Last edition:
Showing posts with label Railroads. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Railroads. Show all posts
Saturday, September 5, 2026
Saturday, August 29, 2026
The Agrarian's Lament: Trump Moves To Allow Ranchers And Farmers To Process Their Own Food
The Agrarian's Lament: Trump Moves To Allow Ranchers And Farmers To Proce...: Trump tries to backstep after a major screw up. Trump Moves To Allow Ranchers And Farmers To Process Their Own Food While this will aid beef...
Trump Moves To Allow Ranchers And Farmers To Process Their Own Food
Trump tries to backstep after a major screw up.
Trump Moves To Allow Ranchers And Farmers To Process Their Own Food
While this will aid beef producers, it doesn't address the existential problem of the packing industry monopoly. Breaking that, and particularly breaking that on Distributist principals, would have a massive impact. That won't be happening, however.
Instead, this basically would allow producers to sell their own beef across state lines. While some people will buy beef in that fashion, most people won't, and that doesn't do much at all for the cost of beef sold at restaurants and the like.
As noted, applying the Sherman Anti Trust Act to the meat packing industry would have a real impact. A bigger one would be limiting corporate ownership to a single packing facility.
All of this will have no immediate impact on meat prices. The US cattle inventories, i.e.., the herd size, have not been this low since 1941. The reasons for that are varied, by herd reduction due to drought caused by climate change is a major part of it. In some ways, this is just a minor way of trying to repair the damage done by Trump allowing the importation of foreign beef, which has the added theater element of being introduced, supposedly, by Glenn Beck in an interview, something that just screams out the entire thing being something that is pitched towards farmer and rancher ignorance.
Small herd size is a problem, but it will take years to address. By that time, given the very small herd size, we may very well be seeing a meat production climate that hasn't existed since the introduction of refrigerated rail cars in 1878. The massive increase in the Western herd during the Civil War and the invention of the refrigerated rail car shifted the American diet from pork to beef. Various factors have been making inroads on beef for years, and the price at the counter, which this will certainly not immediately address, is shifting it once again, and has been for many years.
Whether this will serve as a salve on farmers and ranchers so they can justify voting for a party that has screwed them for years is yet to be seen.
Related thread:
The GOP's useful idiots in agriculture.
Monday, August 17, 2026
Thursday, August 17, 1876. Grant expands the Ute reservation.
Grant expanded Colorado's Ute reservation.
August 17, 1876
Executive Mansion
It is hereby ordered that all that portion of country in the State of Colorado lying within the following-described boundaries, and forming a part of the Uncompahgre Park, viz: Commencing at the fifty-third mile-post on the north line of the survey of the boundaries of the Ute cession, executed by James W. Miller in 1875; thence south 4 miles; thence east 4 miles; thence north 4 miles, to the said north line; thence west to the place of beginning, be, and the same hereby is, withdrawn from the public domain and set apart as a part of the Ute Indian Reservation, in accordance with the first article of an agreement made with said Indians and ratified by Congress April 29, 1874 (Stats, at Large, vol. 18, p. 36).
U. S. Grant
Judge Amherst Stone of Golden, Colorado, was kidnapped at Rocky Flats by a gang of men opposed to a railroad reorganization he was presiding over.
Last edition:
Tuesday, August 15, 1876. Cutting off rations.
Saturday, August 15, 2026
Sunday, August 15, 1926. Martyrs of the Cristero War and open rebellion.
He was rushed to hospital and operated on immediately for a ruptured appendix.
As noted yesterday, Father St. Luis Bátiz Sainz, Manuel Morales, David Roldán Lara, and Salvador Lara Puent were executed by firing squad.
In response, ranchers led by former colonel Pedro Quintanar seized the municipal treasury of Chalchihuites and declared themselves in open rebellion.
After attending a party the prior evening, recently ailing Rudolph Valentino collapsed at the Hotel Ambassador in New York City.
A mail train was robbed in Wyoming:
I'm not sure what was going on with the local elections, but a candidate was really mad at a newpaper editor:
Last edition:
Friday, June 19, 2026
Saturday, June 19, 1926. Cadaverum cremationis.
Pope Pius XI promulgated the papal instruction Cadaverum cremationis, affirming the Catholic ban on cremation. The prohibition would be relaxed by Pope Paul VI on June 5, 1964, but at least with some Catholics, myself included, the practice is looked down upon. Subsequent popes have also written on the practice.
