Any search engine can give you some interesting results if you're willing to pick through the unrelated links.
Putting quotes around your search can force the search engines to narrow your search, and using the plus sign can do the same (ie, narrow +guage). You can also mix the two - "New York Central" +caboose. Note that the plus sign goes next to the second search term - no space there.
Many times you'll happen on the results of some local historian who has put his/her work on the web, pretty much unheralded. That can get interesting, too.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
First, thanks again to every one of you who has helped in my quest for info; it's much appreciated!!
Second, anyone know of on-line resources of info, as I'm on austerity budget right now, so buying more books might not happen for a while (beyond the caboose one coming from Amz.)? Only ones I really know of are this one and Wikipedia.
Thanks again and everybody please be extra careful if you are in this heat wave; it can be deadly for people and pets! They say to check on the elderly and those w/o A/C, which sounds like good advice!
Nance-CCABW/LEI
“Even if you are on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.” --Will Rogers
Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right! --unknown
Already 82 up here...though the humidity seems to be diminished a tad so it's not bad with a small breeze.
CN has started a pairing of trains again: Q117/Q116 intermodal service between Roberts Bank, BC and Markham, IL AFAIK. That adds to the pairing of Q199/Q198 from Port of Prince Rupert, BC to Schiller Park, IL. One neat way (if the "little birdie's" song was true) to tell the difference is that the 116/117 trains are supposed to start having BCOL B39-8's on them. I got word that the forces at Homewood/Woodcrest have pulled several off the 'dead line' and started prepping them for road service. We shall see if and when that happens though. Maybe then the fine folks in BC can send the WC 3026 and 3027 back down to the WI area as they've been in 'captive' service up there.
Dan
Jeff, I know that robo-callers were in use since before I retired, but I never had to deal with one, thankfully. The few times I got called from Omaha it was by a human, and I always was able to do what I needed to with a human at the other end. I think some people probably took advantage of automation to lay off more than they should (and I heard that it finally caught up to one person, who was dismissed).
Dan, we don't have AC at our place, save for window units in the bedrooms. Today (it got up to 97 or 98--it's still 91) we went out for lunch with daughter and grandkids, then went to their house (which is air-conditioned) and sat with the kids while Mom ran various errands.
Couple of good items in the Newswire about the Missouri River flooding, including cancellation of the Zephyr east of Denver.
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
jeffhergert My last trip, I had the most unusual call to go to work I've ever had. Most of the time the railroad's computer calls and gives the assignment. I hardly ever talk to a caller anymore, even when laying off it's usually OK'd by the computer. The other morning the phone rings and it's the robot as usual. Then it says, "We are having technical difficulties in giving your assignment. Please call..." and it gave the number for the automated voice response line. So I called figuring I'd get a person. Nope, got the robot and it gives me the call the same way as if it had called me. Every other time there has been a glitch, a human caller called me. We deadheaded out and got to see some flood preparation along US 30 west of Missouri Valley. Some acreages had temporary dirt berms around their places. A couple of electrical or gas service equipment locations were surrounded by sandbags. Coming home we had a manifest out of Council Bluffs. At the north end of town the tracks go through an opening in the levee. There is dirt and gravel piled up, ready to close the gap (and the tracks) if needed. Up around Mo Valley they are dumping ballast, the story is they're going to try raising the track from there over towards the Missouri River bridge by 18 inches. I did see at the control point in town they were removing the switch heaters off the dual controlled switches. Saw the news tonight and it dosen't sound good for those along the Missouri. Jeff
My last trip, I had the most unusual call to go to work I've ever had. Most of the time the railroad's computer calls and gives the assignment. I hardly ever talk to a caller anymore, even when laying off it's usually OK'd by the computer. The other morning the phone rings and it's the robot as usual. Then it says, "We are having technical difficulties in giving your assignment. Please call..." and it gave the number for the automated voice response line. So I called figuring I'd get a person. Nope, got the robot and it gives me the call the same way as if it had called me. Every other time there has been a glitch, a human caller called me.
We deadheaded out and got to see some flood preparation along US 30 west of Missouri Valley. Some acreages had temporary dirt berms around their places. A couple of electrical or gas service equipment locations were surrounded by sandbags.
