, the funeral train passed through seven states - Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Missouri - to reach its destination in Kansas. The governor of each of these states was advised beforehand of the points and scheduled times at which the train would enter and leave his state, and his help in expediting passage of the train was requested. He was also asked in behalf of the Eisenhower family not to inform the public of the train's route in order to prevent such accidents as had occurred when crowds gathered along the tracks during the movement of Senator Robert F. Kennedy's funeral train from New York to Washington the previous year.
The route of the train nevertheless became known, at least partly as the result of disclosures by train company officials. Either equipped with this knowledge or able to anticipate the progress of the train once it was on its way, people gathered along the track at many points. Stops ranging from ten minutes to an hour were made at several stations for crew changes and train service; the longest were at Cincinnati, St. Louis, and Kansas City. At Mrs. Eisenhower's request, while in Cincinnati the funeral car was marked on the outside with black bunting and flags so that it would be easily identifiable to those watching the train's passage. Around 0645 on 2 April, after more than thirty hours, the funeral train pulled into a siding near the Union Pacific Station in Abilene.
Thanks for the report. My active Army service was Nov '54 - Oct. '56. During this period Jim Crow ws sharply reduced in the armed services, if not eliminated entirely.
IIRC Truman ended segregation in the military in 1947 or 1948, about the same time the USAF was created and the War Department became the Dept. of Defense. FDR had already ordered during the early days of WW2 (if not before?) that any business contracting with the military or other federal agencies could not be segregated or discriminate based on race. That was tested during the war when Jackie Robinson, a US Army officer, refused to move to the back of a bus contracted by the Army to take soldiers to and from the base to the nearest town (in Georgia I believe). Robinson was originally brought up on court martial charges, but the charges were later dropped.
As indicated by the Robinson story, Truman's actions were only partially effective. Eisenhower, with his familiarity with military matters, made it stick. I saw the change at Fort Bragg, near Fayetteville, NC. ACL at FAyetteville, SAL at Southern Pines.
wjstix IIRC Truman ended segregation in the military in 1947 or 1948, about the same time the USAF was created and the War Department became the Dept. of Defense. FDR had already ordered during the early days of WW2 (if not before?) that any business contracting with the military or other federal agencies could not be segregated or discriminate based on race. That was tested during the war when Jackie Robinson, a US Army officer, refused to move to the back of a bus contracted by the Army to take soldiers to and from the base to the nearest town (in Georgia I believe). Robinson was originally brought up on court martial charges, but the charges were later dropped.
That incident occured at Ft. Hood Texas.
Back to the original post, it's important to keep in mind that the federal government had/has only so much control over things that affect railroads. A lot of it is at the state level, so Truman and Eisenhower had 48 separate governments to deal with if they wanted to change something relating to railroading in some cases. Taxing is a good example; property taxes railroads pay on their rail lines, buildings etc. are paid to the state or county government, not the federal.
Even recently, under Obama, plans were put forward for building a high-speed rail line, largely using federal money. One plan under consideration was a Twin Cities to Chicago line, but the proposal had to be dropped because the Governor of Wisconsin (a Republican) refused to go along with the plan (or much of anything Obama wanted to do.) As Rep. Oberstar of MN said, unfortunately, you can't build a bridge over Wisconsin.
This has been a good thread. A wee bit of branch line wandering and although not terribly technical it is a good birds eye view from above of the "before" and the "after" during an incredible short period of time where everything we knew changed dramatically.
I realize we should consider ourselves fortunate in the extreme to have been able to be a part of it and witness this time. Yet somehow in todays world the past is prologue...we had a good thing in place that if extant today would be a good thing not a bad thing.
One can rationalize all they want that things went the way they should have but ultimately they were choices by business and governments and, since we were there and "know" we can look back and point to the mistakes. The future both as a society and environmentally require that "knowing".
I get the feeling that in future generations - they will look back at the early 21st Century as the start of the 2nd Dark Ages - as the populations revert back to warring political tribes - as we have all seen tribal conflict gets a society nowhere except into a declining economy and various forms of slavery.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Geez, I hope your wrong BaltACD but it's possible you are correct.
