Memorable company names

[Deggesty]

Miscellaneous responses and notes when catching up on threads begun while we were traveling.

I had heard the MoPac called "MOP."

Until we heard a radio station in Sault Ste. Marie while we were driving in the U. P. last month, I did not know how to pronounce "Sault," even though I knew of "The Soo Line." I had thought more of a French pronunciation.

"Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer" français" is approved spelling in France. "De" = "of" or "from;" "du" = "of the(masc.)" or "from the(masc.);" if "the" is feminine, the French is "de la."

Champion Davis (long-time President of the ACL) did not refer to the competing road by name; to him, it was "That other railroad."

The ACL moved its headquarters from Wilmington to Jacksonville several years before the merger with "That other railroad." The SAL headquarters remained in Norfolk.

At last, I know how to pronounce "Conneaut" and "Youghiogheny." Thanks.

[dakotafred]

Thank you to SALfan and, belatedly, to cudjoebob (from 5-18).

Re. naming merged roads, my old pals on the U.P. claimed that the surviving company was evenhandedness itself in absorbing the S.P. "We used the first name from 'Union Pacific' and the last name from 'Southern Pacific.' "

[SALfan]

dakotafred

Henry6 says above: "Atlantic Seaboard would have been nice."

 Bingo! Longtime Trains readers will remember DPM lamenting the redundancy of SCL and saying the logical choice would have been Atlantic Seaboard Line. The execs of that day weren't stupid ... was Seaboard the ascendant company and insistent on primacy? (My memory fails me here.)

Seaboard was definitely not the ascendant company.  ACL was stronger financially, and had most if not all the power in the combined RR.  Having Seaboard come first in the SCL name, and I believe the combined company using the former Seaboard's HQ building in Jacksonville, were about the only bones the former Seaboard employees were thrown.

 I agree, Atlantic Seaboard would have been a better name for the combined RR.

[ValleyX]

There was a eastern-southeastern narrow gauge line in Ohio called the Bellaire, Zanesville, and Cincinnati, which locals called the Bent, Zigzag, and Crooked. The depression finally killed it in about 1931.

[cefinkjr]

I was born and raised in Western Pennsylvania...lived for several years within hearing range of the B&LE.  It's Connie-ought; never heard Coney-ought until I heard Bill O'Reilly say it that way.

Memo to NKP Guy: There's a difference between "Don" and "Dawn"?

 Also to NKP Guy: US&S was also known as Union Swipe and Swindle in some circles.

Memo to sandiego:  That was the Pittsburgh, McKees Rocks, and Youghiogheny (Yes, I checked the spelling.)  The local pronunciation is roughly yock a gany with a mild accent on the first syllable, the first a being short, and the second a being long.  A native would also recognize Yock as a logical contraction.  To improve your knowledge of geography, check this Wikipedia article on the Yock.

[DMUinCT]

Can you ever forget your "MA and PA". ( Maryland and Pennsylvania Railroad)

A trip from York PA to Baltimore MD

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

My favorite in this category is Lake Erie & Western (NKP Peoria line), Leave Early & Walk.

[dmoore74]

AgentKid

Thanks, Erik.

And as Erik says, on a different note - Toronto Hamilton & Buffalo - To Hell and Back.

Pacific Great Eastern (BCRail/CN) - Prince George Eventually - Pray to God Every Day. This railway traverses some beautiful if hair raising terrain.

Bruce

 

Pacific Great Eastern also known as the Please Go Easy.

[AgentKid]

Thanks, Erik.

And as Erik says, on a different note - Toronto Hamilton & Buffalo - To Hell and Back.

Pacific Great Eastern (BCRail/CN) - Prince George Eventually - Pray to God Every Day. This railway traverses some beautiful if hair raising terrain.

Bruce

 

[erikem]

AgentKid

Thanks Larry. I have always wondered about that. St. Paul, St. Louis, but who is St. Boniface, as in the town in Manitoba. I'm going to have to look into that.

