I was cleaning up and leafing through a childhood book of mine, "The Big Book of Real Trains", Elizabeth Cameron, Grossett & Dunlap 1974, and an illustration spread based on the PRR Congressional Limited caught my eye. The illustration depicts all of the crew necessary to operate the Congressional. Pullman conductors are shown, but no brakemen. Were there no brakemen? The diner section is shown with eight waiters, five kitchen staff, and two stewards. Is that right? Fifteen crew to run the diner? No wonder food service was so expensive to operate.

By the way, this is a surprisingly accurately illustrated book for a child's book. It had many editions, the first copyright date is 1949. My copy has a cover illustration of a 2-6-6-2 mallet with slide valve low pressure cylinders, top mounted air tanks, and a pilot mounted headlight. Any guesses as to the prototype?

I'll have to look it up to confirm it, but it seems to me the dining car crew size is about right for "golden age" staffing. This would be considered very excessive today, of course, but in the better time, a dining car was considered the equivelent of a very upscale restaurant, and was also intended as a revenue-boosting amenity, i.e., it didn't make money itself, but it helped sell tickets. Keep in mind we are talking about an era with little if any price competition, at least between railroads, so the competition took the form of services like this. There was also little in the way of automated equipment (such as dishwashers) in diners in this time, and the food was mostly prepared fresh, no frozen stuff, much less radar food or plastic food!

As to the 2-6-6-2, from your description it sounds like a Baltimore & Ohio engine inherited from a merger with the Buffalo Rochester & Pittsburgh back in 1930. From what I can tell, this engine was one of several that appear to have been inspired by the Chesapeake & Ohio 2-6-6-2 of 1910.

http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/ ... 419.0.html

Enjoy.

After the 1951 equipment puchase, and possibly before, the Congressional trainsets included 2 unit, 68 seat diners. This most likely explains the large staff.

Actually, you didn't mention the Engineer, Fireman, or train Conductor (different from the Pullman conductor) either, so the book is highlighting the service staff without including the operating crew.

The underlings on a parlor car operated by the Pullman Company were probably called porters. All but 1 of the Pullman "conductors" should be porters. As another post suggests, this lineup probably didn't include the operating crew.

Actually, yes the diagram showed engineer, "fireman" (diesel E9), railroad conductor, and a porter on each car. Just no brakeman.

I have, or had, an earlier version of the book, from my childhood in the early '60's. I remember counting the number of crewmen (and it was all male and just about all black) represented as being somewhere around 30-34. Fifteen or so years ago, the total OBS crew for an Amtrak Eastern long-distance train like the Capitol Ltd. was about 1/3 of that. I believe that they have managed to reduce it even more since (because of Congressional cost-saving mandates) by doing things like going to only having microwaveable food in the diner, having 2 coach attendants for every 3 coaches, and doing away with OBS Chiefs of On-Board Service.