Coming home we had a manifest out of Council Bluffs. At the north end of town the tracks go through an opening in the levee. There is dirt and gravel piled up, ready to close the gap (and the tracks) if needed. Up around Mo Valley they are dumping ballast, the story is they're going to try raising the track from there over towards the Missouri River bridge by 18 inches. I did see at the control point in town they were removing the switch heaters off the dual controlled switches. Saw the news tonight and it dosen't sound good for those along the Missouri.
Jeff
Great report Jeff. Not that I'm gaining any kind of enjoyment out of the possibility of flooding, but details and nuances that are interesting to hear.
Happy (late) Birthday to Mudchicken. I hope there's many happy returns.
We kicked our air on Carl - 97 in the house is too much for fans! I'm already dreading the utility bills that come with having them working...but we don't have much choice. One of our neighbors had a pet die from heat stroke a couple of years back because he chose to leave the air off and it got nasty like today is supposed to - but worse.
I might try posting some pictures later but I have to recert some folks in CPR first. Adios!
Hey, Happy Birthday to you, MC!! Hope it's a great one for you! Enjoy.
A quick birthday greeting to our resident Mudchicken, with congratulations (again) on the nice article in the July issue of Trains! Hope you're staying cool.
We've bought plenty of air shampoo, so our air conditioner can do its job (That, I say, that's a joke, son!). High in the upper 90s today.
Jeff, I saw the news reports this evening--that's a lot of water headed in your general direction! I've heard that it's expected to back up in rivers like the Platte--don't know how far upstream that effect would go.
The UP Museum in Council Bluffs has cleaned out the basement, from what I've been told, moving archives and other material of value to safe storage on higher ground.
_________________
The field of railroad publication lost another giant recently. Tom Shedd, editor of Modern Railroads Magazine from 1959 until 1983 (and editorial director until 1991, when the magazine was bought out by Railway Age) passed away on June 2, his 93rd birthday. I often saw him in the MR (yes, there were two "MR" magazines in my world back then!) offices when they were in the Loop, but never talked to him...we had a waving acquaintance.
Modelcar Received my magazine May, 26th. Trains
Received my magazine May, 26th.
Trains
Received my magazine today. The rotating postal strikes we are having here in Canada didn't affect the delivery time at all. Today or tomorrow is about when I would have expected it anyway.
Bruce
So shovel the coal, let this rattler roll.
"A Train is a Place Going Somewhere" CP Rail Public Timetable
"O. S. Irricana"
. . . __ . ______
Woot! Woot! to you, too, Nance! Hope things went well today.
I should note that I batted a thousand yesterday--all of the freight-car notes I made while at Rochelle were stuff that I needed. That rarely happens any more, but the fact that most of the "harvest" was on BNSF trains helped there.
Oh, very nice, Carl! Glad you got to see a decent number of trains and I remain amazed at the comment on the other thread, about your clout!!
Larry, congrats on your continuing advancement and achievements!
WOOT WOOT!!!!
Working on the railroad today - and managed to get some hands-on on the locomotive (ALCO RS18u). Several of us were fairly early arriving, including the engineer, so we did a walkaround of the loco, covering the daily inspection and some of the routine tests.
Hopefully I can get more "over-the-shoulder" time before I get into the seat at the end of the month. It's one thing to run, but another thing entirely to learn the background workings. At least now I've got an idea of how to start an ALCO!
Today Pat and I both took a break from our respective editing jobs and drove out to Rochelle to see what Railroad Days was like. We were happy to see Jay and Linda Eaton there. I gathered that they were happy to see us, too. Jay said there were no trains in the hour and a half before we got there, but a westbound BNSF intermodal came through as we were walking up to the pavilion, followed closely by two more!
UP seemed to be having some sort of problem. As we were headed west to Rochelle, we saw a couple of stopped westbound freight trains (an auto train between Wheaton and Winfield, a manifest at West Chicago). Eastbounds weren't faring much better--a coal train was stopped at West Chicago and another one between Meredith and Elburn. We saw nothing at all between Meredith and Rochelle.
After we got to Rochelle and BNSF sent those three freights through, a UP train poked its nose out of Global 3, strung out across a couple of grade crossings, then backed in again. That was it (an eastbound BNSF came through soon after the diamond was clear again). As we all were leaving the park, a different eastbound intermodal train came across--this one with four units on the point instead of three.
