In cruising around the web, I came across a site that took me back to a part of my life that I enjoyed tremendously. It was also a part of American life that has largely disappeared.
The site is chicagorailfan.com, by Bill
Vandervoort.
Chicago, my hometown, was and still
is the railroad hub of the United States.
You could show this on a map of the U.S. by sketching in train routes,
joining them at Chicago, and then dropping a big blob of ink on their common
juncture. It would be an ugly map, one
representing some yet-undiscovered species of humongous spider-centipede with
spindly legs and a bulbous body.
At one time, eight large terminal
buildings in Chicago’s Loop—the city’s downtown commercial and entertainment
district—were the arrival and departure points for the passenger trains of 47
railroads. Many of those railroads are now
gone, and half of the terminals have been demolished or put to other uses.
Of those 47 railroads, I rode on six;
I also rode trains that went nowhere near Chicago, including one in England. I suppose there was a lot to gripe about when
traveling by train, but I was always hypnotized by just sitting there, watching
the world go by. And wondering: What is
it like to live in that town? Who lives
in that house? Why have those people
let their backyard become a trash pile?
Along with other pointless thoughts.
I was an economy class
traveler. Most of my trips were short,
and if I did travel overnight I bought a ticket in coach and got whatever sleep
I could sitting up.
Amenities and creature comforts were
better than a stagecoach but somewhat scarce nevertheless.
The cars were heated, but in a
commuter train packed full of people a lot of heat wasn’t necessary. Air conditioning could have existed--that I
don’t remember; passengers could open the windows, but at the risk of being
pelted by an ember from the stack of a coal-burning locomotive.
Food wasn’t served on the short-haul
routes I generally traveled; you had to bring your own or go hungry. Drinking water was obtained from a tank at
one end of the car and consumed from a paper cup that was foldable, reusable,
and disposable. I’ve read that in the early days of rail travel, a single community
cup was used by all passengers until someone read about germ theory and pushed
through a few basic ideas about heath and sanitation.
At one end of the car was a small
closet with a lockable door. Inside was a
toilet. Lift the lid and see … the
ground rushing by. At any given moment
trains were crisscrossing the land depositing human waste hither and thither. I think that passengers were cautioned not to
use the toilet when the train was stopped, but I can remember a conductor
walking through the car and locking the toilet door as a train pulled into a
station.
I had my first train ride when I was
eight years old, to go with my parents from Chicago to South Bend, Indiana, for
a funeral. In my teens and until I was
about twenty-one, trains were recreation and transportation for me. Then I
bought a car.
It was great fun, and I’d do it
again, especially since I’m old enough now to use the bar car.
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