 

More like who was St. Boniface. He brought Christianity to the Germans and was killed by them after cutting down one of their most revered trees.

On a different note - the Nevada County Narrow Gauge was usually referred to the Never Come, Never Go...

- Erik

[ValleyX]

The New York, Chicago, and St. Louis, is a clunky name. Ah, but what it became known as, the Nickel Plate Road, rolls off the tongue. My tongue, anyway. Chesapeake and Ohio sort of flows but I always thought Chesapeake Western, the shortline in Virginia, flows. How did Norfolk and Western take over the Atlantic and Danville, which isn't too clunky, and rename it Norfolk, Franklin, and Danville, which is.

[blue streak 1]

Tallulah Falls RR     ---  TF  --  Total Failure 

[Bob-Fryml]

Trainrev

 Beautiful -- Denver and Rio Grande Western

 Not so beautiful -- Dirty, Rotten, and Getting Worse (DRGW)

How about "Dangerous and Rapidly Growing Worse" as suggested by someone who's always loved the "Crash, Bounce and Quiver" and one of the latter road's important eastern connections, the "Eerie Lack-o'-money?" 

[Trainrev]

 Beautiful -- Denver and Rio Grande Western

 Not so beautiful -- Dirty, Rotten, and Getting Worse (DRGW)

[cudjoebob]

to dakotafred: when I hired out with SCL in '73 in miami, (former SAL territory) I asked the same question, "in the '67 merger, which was the stronger company". the answer was a safe "they were equal". because of layoffs in miami, I later moved to waycross, ga. (former ACL territory). I was asked "are you a coast line man or a seaboard man?" the guys in waycross didn't like us seaboard 'refugees' from miami coming up and seniority bumping the local coast line men! I got the feeling I was working for Atlantic Coast Line, not Seaboard Coast Line! (8 years after the merger).

[cudjoebob]

well, I didn't expect to be censored, so I will have to explain my previous post: "that other railroad" in south florida is the 'Florida East Coast'. it's reporting marks are FEC. the conductor merely added an 'E' and an 'S' to the reporting marks and there you have it! because of the violent strike at the FEC in the '60s, and the fact that the management wouldn't give in to the strikers, there was a lot of hard feelings against the FEC of the '70s. some of the guys I worked with on SCL had come over from the FEC and they considered those who worked on FEC as the worst of the worst scabs!

[erikem]

dakotafred

Henry6 says above: "Atlantic Seaboard would have been nice."

 Bingo! Longtime Trains readers will remember DPM lamenting the redundancy of SCL and saying the logical choice would have been Atlantic Seaboard Line. The execs of that day weren't stupid ... was Seaboard the ascendant company and insistent on primacy? (My memory fails me here.)

 

I liked "Atlantic Air Line" used as one for one of the layouts in Wescott's 101 Track Plans.

[cudjoebob]

a nice flowing name is the French national railways SNCF: Societe Nacional Chemin du Fer. not positive about the spelling, but it has a nice flow to it. also, if you can get the accent down right, how about Suid-Afrikaans Sporweg. (put a good roll into the first 'r') the best sounding american name would be Delaware, Lackawanna, & Western. for clunkiness, the full name of the CNO&TP and the big 4 side of the New York Central both are too much of a mouthful. I used to work local switch jobs with Seaboard Coast Line in south florida in the '70s. (I like that name). whenever we had cars to interchange with 'that other railroad' in south florida, if the conductor was an old head he'd say "we've got some '***' to drop off"!

[NKP guy]

 Memo to The Butler

re:  pronunciation of Conneaut

Conneaut, Ohio is in the northeastern-most part of Ohio's old (Connecticut) Western Reserve, but it takes its name from the creek which begins in Pennsylvania. Therefore, in Ohio we pronounce it Connie-aht.  Connie, as in Connie Mack, and aht as in yacht (accent on first syllable).