We needed to cool off at Culver's (thanks, Linda, for giving Pat that idea!). As we came over the tracks south of there, the eastbound intermodal was moving slowly, crossing over from track 2 to 1, clearing the way for the westbound manifest (same one we saw at West Chicago). As we left Culver's, the three-unit intermodal (the one that had poked its nose out of G3) came up, also very slowly. We caught him before Creston, and between Creston and Malta was the four-unit intermodal, still moving slowly, obscuring our view of the westbound auto train (from Wheaton, remember?). Between Malta and DeKalb we saw a short westbound stacker (maybe ten tubs and a DPU!) and a manifest (behind the buildings--never did see which way he was headed). But before we could get across downtown, the three-unit intermodal blew by us, obviously having run around everything in both directions that had been ahead of it, and dragging its feet no more! Kind of nice to see--the freights aren't allowed to go over 50 by us any more .
Tomorrow it's back to the computer for both of us--Phase 3 of the book for me (digging out pertinent data from diagram books), and finishing off the Historical Society's quarterly newsletter for Pat. For tonight, though, I have a few freight cars to research from the trains I saw go by at Rochelle!
CShaveRR daily lineup was given at 1:00 p.m.
daily lineup was given at 1:00 p.m.
Thank you Carl. I had forgotten about that.
Line-ups were issued at the start of each trick. Dispatchers would issue them just after midnight, just after 8 AM and again at just after 4 PM, But Section Mens' hours were 7:30 to 4:30 with a hour off from noon to 1 PM. There was a second line-up delivered by the 1st trick Dispatcher at 1 PM to advise the MOW crews of any changes to the morning line-up.
I remember about the time I learned to read well enough to read anything in the office that wasn't locked in the safe, or in books too heavy to lift, reading the office copy of the line-up after the section man had picked up his copy. I can also remember a point about 1961 or '62 when there were no longer any trains listed on that line-up. Only changes from the 8 AM copy were listed. That would have been the end of extra coal drags to serve the household coal market.
There was a cartoon in some magazine back in the '70's showing a group of executives sitting around a conference table looking at a guy presenting a large graph. There were several lines on the graph. They were going up and down in a normal looking manner until at the exact same point on the horizontal axis of the graph, all of the lines suddenly went straight to the bottom. The caption was "This is a phenomena known as the s**t hitting the fan".
Although no one knew it then, the day the last extra coal drag went south past Irricana was that point for the Langdon Sub. The stations on the Sub. closed in June 1965, the Mixed lingered on until 1966, and the tracks were pulled up about 1972.
(Taking a breakfast break from work on the book...finished with Phase 2.)
The town agents I remember while growing up were, in one way or another, pillars of the community. The one from the C&O (he dated back to Pere Marquette days) was involved in service clubs, the local stamp-collector's club, and so on. After retirement, he was in the area's NRHS chapter. His younger brother was a dispatcher on the C&O; I met him once at Grand Rapids, and met his daughter in college. As for the agent, I remember "outing" his grandson (named after him, as was his dad) on this very Forum many years ago. I don't think he's been around here in years, but he did work at the local hobby shop in my home town.
When this agent retired, he was replaced on days by the night guy, who was a sour-faced and sour-tempered guy who couldn't be bothered with anything (especially kids like me trying to learn).
On the GTW, the local agent was known around town as the baseball coach. He was known for yelling at his team, at the umpires, or whatever--a real ball of fire. But as the agent, he was great...he allowed me in the office to sit and listen in on the dispatcher (daily lineup was given at 1:00 p.m.), and took the time to show me some pictures from the day when Grand Haven was a prominent-enough city to be included in the railroad's name, and took a genuine interest in my interest.
Both of those guys--Denver and Elmer--got their spreads in the daily newspaper when they retired from their respective railroads. Elmer's job went to a traveling agent (Ralph from Coopersville would come in for a few hours three times a week), and the C&O, after passenger service ended in 1971, eliminated the agent in favor of an "Enterprise" telephone number.
I don't remember much about Railway Express' workings with the railroads locally, though the GTW station used to have a REA sign on its outside wall. Western Union had its own office in town by the time I was growing up.
