"Lightning Express goes coast-to-coast in 83 hours (in 1876!)"
June 4, 1876 Are We There Yet?
Last edition:
Showing posts with label Railroads. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Railroads. Show all posts
Thursday, June 4, 2026
Tuesday, June 2, 2026
Friday, June 2, 1911. Post revolution journeys.
Madero left El Paso on a Southern Pacific train which took him to Spofford Junction, Texas. He crossed the border there into Mexico where he boarded another train on his trip to Mexico City to meet interim Mexican President de la Barra.
Prominent Porfiristas José Ives Limantour, Guillermo de Landa y Escandón and Leopoldo Batres left Mexico City en route to destinations in the United States and Europe where they'd go into exile.
Fort Lauderdale, Florida, was incorporated.
Houston, Texas, June 2, 1911.
Last edition:
Wednesday, May 31, 1911. "Moriré en México"
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.
Monday, March 16, 2026
Tuesday, March 16, 1926. Sgt. Stubby crosses the Rainbow Bridge.
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Boston Terrier Sgt. Stubby, mascot of the mascot of the 102nd Infantry Regiment, died at age 10. He'd served for 18 months in France in the Great War, participating in 100 battles and four offensives. He provided warnings of attacks and of the use of mustard gas, and captured a German soldier by holding him by the seat of his pants.
He was a genuinely heroic dog.
The Casper recaptured fugitives indicated that they'd left Casper by rail.
I posted this page for the bus schedule. I have a detailed thread coming up on trains, and then noted this. I wasn't aware that there was a bus by 1926.
A closer look.
What isn't clear is how long the bus trip took.
There is bus service from Casper today. Greyhound. We'll take a look at that in some future post.
Apparently unrestrained immigration was worrying some. Others were worrying about Wyoming's oilfield population leaving for Texas.
Robert Goddard launched the first liquid fuel rocket in the United States at his Aunt Effie's farm in Auburn, Massachusetts.
Rocketry, like aviation, advanced like crazy. By World War Two rockets would be in use as ground weapons, air to air weapons, and of course, with the first ballistic missiles.
Last edition:
Sunday, March 15, 2026
Monday, March 15, 1926. Boxer Rebellion Echoes, Manhunt ends, National Guard Cavalry Inspection.
The signatories to the Boxer Protocol gave China an ultimatum for the commanders of the Taku Forts, who had just fired on the Japanese, to remove all mines placed at the mouth of the Pei River and to end their blockade of Tianjin by noon on Friday, March 19.
At least 12 ships from the U.S. Navy, the Royal Navy, the Imperial Japanese Navy, France and Italy were blocked from traveling into the Pei River to Tianjin. They were authorized to end the blockade by force if necessary.
A manhunt came to an end:
Of interest to us here, an inspection of National Guard cavalry was taking place in what was a unit that comprised Idaho and Wyoming National Guardsmen. I knew that had happened later (the joint command), but I wasn't aware of it being so early, well before the 115th Cavalry Regiment came into existence.
Last edition:
Sunday, March 14, 1926. Reddy Kilowatt introduced. Manhunt in Natrona County.
Saturday, March 14, 2026
Sunday, March 14, 1926. Reddy Kilowatt introduced. Manhunt in Natrona County.
Introduced on this day in 1926, the cartoon emphasized, in its introduction, electrical appliances and how they made life easier. Power companies used the cartoon figure for decades. I well recall it from when I was a kid.
There'd been a jail brake in Casper.
A railway disaster in Costa Rica resulted in the deaths of 248 people.
One via Reddit's 100 Years Ago sub, 16 year old Maybelle Addington married 27-year old Ezra J. "Eck" Carter, brother of A.P. Carter, in Virginia giving rise to the "first family of country music".
Country music, we'd note, is a bit deceptive in this context. As we've discussed before, Country & Western were actually two categories of music identified by early record companies, as was Rhythm & Blues. Western ballads, associated with cowboys and ranching, was really its own distinct genre, as was "Country", which was sometimes referred to as "Hillbilly Music". The current categories of C&W, Folk, etc, really hadn't set in, in a hard and fast way, either. Folk and Country music were in fact very rapidly evolving. Blues, which of course also had a Southern rural origin, was frequently picked up by Country artists at the time, even while it was breaking out in new directions in the Midwest and East coast, where it has already given rise to Jazz.
Last edition:
Saturday, March 13, 1926. Daydreaming.
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