The Pullman Company has received a request from a man who was forced to take an upper in the car Aloha, that the car be rechristened Anuppah. This Old railway stations are sometimes put to peculiar purposes, but the one in Vienna, Austria, is probably unique. station has been turned into a public indoor ski-slide, snow being hauled down from the mountains for the purpose. The Fort Smith, Subiaco & Rock Island, a 54-mile line in Arkansas, has had fame thrust upon it by the Pullman News. It serves, it seems, such far flung points as Paris and London (both of which are, however, Arkansas municipalities); it crosses the Delaware (creek, not river) and goes through the Dardanelles, (Dardanelle, Ark.) and Subiaco (the original of which is an Italian monastery town). A Champion Loser You've all heard the story of the man who said he had lost a bass drum once. In fact, it has appeared in this column. No one believed that it could have been founded on fact, however, until recently, when employees turned into General Baggage Agent Bissland, of the Missouri Pacific, a huge bass drum which someone had lost on the Sunshine Special. Diligent inquiry revealed that Henry Kitcher of Palestine, Texas, was the talented individual who had performed the seemingly impossible. When complimented, Henry responded modestly: "Shucks, that ain't nothing. I lost that drum in a telephone booth once." De-Georging Porters At the seventeenth annual meeting in Chicago last month, of the S. P. C. S. C. P. G. (The Society for Prevention of Calling Sleeping Car Porters George) George Dulany, Jr., the founder and secretary, announced that on many recent trips on the Twentieth Century Limited, he had made it a point to walk through the train and see how many porters had George for a name. He said he went through about 100 cars on various sections of the Century and found only one porter assigned to the famous train whose name really was George. "So you see how idiotic is the habit of calling all porters George," said Mr. Dulany. He viewed as a signal victory for the society the recent practice of the Pullman Company of putting porters' names on cards in the cars on crack trains. Limerick Department Over in England, they have taken the story of the old lady and the ticket clerk and made a limerick of it, as follows: There was an old lady of Crewe, Who wanted to catch the 2.2 She said to the porter, "Don't hurry, It's a minute or 2 2 2 2." All of which, for reasons unknown, reminds us of another story of an old lady and a porter. Querulously, the old lady said: "Porter, there's 20 minutes difference between the time of the clock in the train-shed and the one in the waiting-room. "Don't make no difference, ma'am," the porter replied, "De train goes at 5:15 anyhow." An American Army Mule-Skinner Needed Here Railway officers employed at the little station of Cochem in the Rhineland, Germany, or on the jerkwater trains stopping there, have given up an unequal battle with a donkey. This donkey is owned by the local milk dealers' association and has the important mission of pulling the cart with the milk intended for shipment to the station. He has taken it into his head, however, to stop at a certain point alongside the track and to insist that the baggage car must come to a halt there. Attempts to get him to move toward the baggage car in case it was carried a bit beyond him proved futile. He was beaten, tickled, the hose turned on him-in vain. He would not budge. The locomotive engineers have been instructed to humor the beast and bring the milk car exactly where the donkey decrees that it shall stop. "We can order our staff about," sighed the station master, "but rules and regulations mean nothing to an obstinate ass." Cab Signal Advocate Displays Resourcefulness TO THE EDITOR OF ODDS AND ENDS: KAIGHN'S POINT, N. J. NEAR PHILADELPHIA, PA. Your department seems to be the one in the Railway Age for giving to the reader interesting novelties and, therefore, I make bold to tell you about my invention. At the hearings before the Interstate Commerce Commission, in Washington, last month, I was much disappointed to hear a lot of locomotive enginemen say that they objected to the use of cab signals in connection with automatic train stops. These signals, consisting of small red, yellow and green lights constitute, in their opinion, an element of danger in that too much attention to the lights may result in too little attention to conditions on the track ahead. A number of signal engineers apparently agreed with this view. This objection, whether valid or otherwise, is, however, very easily met. All you want is to fix the light where the engineman is obliged to see it, when he is looking out of his front window. It would be of no practical disadvantage if he had to look out through a green window or a yellow window. However, to meet the most meticulous critic, I have designed a combination window. The glass is circular, 18 in. in diameter and, marking out a concentric ring inside, about 10 in. in diameter, and leaving the central portion clear, I have left an annular surface of glass which can be colored. When the road is clear for full speed, I make the upper half of this annular ring green, by dropping down from above a green glass of suitable tint. When caution is to be indicated, this glass is raised and from the lower side of the window is lifted a yellow glass to fill the lower half of the annular ring. No engineman, either the sharpest critic or the dullest objector, can look out of this window without seeing the color which should guide his action in regulating his speed. What objection do you see to this scheme? The critic who will not accept my proposal may very reasonably be asked to make use of an audible cab signal. We advocates of cab signals have not taken reasonable advantage of the strength of our arguments to put them before the railroad world. Audible cab signals have been used extensively and with great success on the Great Western of England for twenty-five years; and we wise men of America calmly remain in our seats and neglect the lesson of this experience. Finally, to those critics who are still deaf to my appeal, I will say, why do you not put the small red, yellow and green lights (which you now have) in the sill at the bottom of the front window? Red rays or yellow or green rays, these would reach the engineman's eyes in spite of him. The engineman who wishes to keep his head out of the window most of the time, can of