THE SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST
One of the most interesting elements in the history of the Pullman car
and the Pullman Company is the story of imitation and competition which
for a period after the foundation of the parent company thrived and
later disappeared. The success of the Pullman car necessarily brought
competition. It was wholesome that such competition should arise. If
a car more convenient than the car of Mr. Pullman's invention could
be devised, it was right that it should be given the test of public
opinion. That no car constructed along different basic lines survived,
established the right of the Pullman car to its preeminence. That
certain cars patterned after Mr. Pullman's basic ideas, and in
most cases directly infringing on his patents, received a degree of
popularity again reflects creditably to the Pullman car.
Distinct from the innovations afforded by Pullman car construction, the
universal service of the Company afforded the public a new service of
equal value. Where formerly it was necessary for the traveler to change
from car to car whenever and wherever one railroad connected with
another line, the uniform service of the Pullman Company created a new
and infinitely more desirable situation, for it was now possible to
travel without inconvenience or interruption between practically any two
points in the country regardless of the number of different railroads
over whose tracks the traveler's ticket required passage. By
competition, the value of such a service was tested; tested alike by the
individual railroads and their patrons. That each and every competing
company ultimately retired from the field, and that practically every
railroad in the United States has today contracted with the Pullman
Company for its standardized service, is tacit recognition to the worth
of the service rendered.
[Illustration: More ornate interiors. (1) early Pullman parlor car; (2)
old type Pullman sleeping car]
[Illustration]
There are still other reasons why the control of sleeping and parlor
service should be delegated to a single company. Due to the vast area
embraced by the boundaries of the United States and the wide range of
climate which these boundaries contain, there are many railroads which
require during certain months of the year a larger number of cars to
transport their through passengers than in others. Other roads require
an equally great number of sleeping and parlor cars during other months,
as for instance those roads which carry the winter tourists to the South
and Southwest in winter as opposed to the roads which feel the peak
of passenger travel in summer when the vacationists are headed for the
Atlantic coast resorts or the northwestern mountains. Again, there are
special occasions, like great conventions, when the railroads touching
the convention city must have hundreds of sleeping cars above their
normal needs.
Few railroads could afford to tie up capital in the cars required for
such brief periods of demand; it would be an economic fallacy to pass
the expense of the maintenance and constant replacement of such an
equipment on to the public. To meet this situation is the mission of the
Pullman Company.
Of the numerous sleeping car companies the Gates Sleeping Car Company
was perhaps the earliest. This car was named after Mr. G. B. Gates,
General Manager of the Lake Shore Road, and with the consolidation of
the Hudson River Railroad and the New York Central in 1869, these cars,
previously only operated on the Lake Shore, were put in the New York,
Buffalo, Chicago service.
[Illustration: The latest Pullman parlor car, showing simplicity of
modern car decoration, combining quiet elegance with good taste and
comfort]
Among the various competitors of the Pullman Company, the Wagner Palace
Car Company, which succeeded, in 1865, the New York Central Sleeping Car
Company, and absorbed in 1869 the Gates Sleeping Car Company, developed
by far the widest and most formidable competition and continued its
service over the longest period. The underlying reasons for the strength
of this competition lay primarily in the fact that the Wagner cars
followed more closely the Pullman characteristics, and in fact the
infringement of certain basic Pullman patents by the Wagner Company
was a cause of frequent litigation over a period of many years. Webster
Wagner, the founder of the Wagner Palace Car Company, began his career
as a wagon maker. The first cars which he constructed had a single tier
of berths, and the bedding was packed away by day in a closet at the end
of the car. Commodore Vanderbilt backed Wagner and became interested in
his company, a connection which gave Wagner invaluable assistance and
a hold on the sleeping-car business of the lines controlled by the
Vanderbilt interests, a connection which enabled him for many years to
be a keen competitor of the Pullman Company.
Early in June, 1881, suit was brought by the Pullman Palace Car Company
against the New York Central Sleeping Car Company and Webster Wagner,
claiming $1,000,000 damages for infringement and use of patents in the
construction and use of Wagner sleeping coaches. The bill stated that
in 1870 the Wagner Company began building sleeping cars, and for several
years its coaches ran only on the New York Central Railroad and
its various branches. The company finding it impossible to build
satisfactory cars without using the Pullman patents, contracted with
the Pullman Company to use certain of its patented improvements. This
arrangement was made with the distinct understanding that the Wagner
Company was to run its cars only over the New York Central Railroad. For
five years this arrangement was satisfactorily carried out. But in
1875 the Pullman Company's contract with the Michigan Central Railroad
expired and the Wagner Company secured the contract to run the cars
between Detroit and Chicago, thus making a through connection for the
Vanderbilt lines between New York and Chicago.