DeFord Bailey became the first African-American to be listed in newspaper radio schedules as a performer on the WSM Barn Dance (The Grand Ole Opry). He had performed on the show previously.
from the studio of the Nashville radio station WSM. As authors note in a biography of Bailey, "he had probably begun regular appearances before then.
It was a Saturday.
Last edition:
Friday, June 18, 1926. Egyptian troops at Mecca.
Labels: 1920s, 1926, 69th Congress, Egyptian Army, Food, Greece, Hobby and Interest Organizations, Islam, Localism, Mecca, Monarchy, Philately, Russia, trends
Saturday, June 6, 2026
Thursday, June 4, 2026
Saturday, May 30, 2026
Thursday, May 30, 1946. First post war Indianapolis 500.
The Indianapolis 500 was run for the first time since 1941. George Robson, took the race.
Robson was killed in a racing accident that September.
Over 90 passengers were killed in a railway accident at Hengyang, China.
The day prior the Senate had defeated a really badly thought out plan by Truman to draft striking rail workers.
Last edition:
Saturday, May 25, 1946. Jordanian independence, Railroad strike ends.
Labels: 1940s, 1946, Harry S. Truman, Jordan, Labor unrest, Monarchy, Railroads, Strike Wave of 1945-1946, Unions
Monday, May 25, 2026
Saturday, May 25, 1946. Jordanian independence, Railroad strike ends.
Jordan achieved full independence.
Railroads and Railway workers signed an agreement at the White House averting a Federal seizure of the railroads. Truman's order to take control was only three minutes away from implementation.
Last edition:
Friday, May 24, 1946. Truman and the railroad strike.
Sunday, May 24, 2026
Friday, May 24, 1946. Truman and the railroad strike.
President Truman made a radio address promising that if railway workers had not returned to work by 4:00 p.m. May 25, he was going to seize control of the railroads.
Last edition:
Thursday, May 23, 1946. Chick-fil-A.
Wednesday, May 20, 2026
Thursday, May 20, 1926. Trains and Planes.
President Coolidge signed the Air Commerce Act providing for the licensing of pilots and commercial aircraft. He also signed the Railway Labor act abolishing the Railroad Labor Board.
The Air Commerce Act provided for an Aeronautics Branch within the U.S. Department of Commerce to implement and enforce regulations and is depicted as a story element in the film The Great Waldo Pepper. The film accurately portrays the role of the Aeronautics Branch in brining barnstorming to an end.
1930 photograph by Ernst Udet, German fighter pilot in World War One and Luftwaffe officer during World War Two, upon whom the movie character Ernst Kessler is based in the movie The Great Waldo Pepper. Udet was a barnstormer in the 1920s.
Last edition:
Wednesday, May 19, 1926. Bad coinage idea.
Labels: 1920s, 1926, Calvin Coolidge, China, Currency, French Air Force, George Washington, Great Syrian Revolt, Kuomintang, Syria, Syria (Damascus)
Tuesday, May 19, 2026
Sunday, May 19, 1946. Food protests in Japan.
Protests against the Japanese government occurred in the form of the People's Rally for Obtaining Food.
The news did appear in the Rocky Mountain News, but the aversion of a rail strike is what was on the front page.
Last edition:
Friday, May 3, 1946. War Crime Trials in Tokyo and the Battle of Alcatraz
Saturday, April 4, 2026
Railhead: UP 4014 "Big Boy", March, 2026.
Railhead: UP 4014 "Big Boy", March, 2026.: The great UP 4014 is making the rounds of the West/ UP 4014 Rounding the Corner Outside Rock River, WY 2026. MKTH Photo. This is my favorit...
UP 4014 "Big Boy", March, 2026.
The great UP 4014 is making the rounds of the West/
UP 4014 Rounding the Corner Outside Rock River, WY 2026. MKTH Photo.
This is my favorite engine. It's the third time I've seen it. Every time was accidental.
MKTH Photo.
MKTH Photo.
Big Boy UP4014 in Medicine Bow, Wyoming. MKTH photo.
MKTH photo.
MKTH Photo.
MKTH Photo.
Monday, March 23, 2026
Railhead: Cheyenne Railroad Historian Rushing To Save Abandoned Rail Line Before It Disappears
Railhead: Cheyenne Railroad Historian Rushing To Save Abando...: Cheyenne Railroad Historian Rushing To Save Abandoned Rail Line Before It Disappears
Wednesday, March 18, 2026
Railhead: The Nightcrawler. The train from Denver, Colorado, to Billings, Montana.