Also technology could play a role in your Dark Ages concept.
For example- An underground survey crew consisting of three technicians/technologists, sometime's two. Today however its now possible for just anyone to bring down an instrument, spread the tripod legs and walk away... it then levels itself, finds it's own backsight, then takes all the measurements required. Then it transmits the information to a computer on surface which records and stores the information and plots the new plans and sections and sends it electronically to those that require it.
You do not need a qualified surveyor to bring down an instrument. My concern is that over time no one knows what is involved in surveying or how to do it. In that way it is possible we are entering a new Dark Age.
It's an easier argument to refute I suppose. We still retain math skills despite the calculator, but we can all see the decline in math skills, the lowering of the bar if you will, in overall scores. Should it continue for generations it is possible that a large majority of people get accoustomed to just going through the motions without really understanding.
Two general questions and if any of you intend to tar and feather me go for it but please don't make me eat crow!
1.) What would America and the world look like had JFK, Robert, and Edward, each served two consecutive terms which would have added up to a total of 24 years of Kennedy's in the White House, compared to what we have today?
2.) Would the US embarked on high speed rail projects after witnessing what it did for Japan after their first line was placed in service in 1964 or would America continue to ruin the landscape (it took my grandparent's small farm in Texas) with Interstate highways that was started under Ike's leadership?
1) Well lets see...according to Stephen King the world underwent a nuclear holocaust just after JFK's 2nd term..but who reads that stuff anyway. The JFK, and family, Democrats were not todays Democrats by a mile. I think the world would have turned out just fine, lots of fairness and common sense...the Reagan years likely would have occured without Reagan. Still the Dem's would progressively have moved to the left and maybe today we would be staring at a President Bernie Sanders and some sort of socialist utopian nightmare. ( I think Stephen King wrote a novel about that as well).
2) The Interstate Highway System would have been built hell, fire or water ...National security issues and serious manipulation by GM and others. Nothing could have stopped that but it's usage could be vastly different.
However!...there was absolutely no reason to have left the railroads behind and taxed them to death. No reason at all why high speed rail could not have been undertaken full scale coast to coast...perhaps offering electrifcitation of everything rail as an environmental move forward and a reward for the great service in their role in winning WWII. Also critical to implement simultaneously serious deregulation and allowing end to end mergers, preserving numerous competitive routes. Instead of insane clogged and inconvenient airports we could all have incredible fast downtown to downtown super high speed trains....maybe even preserved and prevented the decay of inner city core's. Right across the whole country. Penn Station would still be standing as it was ( cleaned up of course).
No reason at all we could not have had both the Interstate ( or 400 system highways and Trans Canada up here) and high speed rail. We have the highways and airports instead.
Truman stated "What a paradise we could have if we don't make a mistake".....I say we were there, we were close, but we chose not to make it.
Trinity River Bottoms BoomerTwo general questions...
And both of them very good questions, in my opinion - although I have a very different view of the matter than most people here will have...
Personally, I didn't think much of JFK as an actual President (just as most of the leaders in power at that time didn't think much of him). One thing that can be asked is whether the High Speed Ground Transportation initiative that Johnson got through Congress (knowing as he did where all the bodies were buried) would have transpired under that Administration ... I rather doubt it would.
Bobby was another matter - I think he would have ranked among the best American Presidents, had he taken office in 1968, and it's interesting to see who would get the pitcher of warm spit and the big leg up on the Bicentennial election.
It would be nice if we'd gotten out of the Viet Nam entanglement with some kind of honor, but John Kennedy was the fellow in whose name the assassination over there happened (and I think the favor may have been, in no small part, returned) and I don't think he could have resisted the sort of escalation that in the event produced the Gulf of Tonkin resolution and engagement in war activity we couldn't win. Be good to see where all the wasted lives and money might have gone if spent domestically, without the whole pseudo-Keynesian guns-and-butter drivel.