Mail, though, was another story. Around 9:00 at night the truck would come to the C&O station, back up on the platform, and start unloading mail...a few sacks for Muskegon (the next city to the north and the end of the line for the passenger train due in an hour or so), and a baggage-cart full of mail sacks for the southbound train (we called it the "midnight train", though it came in slightly earlier). That mail mostly went on to Chicago. The "milk run", due at sometime around 5:00 a.m., brought most of the mail in from Chicago, so the postal truck had to come again to take that all to the post office. All of this was done under the eye of the night agent/operator, who kept pretty busy on his/her job handling train orders and this business. When the mail stopped traveling by rail, the "midnight train" and the "milk run", along with their mainline connections, lost their reason for being, and were cut off. The remaining passenger trains lasted until Amtrak day.
tree68 Don't forget that the mail travelled by rail, too, and RPO's had mail slots where you could mail something at the last minute (assuming the train stopped....).
Don't forget that the mail travelled by rail, too, and RPO's had mail slots where you could mail something at the last minute (assuming the train stopped....).
Railway mail service is the one thing I can't remember ever seen being done. There was RPO service to our first station at Hatton, SK, but I wasn't old enough to remember it. When we moved to Irricana, AB in December 1956, that was a peculiar situation.
Irricana had always been served by RPO on the CNR line through town. This was their Calgary-Edmonton route. However, in 1954 a major bridge on this line was washed out and it took over a year to get the bridge fixed. All of the towns south of the bridge down to Calgary became the first towns in Alberta to have their mail delivery switched from rail to truck.
Not to be confused with towns that never had RPO service. My Mom grew up near two towns that first had mail service by horse drawn wagon, then by truck, from the CPR mainline. CP did build a branch line through these towns, but never did receive a mail contract.
My brother's father-in-law worked for the then Royal Mail on RPO cars. At their wedding in 1980, at the reception, my Dad and my brother's father-in-law got to talking. In the early 1950's the father-in-law didn't yet have enough seniority to work on a mainline RPO route, but during the summer he did get to relieve more senior men on those routes. Hatton was on the transcontinental mainline. After a bit more comparison of dates it seems about 99% certain that they had been handing mail bags to each other before either my brother or his daughter had ever been born.
Johnny....back then it was almost as normal to see REA cars {rail}, & trucks as it is now to see UPS, etc......
I remember seeing adds {somewhere}, advertising: Shipping by REA, via "fast passenger trains". Especially when having electronics shipped.
Quentin
And, Quentin, when I used Railway Express in 1959, I was shipping home what I could not carry in my suitcase when I finished college. When I went off to college, I mailed a seabag full of clothes and "linens" (I had to watch the seventy pound limit) and hitchhiked with a suitcase. I carried more up, from time to time, (one trip I had my then accumulation of Trains in the suitcase; I did not like to carry it very far at a time), and thus had a little more at the end than at the beginning. In Bristol, Railway Express came out and picked my shipment up; at home, I had to borrow a truck to get my belongings--which came by a freight train (the coach had been cut off in 1963). I believe that it arrived in a Railway Express car, which was still carried on the train.
Johnny
mudchicken Railway Express Agency http://www.nrhs.com/archives/rea.htm
Railway Express Agency
http://www.nrhs.com/archives/rea.htm
......My first component stereo system arrived by REA back in 1964. Picked it up here in Muncie at the REA office. I'm sure it arrived by passenger train. Back then, it was NYC RR and we still had several passenger trains serving our city...{pre Amtrak}, Shipment would have been from L I, NY.
WMNB4THRTLCommunications was another BIG part of this, too, I believe.
I believe Western Union contracted with the railroads, once they built up their networks, which would have added commercial telegrapher to the duties of the station agent.
There were cases of the station being built "outside of town" only to have the town migrate to the station. Sometimes the original settlement became a ghost town while the new settlement, around the station, thrived.
Highland, MI is such a case. What is now known as "West Highland" was the original settlement of Highland, while "Highland Station" eventually was shortened to Highland, as West Highland became a wide spot in the road.
Nance, I don't know about the centre of town part. It probably had to do with the personality of the Agent involved. The commercial side I mentioned paid commissions on all the activity the Agent could generate. He literally was the Sales Agent as he went about his life about town. going up to the Post Office to pick up the mail, going to the General Store to get milk and bread, or anything else. He would keep an ear to the ground, and when anyone mentioned something in passing that would lead to a service the Agent could provide, he would speak up.