course, be furnished with a set of two or three lights on a bracket extending out from the window. Indeed, the cab signal specialist can give the obiector anything that he wants; and is willing to hand it to him on a silver platter. And please note that no red light or red window is needed. Unless the engineman sees either green or yellow, he must at once bring his train under control. The Chicago & North Western in the admirable arrangement of its automatic train control system, has shown, in a way that should be satisfactory to any one, that the red light is not needed. ALEX DUR THE NEW ENGLAND RAILROAD CLUB will hold its annual meeting and election of officers at the Copley Plaza Hotel, Boston, on March 13; dinner at 6:30 p. m., meeting at 7:45. A. A. Northrop of Stone & Webster, Inc., will present a motion picture of the 600,000 h.p. hydro-electric development at Conowingo, Md. ENGINEMEN AND FIREMEN of the Virginian have had their pay advanced to parity with the increased rates now enjoyed by other railroads in the southeastern states. The advance is retroactive to February 16, only. The increases for the higher paid enginemen are about 61⁄2 per cent. THE INTERSTATE COMMERCE COMMISSION, Division 6, has issued a report approving after inspection and test the installation of the automatic train-stop system of the National Safety Appliance Company on the San Antonio sub-division of the Houston division of the Galveston, Harrisburg & San Antonio, now operated under lease by the Texas & New Orleans (Southern Pacific), 119.9 miles of single track. THE NASHVILLE, CHATTANOOGA & ST. Louis reports that for the year 1927, and thus far in 1928, the 216 men employed in the freight yards of the company at Chattanooga, have had to report no accident to the Interstate Commerce Commission; and during this period of about 390 days, these men have handled more than 820,000 cars. The N. C. & St. L. has been conducting education in safety since 1914, and has made numerous fine records. During the year 1927, there was only one fatality among its 10,000 employees. THE SOUTHERN RAILWAY has announced its intention of transferring to Atlanta, Ga., about 1200, or more than onehalf, of the employees now located at its general offices in Washington, D. C., while the Washington offices will be moved to a new building at Fifteenth and K streets. This is because the government has authorized the purchase of the general office building in which the company has been located for many years, and the ground on which it is situated, for use in connection with an extensive public buildings program which has been prepared and approved. Southwest M. C. B. to Meet The third semi-annual meeting of the Southwest Master Car Builders' and Supervisors' Association, and its auxiliary, the Southwest Railway Supplymen's Association will be held at the Mayo Hotel, Tulsa, Okla., on March 16 and 17. The program includes the presentation and discussion of committee reports, and papers covering many phases of car department operation. Officers for the ensuing year will be elected. P. R. R. to Stimulate Safety President W. W. Atterbury of the Pennsylvania announces that, to stimulate competition among employees of the different regions of the company's system in avoiding accidents to themselves or their fellows, he is to award five trophies to the departments in each region, which make the best record for 1928. The trophies are now being prepared by artists and will be awarded quarterly, to winning departments, for temporary custody. The management hopes to record, for 1928, not more than ten injuries to employees per million man-hours worked. If this degree of safety is reached, the injuries will have aggregated a third less, per million man-hours, than heretofore; and 50 per cent less than the record for all Class I railroads in the country, in 1927. New York Railroad Club Meeting The March 16 meeting of the New York Railroad Club will be "American Car & Foundry Co.'s Night," the subject, "In the Service of Transportation," to be discussed by Hector Fuller of that company. The meeting will be held, as usual, in the Engineering Societies building, New York; time 8:15 p. m. The "dutch treat" dinner will be held at Friedlander's Restaurant, 56 West Thirty-ninth street at 6 p. m. Discuss Taking Over Express Business The Mail and Express Committee of the Association of Railway Executives met in New York on March 5 to discuss further the proposal that the railroads handling express business under uniform contract with the American Railway Express Company themselves take over the company or its activities at the expiration of the contract next year. Progress was made in the discussion and the general attitude, as announced some weeks ago, appears to be favorable to some such action. No definite plans have as yet been made, however, nor has a decision been reached as to the method of acquiring the property of the express company in the event that the railroads do decide to take it over. This can be done either by purchase of capital stock or by taking over the assets at cost less depreciation. The committee will meet again in five or six weeks for further discussion. Senate Committee Votes Against Confirmation of Commissioner Esch The Senate committee on interstate commerce on March 6 voted, ten to seven, to report unfavorably to the Senate on the question of the confirmation of Commissioner John J. Esch for reappointment to the Interstate Commerce Commission. On motion of Senator Bruce, of Maryland, the vote in the committee was made public. Those who voted in favor of confirmation were Senators Gooding, Couzens, Fess, Howell, du Pont, Bruce and Watson, all Republicans except Senator Bruce. Those who voted against confirmation were: Senators Goff, Pine, Sackett, Metcalf, Pittman, Dill, Wheeler, Mayfield, Black and Wagner, all Democrats except Goff, of West Virginia, and Sackett, of Kentucky, who have been opposing Mr. Esch because of his vote in the lake cargo coal rate case, and Pine of Oklahoma and Metcalf of Rhode Island. The committee devoted an executive session on March 5 to discussion of the case, following the hearings held February 18 to 24, and voted as soon as it met on March 6. A bill to provide that the term of office of commissioners of the Interstate Commerce Commission hereafter shall be eight years, instead of seven as at present, and that no person shall be eligible for a second appointment, was introduced in the (Continued on page 601) |