UlrichAlways enjoyed your columns although I was a kid at the time. Would be great to get your incite on the industry as it is today.
Ulrich, I believe that's the Iconoclast's son posting. The John Kneiling who wrote the columns died a number of years ago...
I do have to say that 'incite' here may count as one of the best Freudian slips on record...
You're right... I meant insight.. but I'm a cat..
RME Ulrich Always enjoyed your columns although I was a kid at the time. Would be great to get your incite on the industry as it is today. Ulrich, I believe that's the Iconoclast's son posting. The John Kneiling who wrote the columns died a number of years ago... I do have to say that 'incite' here may count as one of the best Freudian slips on record...
Ulrich Always enjoyed your columns although I was a kid at the time. Would be great to get your incite on the industry as it is today.
Haha. I saw this thread and thought we were witnessing a miracle!
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
Sorry, guys - yes, that was my dad. I thought it was pretty well known that he passed many years ago. We had lots of interesting conversations and rail fan trips together. Thanks for your comments.
I think he liked controversy more than anything. If I can paraphrase Ulrich's model railroading posts, he sort of rusted away. "Inciteful" indeed... well said!
John Angus Kneiling
JAK - Can you share any stories of those rail fan trips ? That's a side of your dad that isn't widely known (other than Dave Klepper's posts). For example, would he criticize the operation of the fan trip or other rail operations that were observed during the trip, or did he just accept them as they were and enjoy being in the place and the moment ?
- PDN.
Having been on many John Kneiling run fantrips as a teenager and after, I can say that during the trips he concentrated on insuring they ran according to his plans, and started crticizing only when the railroad or transit system was not performing according to thse plans. Sure , they may have been a few comments concerning other issues, but his concern was that his fan ticket holders got value for their money. He certainly arranged some duzies. Like on an 1948 Bronx trolley trip going beyond the end of the Treemont Avenue line at Bernside and University Avenue and continuing down the 1-1/2-year earlier abandoned Sedgewick Avenue line, since the wire was still up and energized.
One trip was riding the shop move from Carona Yard on the Flushjing Line to Coney Island Yard with the mixed conosist of Steinway and Worlds Fair steel IRT cars hauling the composite BMT Q-Types. My parents were not too keen on my spending the night in the subway instead of in bed, but somehow I convinced them that this was a one time in a lifetime.
Does anybody have the front page of the New York Times in March 1947 with a picture of a flatcar full of railfans being pushed by a train of gate cars northbound on the express track or the Third Avenue Elevated? Did any other railfan trip ever make the front page of the New York Times?
A South Brooklyin stgeeplecab hauling a train of BMT D-Type subway cars down the McDonald Avenue streetcar and freight line. And one hauling gate elevated cars over the Bush Terminal street fright tracks.The 3rd Avenue El trip also involved allowing fans to ride the shop switcher across the Lexington Avenue coasting-required grade crossing at 99th Street. Made several trips back and forth to accomodate all of us.
i
daveklepper . . . Does anybody have the front page of the New York Times in March 1947 with a picture of a flatcar full of railfans being pushed by a train of gate cars northbound on the express track or the Third Avenue Elevated? Did any other railfan trip ever make the front page of the New York Times? . . .
Dave and Paul, sorry, can't find the picture. Was this the trip?
Thanks once again, Mike, for finding and posting a great item out of the archives ! This is great all by itself - the photo would just be icing on the cake.
I'll defer to Dave Klepper, as I wasn't there and hadn't seen the article before today.
From one of John Kneiling's columns*, I understand that the Joint Rail Fans Trip Committee was established by him to get around some of the disputes and conflicting schedules between other NYC area rail fan organizations.
I'm amused by the tone of the article, noting that 12 women were participants and especially that "An unusual feature of the ride was the abundance of seats". I think that refers to the cars not being as crowded as they usually were during a normal business day (not that the trip was lacking participants).
(*Someday I'm going to compile an index of JGK's columns and articles . . . ).