By far the biggest question, though, is what would have happened with the American passenger trains, and to a lesser extent with REA as a 'going concern'. I see no reason why a Kennedy Post Office would have retained extensive RPO (or even bulk mail handling) on railroads, including regionals, and without that the lion's share of passenger trains would have been just as unprofitable and seen as just as worthless (except perhaps as continued excuses for local boondoggling taxation) as the situation played out in the late '60s. The question that should be asked is, "would there have been something like the NRPC" or what the logical Kennedy-administration version of aid to passenger service on private carriers might have been. The follow-on question is what, if anything, could REA have accomplished to provide effective subsidy for the network of secondary and local trains that made its primary delivery model work. It might be a stretch to predict widespread double-stack use of ISO I and III standardized containers (note that it would have been in more or less direct competition with TrailerTrain) but with enough aggressive hunting of other business, it might have been feasible to string an enhanced group of connecting train services together until oil price and politics erupted (I see this happening by the '70s under any Administration) and made continuation more desirable. (I happen to think that use of a modern, high-speed analogue of the RDC, like an SPV2000 designed by actual competent engineers, would have contributed to this.)
I don't think so. We certainly saw nothing even remotely like it tried here (except insofar as the tracked-hovercraft people tried to sell the idea of new elevated guideways out of necessity) and even today there seems to be pious horror against doing the necessary grading for any sensible 'second spine' for the northern end of the NEC -- heck, we're only just getting the first round of actual HSR in Texas and (hopefully) Florida, perhaps with Illinois distantly following; I doubt California will actually produce meaningful passenger-miles at actual high speed in my lifetime). As noted above, only if we had the ability for "wartime" tax-revenue generation with allocation to key Government projects would there be enough for high-speed projects that worked. And there is little doubt in my mind that such money would NOT have been used to save Penn Central, or do the necessary substantial infrastructure improvements and then maintenance for true HSR even at Metroliner scale, let alone alternative projects like electrifying the Reading east of West Trenton and running high-speed service there. Most other places, there was no compelling demand for true HSR divorced from freight service... and a Super C started a few years earlier would still likely have been insufficiently patronized to make it practical. Actual top-down Class 9 track design for HAL was years in the future (although it could have been accelerated given sufficient demand - I had a version of it in the early '70s) and I don't think any railroad was then willing to invest substantially in sprung track fixation and the like.
What I think you'd have seen would be something of equal practical import: the development of the ITS 'automatic highway' initiative that had been more or less sputtering along since the late '40s, similar to the introduction of air brakes in that vast amounts of infrastructure needed to be in place before there was much perceived benefit from the various capabilities ... but once there, oh brother! what advantages there would be (and still are). Just the idea of self-parking cars eliminating much of the actual cause of congestion on limited-access arteries would have been a signal improvement worthy of HTF attention.
As noted, I don't know if there would have been a HSGTI without Johnson in the White House. Or, if there had been, whether it would have favored steel-wheel-on-steel-rail trains over things like TACVs in that era. I strongly doubt we would have had either Metroliners or built examples of the UA TurboTrain without that specific legislation... on the other hand, who knows what might have been promoted or subsidized, perhaps as a demonstration that led to widespread acceptance by carriers (as for motor trains and then high-speed streamliners in the '30s).
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Thanks guys, for your perspectives.
In the case of Penn Central or better yet, Post-PC. Should Conrail have been broken up or left as a major Class One carrier? Personally, I believe it should have remained as an independent railroad. What are your views on this subject?
I must contradict RME and state flatly that widespread use of self-driving cars and trucks will never occure. For reasons, see the November - December 2016 issue of MIT Technology Review. A summary is on the self-driving thread in General Discussion on the Trains website.
Otherwise, he has a very good insight.
To answer the last question. If the USA Government could have gotten a larger return of the tax money used to establish Conrail and subsidize its initial operations until it became profitable, it would have remained independent. The government would have sold stock to the public. But dividing it between NS and CXS gave the government a greater return of the mony spent.
Conrail was privatized in 1987 with an IPO of common stock, taking government ownership out of the equation. You would also have to assume that CSX would never have shown an interest in acquiring Conrail, which is what eventually led to the partition of Conrail.