If one leaves the Western Reserve and enters deepest, darkest Western Pennsylvania, one then walks among a people who speak a language called Pittsburghese.  In this language the o sound is pronounced differently and thus their Conneaut (the creek, the lake, etc.) is pronounced Cawny-ought (as in tawney).  For example:  a man in Conneaut is named Don.  In Pittsbughese it's pronounced Dawn;  his small bed, or cot, is pronounced as caught.  A blend of Pittsburghese and English is found in the marches of Ohio's Mahoning Valley.

I go through Conneaut all the time on The Lake Shore Limited.  I have visited there a number of times and I like it.  

By the way, the names & clunky names thus far submitted are as fascinating as they are amusing!

 

 

[CNSF]

Musical?  How about Grand Trunk and Chicago Transit Authority?  They were good enough to be borrowed by bands. 

Don't you hear that whistle down the line,

I betcha that it's engine number forty-nine.

It's the only one that sounds that way

On the Atchison Topeka and the Santa Fe

[Bob-Fryml]

"The Once Mighty Chicago, Milwaukee, Saint Paul and Pacific." 

Ah, yes.  Everytime that phrase leaves my lips, I have a tendency to momentarily speak with a uniquely euphonious, well-modulated tone reminiscent of the cinematic emoting of that late, great vaudevillian, William Claude Dukenfield.  To the reader innocent of such an appellation, I am referring to that uniquely entertaining master of the comedic celluloid art, W.C. Fields.

[Bob-Fryml]

blue streak 1

daveklepper

And didn't was aways call the MP the Mopack?   (But not the Upack, NoPack, nor SouPack.)

I remember when the UP proposed merging with MP that many rails called it   "MOP-UP" as to what they would do with rest of the industry.

And let's not forget two of the roads that were consolidated into the Missouri Pacific just before the "Mop-UP" merger:  the "Mike & Ike" (Missouri-Illinois) and the "Hook and Eye" (C.& E.I./ Chicago and Eastern Illinois).

[henry6]

Yeah, I think it was Seaboard power...

'nother clunky name: Pittsburgh and Shawmut or the Shawmut.

 

[dakotafred]

Henry6 says above: "Atlantic Seaboard would have been nice."

 Bingo! Longtime Trains readers will remember DPM lamenting the redundancy of SCL and saying the logical choice would have been Atlantic Seaboard Line. The execs of that day weren't stupid ... was Seaboard the ascendant company and insistent on primacy? (My memory fails me here.)

[Jerry Pier]

Mt Jewett, Kushequa & Riterville RR

Railroad Friction Products (RFPC

Cobra Canada

Benn Iron Foundries (WABTEC)

[AgentKid]

tree68

'St.' is the masculine.  'Ste.' is the feminine.

 

Thanks Larry. I have always wondered about that. St. Paul, St. Louis, but who is St. Boniface, as in the town in Manitoba. I'm going to have to look into that.

I was thinking Chicago from the full name of the Milwaukee Road.

Bruce

 

[tree68]

AgentKid

Ste., the french abbreviation of Saint. And yet there are numerous places with french names that use the English, St. I never have figured that one out

As I recall, 'St.' is the masculine.  'Ste.' is the feminine.

[The Butler]

henry6

Johnny Mercer had no trouble with the Atchison, Topeka, and Sante Fe...made it into a great song!

Oh, I know.  I was humming that song while typing the last post.  I was surprised AT&SF had not been mentioned by page three.  I have always had problems with the t-ch, though.  My tongue gets in front of my eye-teeth and I can't see what I'm saying.

[sandiego]

AgentKid

mudchicken

And the Soo Line.   Someone else spell out the full name.

 

Chicago, Minneapolis and Sault Ste. Marie.

WRONG! Full name before the 1961 merger with WC and DSSA was:

Minneapolis, St. Paul and Sault Ste. Marie Railroad

Kurt Hayek