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Cabooses or Cabeese?

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Posted by hon30critter on Thursday, March 21, 2019 10:50 PM

maxman
the crossword puzzle in the local paper wanted a 6 letter word and the clue was caboose the answer was "heinie"

LaughLaughLaughLaughLaughLaugh

Well, cabooses do bring up the rear!

Dave

I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!

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Posted by wojosa31 on Thursday, March 21, 2019 10:17 PM

On the Pennsylvania we had "Cabin Car(s)".

It was a "switch", not a turnout.

A "motor" was an electric locomotive.

A switch engine was a "Shifter" or "Drill".

And you can use what ever terminology you feel is correct. BTW, in Canada (at least on the CN), it was a Van or the French equivalent.

Boris

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Posted by Track fiddler on Thursday, March 21, 2019 10:15 PM

maxman

While this thread is still luke warm.......

the crossword puzzle in the local paper wanted a 6 letter word and the clue was caboose

the answer was "heinie"

 

That makes perfect sense since the definition of heinie is a person's buttocks.  That would be perfectly appropriate for the definition of caboose  (rear end).

I don't know how long the cabeese humor thing has been going on in this forum.  I do know prior to Christmas of this last year Ed,  gmpullman posted it on show me something and I busted a gut. I was having a scotch at that time.  And I do remember blowing it across the room.

That's when I first saw it.  I posted back to him and told him of course it's cabeese,  more than one goose is geese,  so that works.   I don't know if he came up with it or it's been going on long before that??? .... but in the two years I've been here, I never seen it prior to that.

TF

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Posted by maxman on Thursday, March 21, 2019 9:50 PM

While this thread is still luke warm.......

the crossword puzzle in the local paper wanted a 6 letter word and the clue was caboose

the answer was "heinie"

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Posted by jeffhergert on Friday, March 15, 2019 6:23 AM

QuincyPAW

How did y'all get this far without "waycar"?  Waycars were common on the C&NW, CB&Q, and on the Rock Island. (Had a secretary on the RI who typed it 'weighcar')

PAW

 

I've never heard any RI people in Iowa use "waycar" for caboose.

Jeff

 

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Posted by hon30critter on Friday, March 15, 2019 2:42 AM

Reynold
It's cabooses when there are only a few of them, but it is cabeese if there's a flock of them ! Reynold Puyallup

LaughLaughLaughLaughThumbs UpLaugh

Dave

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Posted by Reynold on Thursday, March 14, 2019 8:16 PM

It's cabooses when there are only a few of them, but it is cabeese if there's a flock of them !

Reynold

Puyallup

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Posted by BRAKIE on Thursday, March 14, 2019 7:52 PM

doctorwayne
While it's my impression that the "correct" nomenclature sometimes refers to the moveable points as the "switch", we generally took the whole shebang to be the switch, and the points were, of course, points.

A switch is what you use to enter a diversion route so,in railroad speak the whole shebang is indeed a switch and the points is something you check before entering the diversion route to ensure they are completely closed.

Ever see a brakeman or conductor push on the switch handle with his foot? 

That is to ensure the switch handle locks in place.Some times we would place the switch lock in the locking holes  to ensure the handle didn't move thus moving the points just enough to cause the wheels on the car to spilt the switch and derail...

Larry

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Posted by doctorwayne on Thursday, March 14, 2019 1:12 PM

BRAKIE
To the operating crews and dispatchers its a switch..

I agree, Larry.  If I had told the switchman, at the steel plant where I worked, to drop four (ingot) buggies just beyond the north turnout, he would've thought me   to be from another planet.
Naturally, whether they were spotting loaded buggies or clearing empties, they were doing "switching", and surprisingly, using a "switcher", not a "turn-outer".

While it's my impression that the "correct" nomenclature sometimes refers to the moveable points as the "switch", we generally took the whole shebang to be the switch, and the points were, of course, points.

As for caboose/cabeese, I had never heard of them referred to as vans until I got into the social aspect of model railroading, despite watching them run past my front porch in the early years of my existence.  To me, even here in Canada, it's still a caboose, just as a van was what used to be called a "shaggin' wagon".