Railhead: The Nightcrawler. The train from Denver, Colorado...: I had no idea that this is what this train was called. Thanks go out to MKTH for letting me know! I've been looking into local passen...
The Nightcrawler. The train from Denver, Colorado, to Billings, Montana.
I had no idea that this is what this train was called. Thanks go out to MKTH for letting me know!
I've been looking into local passenger train travel as part of my efforts with a novel. What I found is that I knew very little about it. Probably more than your average bear, but that's about it. I'd long assumed that a person could board a train in Casper in 1916 and take the train to Douglas or Cheyenne, and then return that evening, but the more I looked into it, that was just an assumption.
I'm not the one who figured out how it really worked. That goes to MKTH. the result is fascinating.
It turns out I was right sort of. The Burlington Northern ran a train from Denver Colorado, to Billings Montana, and vice versa, daily. This article takes a look at it.
What I imagined, for novel purposes, was boarding in Casper, and traveling to Douglas. I may, as I work at it, make it Cheyenne.
Union Station, Denver Colorado
Union Station, Denver Colorado
Union Station as viewed from in front of Denver's Oxford Hotel.
Anyhow, this is a really interesting article and give a really good look at what traveling on the Denver to Billings night train was like, complete with stops for food, which is something I hadn't considered. It also picked up mail, and my source indicates, cream, something I also hadn't figured, but that may explain why the creamery my family owned was just one block from the Burlington Northern. In fact it probably does.
Jersey Creamery Inc.
The trip took 19 hours. It take 8 hours today by car, assuming good weather conditions, and not figuring in stops for food, etc. The train moved about 34 miles an hour.
We'll look at the return trip first. The train having come up from Cheyenne boarded there at 12:49 in the morning. Uff.
It got to Casper at 6:20 in the morning, having made a couple of stops along the way.
Burlington Northern Depot, Casper Wyoming
What I imagined?
Not really. And I also had no idea that there was a major cafe right off the railroad. This article deals with the early 1960s, but I can see that some variant of it was there decades prior. That makes piles of sense, really. Of course there would be. How else would people eat if they were making the long journey?
It simply hadn't occurred to me.
In my imaginary trip., that'd be it. If I stuck with the Douglas variant of this, my protagonist would be boarding the train in the early, early morning hours and get in a couple of fitful hours of sleep, probably interrupted by a stop in little Glenrock. Indeed, this train stopped everywhere to pick up mail, and a few passengers.
What about the other way around?
Well that was a day trip, but as we can see, the 19 hours the train traveled in total meat that it took a good 6.5 hours to travel just from Cheyenne to Casper. Going the other way would mean the same thing, and likely a bit in reverse. The 6.5 hour trip from Cheyenne to Casper was the second major leg of the trip (it'd still stop in numerous small towns in between), the first being Denver to Cheyenne. Going the other way around meant that the Cheyenne to Denver leg was about five hours. The article notes that the train actually arrived from Billings 40 minutes before its 7:00 p.m. departure. So it arrived, more or less, at 6:00 p.m. and changed crews. That would have meant that it left Cheyenne, on the way to Denver, at about 1:00 p.m. or so, which makes sense. Passengers traveling all the way to Denver would have eaten lunch there.
By extension, however, that meant that the train left Casper at about 6;00 in the morning, approximately.
These times are almost unimaginable now. When we had good air travel to Denver I'd frequently board United Express here about 6;00 a.m. and be in Denver about 8:30, and take the train downtown and be to work by 9. I'd be back in Casper on the redeye about 10:00, or if I was lucky, 6:00.
And when I go to Cheyenne, I drive. Normally that takes me a little under three hours. I haven't stayed overnight in Cheyenne for years, although I recently had an instance which should really cause me to.
Anyhow, if I'm looking at 1916, why not just drive?
Well, in 1916 most Americans, including most Wyomingites, didn't own automobiles, and those who did, didn't normally make long trips with them. They frankly weren't that reliable, even though they were simple. Roads also tended to be primitive, and not really maintained for weather. Could a person have driven from Casper to Cheyenne in a Model T, the most likely car they would have had? Yes, but it wouldn't have been any faster. It may well have been slower, quite frankly, as well as much riskier.
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