Sign says Joint Railfan Trip Commitee.
http://www.thejumpingfrog.com/?page=shop/flypage&product_id=1389597
“If all who said they went to Newark Aug. 10 sans reservations had gotten in in advance they would have had their ride then, and cheaper, too. It is advance reservations that make trips possible.”
"JRTC is devoted exclusively to amateur ferroeqinologists' trips - The only such organization in the East"
to Mike/ wanswheel once again for finding and posting these.
Note that the first photo is in a different place than we've been discussing - an old New Haven car - with pantographs. Info at the link says 1958 at Ridgewood, NY.
Some of those notes on the postcards do read like JGK wrote them. On the top card, at the lower right, the note inside the thick black border seems to refer to some of the parochialism that JGK alluded to in one of his columns.
I saw this thread and I got a chuckle out of it.
I'm 40, but have always loved history and trains and that has led me to pick up a ton of issue of Trains from before I was born or very young.
Always ended up reading the Professionla Iconoclast. He said what needed to be said and didn't care who didn't like it. I appreciate folks like that.
Delighted to see Mr. Kneiling's son turn up at this site -- I'm assuming he also posted under the pseudonym "zolagorgon" over at railroad.net a few years ago.
But at any rate, I'm hoping he'll contact me (des949penn@yahoo.com) with a few additional details so that his Dad can be further memorialized at findagrave.com -- as has already been accomplished with timetable/train order dispatching expert Peter Josserand and Robert F. Leonberger (last block operator known to lose his life to a derailment while on duty via a "knockdown" of a tower -- Confluence, PA - 1987).
jkneilingI'm not sure anyone is still following this thread but I havery certainly enjoyed reading it. John Kneiling
Your father certainly opened my eyes and my mind.
greyhoundsYour father certainly opened my eyes and my mind.
Please keep this thread going with personal reminiscences or anything else. John Kneiling was one of the major formative influences on my interest in modern solutions to railroading, too.
RME greyhounds Your father certainly opened my eyes and my mind. Please keep this thread going with personal reminiscences or anything else. John Kneiling was one of the major formative influences on my interest in modern solutions to railroading, too.
greyhounds Your father certainly opened my eyes and my mind.
Iconoclasts are often more appreciated by subsequent generations than their own; in other words, institutional resistance to criticism/change runs deep, even on here: eg., our moderators locked another thread which questioned the competence of the forum code writers.
I think that it might be time to re-read "Coal: Going, Going, Gone?" by JGK in a 1967 issue of TRAINS. Substitute natural gas for nuclear plants and the effect is about the same.
CSSHEGEWISCH I think that it might be time to re-read "Coal: Going, Going, Gone?" by JGK in a 1967 issue of TRAINS. Substitute natural gas for nuclear plants and the effect is about the same.
Predictions are a dime a dozen. I would not discount any nor would I say they are "Settled Science". All possibilities are in play. Tomorrow may bring a breakthrough of major proportions. "Stand by for news".
Thank you Paul Harvey.
Norm
I'm happy to report that enough information on Mr. Kneiling has been located that I was able to memorialize him at findagrave,com, where he'll join Mssrs, Josserand and Leonberger. Tribute from other participants at trainsmag is encouraged.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/185331488/john-gilbert-kneiling
I never cared much for JGK. Still don't.
Mr. Josserand is another story. I have "Rights of Trains" and many issues of Railroad Magazine where he was a regular contributor. Back in the 40s and 50s he would have train order puzzle situations. I had an issue from 1942 with the set up, but it took me a few years to find the next month's issue where the answer was. (I was correct in my answer.)
On a Yahoo group a while back, someone who knew him related a story about his buriel. At the time of his death, the local grave digger's union was on strike. There was a picket line at the cemetery. As the funeral procession approached, one of the mourners went to the guy in charge of the picket line. He explained to the guy that Mr Josserand had been a member and officer of the Train Dispatcher's union and a consultant to the BofLE on operating rules. That being a good union member he would've hated to have his last earthly move being one to cross a picket line. After hearing this, the guy in charge called the strikers off the line. Then he and one of the other guys went to the grave, took shovels and dug a couple of more inches out of the grave. This so it wouldn't be said he was laid to rest in a grave dug by scabs.
Jeff
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