Wayne

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Posted by BRAKIE on Thursday, March 14, 2019 11:58 AM

wjstix
like that whole 'switch vs turnout' deal.

To the operating crews and dispatchers its a switch..To the white shirts in engineering its a turnout. 

A form 19 might have read-Do not exceed ten ( one aught) mph over Timkin switch at MP123.8. Today they use one zero mph.

Larry

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Posted by QuincyPAW on Thursday, March 14, 2019 11:00 AM

How did y'all get this far without "waycar"?  Waycars were common on the C&NW, CB&Q, and on the Rock Island. (Had a secretary on the RI who typed it 'weighcar')

PAW

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Posted by wjstix on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 3:24 PM

BRAKIE
 
wjstix
It definetely started as a joke or play on words in the railfan / model railroad community.

 

Yes,just like "lashup".. In my 9 1/2 years as a brakeman it was always locomotive consist never "lashup". 

 

 
I think there's a lot of railfan terms that are unknown to 'real' railroaders - like that whole 'switch vs turnout' deal. I remember someone (Jim Boyd maybe?) talking about visiting the LS&I in the eighties and asking some railroaders how they liked their "Alco Alligators". They didn't know what he meant, when he explained they were the chop-nosed former Santa Fe RSD units, they knew what he meant - but they had their own nickname for them (which I can't recall now.)
 
BTW re another reply, I suspect "bobber caboose" has been around a long time, late 19th century most likely. "Bob" goes way back hundreds of years, meaning something short or cut short...like "bobtail" meaning having a short tail, or "bobby sox" being short (ankle high) socks worn by teen girls swooning over a young Frank Sinatra. Back in the 1920's women used to get their hair "bobbed" (cut short), a rebellion from the traditional long hair of previous generations. (Anyone old enough to remember when "long hair music" was Classical music?)
Stix
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Posted by drgwcs on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 2:58 PM

wjstix

It would be an interesting - though time consuming - project to try to work back who first used the term "cabeese". It definetely started as a joke or play on words in the railfan / model railroad community. I don't think the first person to write it meant it to be a 'real' word, or one that would continue to be used. I started reading Model Railroader in 1971, and I don't recall seeing 'cabeese' in print until many years later, maybe 1980's.

If I had to make an educated guess on who used it first, I would guess John Armstrong, perhaps in an article describing one of his track plans. His plans generally included several puns or plays-on-words for place names, like "Ott Dam".

 

I could be wrong but didn't Pro Custom Hobbies coin the term cabeese in their ads. They used a lot of puns and cabeese constantly. The rumor was back in the early 80's their constant use of "Beano" for the B&O- Baltimore and Ohio was what caused the first round of licencing requirements for model railroad products started by the Chessie System.

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Posted by gmpullman on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 1:19 PM

richg1998
And NYC never had a Mars light in the A unit. Realy strange.

As soon as somebody says never along comes someone to the contrary —

 NYC_4506 by Edmund, on Flickr

I don't know off hand if all eight of the C Liners had mars lights. They didn't keep them very long if they did. Not an F3 obviously, but an A unit just the same Wink

Cheers, Ed

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Posted by richg1998 on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 1:04 PM

BRAKIE

 

 
wjstix
It definetely started as a joke or play on words in the railfan / model railroad community.

 

Yes,just like "lashup".. In my 9 1/2 years as a brakeman it was always locomotive consist never "lashup". 

 

By first "lash up" was with a PCM, by BLI, F3 HO A/B NYC set. What is that? And NYC never had a Mars light in the A unit. Realy strange.

Cabeese is another, lol.

My ex use to say, "you guys look cute playing with your toys".

Rich

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Posted by BRAKIE on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 12:41 PM

wjstix
It definetely started as a joke or play on words in the railfan / model railroad community.

Yes,just like "lashup".. In my 9 1/2 years as a brakeman it was always locomotive consist never "lashup". 

Larry

Conductor.

Summerset Ry.


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Posted by Coquihala and Rock Creek on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 11:25 AM
Or how about Vans.

If you cannot fix it with a hammer;

You have an electrical problem!