To get to the points Johnny raised, there was no Western Union in Canada, CNR and CPR handled all telegraph transmissions in Canada from shortly after the turn of the Twentieth Century. They also sold Money Orders and wired money. About the same time CP bought the Dominion Express Company and from that point forward the railways ran their own express businesses. There was no REA in Canada. As we talked about here in the Lounge a year or so ago, Agents were even in the Flower business through FTD. Before 1965 it stood for Florists' Telegraph Delivery.
I wasn't old enough to see baby animals shipped, but I saw big wood crates of eggs, and cans of cream. People receiving catalog orders from Eaton's before Christmas was a big deal for Agents, because the commissions on that went to help pay for the Agent's own Christmas expenses. I wish I could remember some of the odd things certain small towns would ship and receive that Dad told me about. In Irricana though, there was a Hutterite Colony (a religious communal group who farmed collectively) that had their coffee shipped in by rail. It came in corrugated cardboard drums about the same size as a forty-five gallon steel oil drum, and they would get eight or ten drums at a time. You would have to manhandle these drums off of the combine, into the freight shed, and then into the back of one of their grain trucks. The drums would just about fill the box, and the commissions were good.
Depending again on the Agent's personality, you may or may not have a lot of kids around. There were always a lot around our station. Dad got into the business hanging around the station at Meyronne, Saskatchewan, and one of the kids who played with my brother and me went on the work for the CPR. I hope i picked up on everyone's comments.
I think we all got brainwashed by the "Wells Fargo Wagon" tune from The Music Man all those years ago.
-darn, now that tune will rattle around between my ears for days....
Thanks, MC. I maybe should have known that, but I didn't yet.
Great, thanks Johnny!! Sorry, but what is REA?
I had meant to add an experience I had about forty-seven years back--selling tickets when the Brookhaven operator was busy with communications (I do not remember if it was by telephone on the IC wire or by telegraph on the Mississippi Central wire). He had to tend to the commuication--and there were several people at the ticket window; I offered to sell tickets and he took me up on it. Now, Brookhaven (it was a continuous station back then) does not have any agent at all--either Amtrak or CN--even though the City of New Orleans is scheduled to stop there.
Nance,there was another job that small-town agents had. It may not have been necessary in Canada, but in the U.S., if a town was so small as to not warrant having a telegraph company office, the railroad station agent was often the man who handled telegrams; thus he had another master.
Another master yet was the REA. Even though the REA was owned by the railroads, it required separate accounting, and reports and receipts for express service were sent to its office. After whatever was to be sent had been placed in an envelope, the agent sealed the envelope with sealing wax, using an REA seal..
Once, when I had stopped to visit with the station agent, he asked me to deliver a collect telegram to the recipient. The recipient refused to accept the telegram; he said he knew what was in it and thus saw no reason to pay for it. So, I took it back to the station.
This agent offered to teach me telegraphy, but the railroad would not pay for my learning--so I did not learn the code(about the only code I ever learned was the color code used on resistors, capacitors, and such). He had worked for the Big Four and the KCS, but he sppent most of his working years working for the Southern. Sad to say, he was bumped and moved to a town in North Carolina which was on my way between home and college. Twice, when I was hitchhiking between home and college, I stopped in to see him. The first time, I saw that the Southern had issued a new rule book and I asked if I could have his old book. He was not sure if the company wanted the old one back or not, so he felt he should not let it go. The second time I stopped, he was able to let me have it (now, where have I put it?).
OK, so the site is mucked up, yet again, right now, so I have to reply and not edit!
Communications was another BIG part of this, too, I believe. What else?
Wow fantastic, Bruce; thanks so much!! I really appreciate that! And..
my gratitude to Carl for the good wishes and kind words!
Bruce, or anyone, I understand that the depot was often the center of the town, not geographically, but socially, etc. People came there to get the news, see their neighbors, etc. Baby chicks and pigs (other animals??) were shipped by rail, as were orders from the catalog--Sears in the US, along with supplies, lumber, etc. It was where you met (and later saw them off) your friends and relatives when they came to visit. Young kids loved to hang around. People were, in general, interested in the trains.
Have I got that about right? What important ideas am I missing? Thanks!
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