Thanks for the correction. So it was really CSX’s desire to buy all of Conrail that precipitated the division. If CSX had gotten the whole railroad, it would have had a huge competitive advantage over NS. So the compromise we have was worked out.
Re the political 'what ifs'...
If the US didn't elect Hubert Humphrey in 1968, it's unlikely they would have voted for either Robert or Ted Kennedy. People felt that the country was falling apart (riots, protests etc.) and turned to Nixon believing he would be a "law and order" president. (Wait for laughs to subside....) Plus many Democrats in the Old South were upset by LBJ's civil rights legislation, and turned to Nixon (or George Wallace). Don't think many of them would have supported either Kennedy.
The US has a lot of agreements and treaties that it pretty much has to honor, no matter who is president. We had membership in SEATO (South East Asian Treaty Organization), whose members pledged to help any member under attack by Communist forces. When South Vietnam asked for help, we were bound to help, whoever was president. That being said, I think it could have been realized a lot sooner that it was a lost cause...certainly by 1968 the handwriting was on the wall.
p.s. It's interesting that John Kennedy became president, in that of the four brothers he was the least "natural" politician. Robert was the ultimate political bulldog, and Ted was a 'happy warrior' that even people politically opposite to him (like Barry Goldwater) enjoyed working with. Jack was a very good public speaker, but very awkward in small groups (the opposite of Nixon oddly enough). Had Joe Jr. not died in the war, Jack might have ended up a history professor at UCLA or something similar.
I am glad to see SEATO mentioned--especially it was scarecely even breathed during the Vietnam War. There was great moaning over our involvement--and no mention of our commitment by treaty once we had troops in the area.
Johnny
daveklepper Thanks for the correction. So it was really CSX’s desire to buy all of Conrail that precipitated the division. If CSX had gotten the whole railroad, it would have had a huge competitive advantage over NS. So the compromise we have was worked out.
CSX & NS became involved in a bidding war over all of ConRail, after bid and counter bid through a number of iterations the companies ended up with the compromise 42/58 split between CSX & NS that is what is in place today, along with the creation of the jointly owned Shared Assets operations in New Jersey and the Greater Detroit area. At the time the deal was finally concluded, the financial experts felt that the finally settled price for ConRail two to three times what the real value of the property was.
Conrail was a sucsessor to PC, which should never have been formed in the first place. Before the PC merger, NYC and C&O tried to merge but were stopped by ICC. PRR already owned NW. They would have been better fits. The Conrail split to CSX and NS fixed the PC mistake.
MidlandMike Conrail was a sucsessor to PC, which should never have been formed in the first place. Before the PC merger, NYC and C&O tried to merge but were stopped by ICC. PRR already owned NW. They would have been better fits. The Conrail split to CSX and NS fixed the PC mistake.
Good point Mike, everyone except the government seemed to understand that.
So then the obvious question is had NYC/C&O. Pennsy/N&W happened would Staggers have occurred? It's sort of like, so sadly and pathetically, stoplights are not put in until there are fatalities.
That was the way to go and should have but what were the repercussions? It would be nice to have grey, black and yellow diesels. Have no idea what Pennsy/N&W would have called themselves.
Instead of Norfolk Southern, Norfolk Pennsylvania?
Dave K.- You think the Pennsy executive and employees would allow "Norfolk" top billing...not a chance. How about "Union Atlantic" as in Union Pacific. Ah, probably not.
New York, Chesapeake, and Ohio Central works ok. Very railroady. Not quite as clumsy as Burlington Northern Santa Fe is.
Miningman So then the obvious question is had NYC/C&O. Pennsy/N&W happened would Staggers have occurred? It's sort of like, so sadly and pathetically, stoplights are not put in until there are fatalities.
I would think that the merger alignments suggested would have delayed the collapse in the Northeast but not prevented it. There was enough red ink coming out of PRR and NYC that it would have absorbed a fair chunk, if not all, of the coal profits of the Pocahontas railroads. Dereg would have come at about the same time based on the political climate (Commercial aviation was de-regulated at about the same time).
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