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Posted by wjstix on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 8:35 AM

It would be an interesting - though time consuming - project to try to work back who first used the term "cabeese". It definetely started as a joke or play on words in the railfan / model railroad community. I don't think the first person to write it meant it to be a 'real' word, or one that would continue to be used. I started reading Model Railroader in 1971, and I don't recall seeing 'cabeese' in print until many years later, maybe 1980's.

If I had to make an educated guess on who used it first, I would guess John Armstrong, perhaps in an article describing one of his track plans. His plans generally included several puns or plays-on-words for place names, like "Ott Dam".

Stix
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Posted by riogrande5761 on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 5:51 AM

The MR forums truly is a coffee clutch.  Clown

Rio Grande.  The Action Road  - Focus 1977-1983

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Posted by OT Dean on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 12:30 AM

DSchmitt

Cabin Cars

Vans

Crew Cars

Crummies

Hacks

 

Also:

Brain box

Louse cage

...and several unprintables.

Deano

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Posted by OT Dean on Tuesday, March 5, 2019 12:27 AM

hon30critter

 

 
MisterBeasley
Cabooses is probably correct, but cabeese works fine here and you will see it often.  Personally, I use cabeese.

 

Maybe if we use 'cabeese' often enough it will be added to Webster's dictionary!Smile, Wink & GrinLaughLaugh

Dave

 

I usually call a gaggle of cabooses "cabeese," as a slang term.  I think it's particularly appropriate in my case because my Dream Railroad (I'm somewhat reconciled to the fact that I'll never again have a model railroad, just bits and pieces) has only bobbers on the roster.  (If it was good enough for the B&O all those years, it's good enough for my proposed short line!)

Come to think of it, I doubt if "bobber" is in the dictionary, either.

Deano

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Posted by rrinker on Monday, March 4, 2019 3:46 PM

Cabeese is a humorous term, the correct word is cabooses. While many Goose are Geese, many Moose are not Meese, it's mooses. Goose is the odd word out. And the old cartoon shown above, that's WAY out there. "meeses" would be like a double plural. The correct word, of course, is mice, but then it wouldn't rhyme with "pieces". Good old Pixie and Dixie (the meeces) and Mr. Jinks, the cat.

Oh how I miss studying German. It's almost 100% according to the rules, no hundreds of little exceptions like English. But that's because English is made up of words taken from many other languages. Alles in Ordnung.

                                        --Randy


Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's

 

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Posted by E-L man tom on Monday, March 4, 2019 3:30 PM

Cabooses!

Tom Modeling the free-lanced Toledo Erie Central switching layout.
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Posted by richhotrain on Sunday, March 3, 2019 4:29 PM

cabeeses!

Alton Junction

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Posted by mvlandsw on Sunday, March 3, 2019 4:12 PM
Cabooze
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Posted by davidmurray on Sunday, March 3, 2019 2:39 PM

Why not go all out and use England railroad terms.  The rear brakeman rides in the Van.  Two or more are Vans.

Problem solved.

Dave

 

David Murray from Oshawa, Ontario Canada
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Posted by Lone Wolf and Santa Fe on Sunday, March 3, 2019 1:49 PM

Image result for i hate you meeces to pieces

One is a mouse. More than one is mice. There is no such word as cabeeses.

Modeling a fictional version of California set in the 1990s Lone Wolf and Santa Fe Railroad
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Posted by dknelson on Sunday, March 3, 2019 11:47 AM

Shades of the old Victor Borge story that since citizens of Portugal are Portuguese, then any one citizen is a Portugoose.  Except for children who are Portugoslings.  He'd then shrug and say "it's your language."

Dave Nelson

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Posted by BroadwayLion on Sunday, March 3, 2019 11:24 AM

Little Johnny was the best football player the school had seen in fifteen years. But the English teacher was demanding that he drop out because his grades were so poor. The coach pleaded with the teacher.

 

"Well, if he can spell one word right, I'll give him another chance.'

 

Johnny, spell coffee.

 

"K, no wait.... C a, no Cof......f...e..........um er E.

 

And the coach says awe, come on give him another chance.

 

 

ROARING

 

 

KAPHY

The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.

Here there be cats.                                LIONS with CAMERAS

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