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Living Hx . I Wish Was at every RR Museum Part 2
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Author:  Superheater [ Sat Aug 07, 2004 8:10 pm ]
Post subject:  Living Hx . I Wish Was at every RR Museum Part 2
The Board of Directors: :

In the 1940Â’s RR's were faced with diminishing revenues as air travel grabbed long haul business, trucks ate into freight revenues and cars hammered commuter business. Faced with fleets of steam engines that were war-weary, they had plants and equipment that were set up around steam. Steam was cheap to acquire but expensive to own.

Yet, despite the conformity of thought that existed as the result of the interchange rolling stock and personnel and the influence of industry wide groups like the AAR (and ICC of course), there were significant differences as to how the new revolution was being viewed.

Some roads were “early adopters” of diesel-electric power and some such as the C&0, Reading, Pennsylvania Railroad and of course the N&W were ordering new steam into the late 1940’s and hoping against hope that steam would find a new archetype in turbines or some other novel reconfiguration of external combution. It would be interesting to illustrate behind this technological earthquake, the driving consideration was ultimately monetary.
A railroad is a business and sometimes the writing on the wall is written in invisible ink, even to supposedly wise and experienced managers. Sorry, the Pennsy did throw away good bucks on the S-2 and the N&W's 2300 Jawn Henry was a flop.

Would the minutes of a board meeting for a railroad that made an affirmative decision to dieselize be available? Who (generally) made such a decision? I would assume that the board authorizing large capital expenditures would have the final say, but was it an executive position such as the president or even a superintendent of motive power acting with a "gentlemen's" understanding?

I remember reading somewhere that when Cecil Major assumed the presidency of the Lehigh Valley (1946?) he committed the road to dieselization and by 1948 passenger servivce was all diesel and in 1951 the last fires were dropped on a non descript local freight. He certainly had implicit or explicit authority if this is true.

Staffing? How about a local theatrical group or drama club? I would think this would be a blast for actors that throw themselves into their character. The trick of course would be getting the ephemera to back up the dramatization.



superheater62@yahoo.com
Author:  Bob Kutella [ Sun Aug 08, 2004 5:48 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Living Hx . I Wish Was at every RR Museum Part
I would guess this would have a certain attraction to the preservation community, but I am thinking the key would be the dramatic staging to maintain interest. Sort of like watching the movie about the Titanic - we already knew the ending and that she was going down. But the interplay, romantic interests, and side stories got millions to watch, some multiple times. And not much possibility for special effects in a Board Room.

Of course with Hollywood screenwriters and their notorious reputation for stretching the facts, maybe the decision would have to made during an earthquake, while the building was on fire, and within an hour to comply to a terrorist threat.

Bob Kutella

68trolley@comcast.net
Author:  Superheater [ Sun Aug 08, 2004 10:58 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Living Hx . I Wish Was at every RR Museum Part
> I would guess this would have a certain
> attraction to the preservation community,
> but I am thinking the key would be the
> dramatic staging to maintain interest. Sort
> of like watching the movie about the Titanic
> - we already knew the ending and that she
> was going down. But the interplay, romantic
> interests, and side stories got millions to
> watch, some multiple times. And not much
> possibility for special effects in a Board
> Room.

> Of course with Hollywood screenwriters and
> their notorious reputation for stretching
> the facts, maybe the decision would have to
> made during an earthquake, while the
> building was on fire, and within an hour to
> comply to a terrorist threat.

Bob, I'm not proposing anything on a grand scale and this would certainly not be something you show all the time, unless it was filmed-forget Hollywood-as you point out-facts often get in the way of a good story. I'm sure there'd be less cost and less legal and ego issues with a local thespian group.

As for the outcome, there was a point where any railroad had two choices- pursue steam (how about the Reading getting G-3 passenger Pacifics in 1948 or The N&W churning out J's in 1950?) You would think new steam would be expected to have a service life of at least 20 years but the G-3's were done by 1956? and the last J passenger train never saw 1960. Why would those roads being doing that when F-units were available?

Was it defective financial analysis? Affinity to a known technology? Perceived loyalty to coal interests that were significant shippers? Something else or a combination?

If you limit the scope of the period to say the mid or late 1940's and you assume the knowledge of the decision makers at the time, the outcome was apparently not at all certain to some folks. Those are the folks ones that would be interesting to study-in the same way you look back and ask yourself why some general made some great blunder that cost his side an important battle.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that railroads were more than steam engines. We (myself included) are often machine focused and in many ways, leaves out the somewhat more interesting human element.



superheater62@yahoo.com
Author:  Phil Mulligan [ Tue Aug 10, 2004 3:41 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Living Hx . I Wish Was at every RR Museum Part
RDG made the choice to build the G-3's in 1947. By then they had the experience of running B&O passenger diesels since 1934. They tested an E-7 and found one E-7 did not have the acceleration necessary for RDG's needs. Evidently two F-3's were too expensive for passenger (they did buy freight F-3's and FA-1's for 1948 delivery.)

Hence the G-3's. By 1950 coal prices had soared and oil prices fallen. They bought freight F-7's and passenger FP-7's.

Electric City Trolley Museum Association
Author:  JimBoylan [ Tue Aug 10, 2004 8:27 pm ]
Post subject:  Late blooming Steam
> RDG made the choice to build the G-3's in 1947. <

Could the choices of the RDG, N&W, and C&O have been influenced by their extensive coal mine company holdings? Some of these roads also had shops with steam loco building experience, but I don't think they owned many oil wells or had built diesel-electric locos!


104577.651@compuserve.com
Author:  Peter Nicholson [ Tue Aug 10, 2004 9:40 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Late blooming Steam
> Could the choices of the RDG, N&W, and
> C&O have been influenced by their
> extensive coal mine company holdings?

It may have been influenced by their many coal mine customers, but extensive coal mine ownership by railroads was effectively prohibited by the Commodities Clause of the Hepburn Act of 1906. This clause prohibited the railroads from transporting commodities produced by their own enterprises, with the political intent of eliminating the rate and service favoritism shown railroad-owned mines in the anthracite coal market.

pnichol6@prodigy.net
Author:  Phil Mulligan [ Wed Aug 11, 2004 9:24 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Late blooming Steam
R.Co. divested the P&R Coal & Iron in 1925 by Court Order (antitrust) and by 1947 was hauling far more soft coal than anthracite. The road steam engines had switched from mostly anthracite to mostly bituminous (the older Pacifics got extended smokeboxes to handle the greater flyash)

Electric City Trolley Museum Association
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