Word: railroads
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...this had been all that happened, it would have amounted to no more than an unfortunate but minor railroad accident. What followed may go down as one of the most grotesquely needless tragedies in railroad history...
Numbed Senses. Nobody had a rational explanation for the catastrophe. Nobody seemed to know why warning torpedoes had not been placed on the northbound track. The railroad explained that the West Coast Champion's fireman had gone down the track to set a fusee, had stumbled and destroyed his only one. Passengers then lit newspapers...
...doors barred by soldiers with machine guns. Newsmen on the scene suddenly found Army M.P.s imposing a strict censorship: an A.P. cameraman was arrested, a Red Cross photographer had all his film destroyed. The M.P.s had stupidly followed the line of an A.C.L. district chief, who said the railroad did not want "that kind of publicity." A terse directive from the War Department told the M.P.s to stop meddling...
...Rails. The railroad plant is wearing out faster than it is being replaced. Half the freight cars and passenger coaches are more than 20 years old, locomotives are limping along without major overhauls, roadbeds are rough and many are dangerous. Yet WPB has consistently cut down the allocation of materials the railroads have set as their minimum needs. Thus the rails' plea for 2.1 million tons of new rail in 1943 was slashed to 1.5. Result: derailments are dangerously frequent. Anticipating the 15% increase in freight ton-miles in 1943, the carriers begged for at least...
Sellers' Markets. In Kansas City, a railroad pondered a request from a septuagenarian who wrote that he had had two operations, enclosed his hospital bill as proof, declared he could not abide another blizzard, prayed that the railroad would allow him a reservation to Florida. In Birmingham, Mich., Mrs. Richard J. Coveney put an ad in the paper for a maid "to live in, $15 a day. No cooking, cleaning, serving or laundry. . . . Loan of mink coat Thursdays and Sunday. Two children but mistress will take care of them. Maid's duties to answer door and telephone...