By this new routing of the Wagner cars direct from New York to Chicago
and the elimination of the Pullman cars from the Chicago and Detroit
service, an opportunity offered for some other road to avail itself of
the Pullman service and effect a through Pullman service between New
York and Chicago.
The Erie was the road that grasped the opportunity. By arrangements
with the Baltimore & Ohio and several other roads, through Erie trains
between New York and Chicago, comprising Pullman hotel coaches, sleeping
cars and drawing room cars were put in service on November 1, 1875. A
circular published in Chicago announcing the new arrangement said:
From the first of November, the Pullman hotel and drawing room
coaches, for many years so popular on the Michigan Central line,
will be withdrawn from that route, and with new and increased
improvements will thereafter run exclusively on the Erie and Chicago
line, forming the first and only Pullman hotel coach line between
Chicago and New York.
The success of the new Erie Pullman coaches was immediately assured. The
hotel cars especially were a great attraction. These were divided into
two compartments, in one of which the kitchen was located, the other
compartment being utilized as a sleeping car. First-class meals,
including all manner of game and seasonable delicacies, were served on
movable tables placed in the sections. In fact, the _New York Tribune_,
in commenting on the new Pullman equipment, asked: "Should the Erie have
a monopoly of such comforts? Why does not Wagner imitate or improve upon
Pullman?"
These cars were nicknamed "French Flats."
All the modern conveniences of a first-class house are condensed
into one of these hotels on wheels. The beds at night are put away
to make room for spacious seats by day, between which a table is
placed, covered with damask cloths and napkins folded in quaint
devices, at which four may sit with ease. The whole car--a
Pullman--is luxuriously fitted up, and one end is partitioned into
a storeroom and kitchen; there is a smoking-room for lovers of the
weed, and a separate toilet room for ladies. As the porter of the
car blackens the boots, and there is a telegraph office at each
stopping place, the waggish question of "Where is the barber shop?"
is often made. But this may come, too, as last summer an excursion
party of ladies and gentlemen took a hair-dresser with them over the
Erie to Niagara Falls, and two or three ladies actually _had their
hair crimped_ while traveling thirty or forty miles an hour! At this
time, while game is plenty in the West, the Pullmans, with their
facilities, and two fast trains each way per day, are able to make a
bill of fare and serve it in a style which would cause Delmonico
to wring his hands in anguish. The service is on the European plan;
that is, you pay for what you order, and we give the prices of the
principal articles, to show at what a reasonable rate one can take
a superior meal of fifty or a hundred miles long: Prairie chicken,
pheasant, and woodcock, whole, $1; snipe, quail, golden plover and
blue-winged teal, each 75 cents; venison, 60 cents; chicken, whole,
75 cents; cold tongue, ham, and corned beef, 30 cents; sardines,
lobster, and broiled ham or bacon, 40 cents; mutton and lamb chops,
veal cutlets, or half a chicken, 50 cents; sirloin steak, 50 cents,
&c. Every traveler who has missed his dinner to catch a train will
rejoice in knowing that a warm meal awaits him at the cars, and that
he can wake up in the morning and choose his time for breakfast,
instead of bolting it down at the twenty minutes' convenience of the
railroad company.[2]
[2]: _New York Commercial Advertiser_, Nov. 30, 1875.
Some time prior to 1861 sleeping cars were being operated over the
Camden & Amboy and Baltimore & Ohio railroads. These cars were known as
"Knight" cars, after their designer, E. C. Knight. The "Knights" were
built at a cost of about $7,000, and were regarded as the handsomest
things on wheels. As in the bunk cars, all of which found their model in
the sleeping arrangements of the canal boat, the berths were only on
one side of the car and consisted of a triple tier of two double and one
single berth; an arrangement later changed to one double and two single
berths.
The Woodruff sleeping car also was designed about this time by T. T.
Woodruff, Master Car Builder of the Terre Haute & Alton Railroad. In
this car both sides of the car were utilized as in the Pullman car, and
the sleeping accommodations consisted of twelve sections, six on a
side. A company was formed to operate the Woodruff cars in 1871, with a
capital of $100,000.
The Flower Sleeping Car Company was another characteristic competitor.
This short-lived company was organized in 1882 in Bangor, Maine, with a
capital of $500,000. The seats in this new car were placed in the middle
instead of on the sides of the cars, thus leaving an aisle on each side
instead of one in the center. Claims were made that a freer circulation
of air would result, and a news item of the _Times_ further recommended
this unique construction as more convenient to families, the berths
being so arranged, side by side, that two could be made up into a double
bed.
Mann's Boudoir Car Company was incorporated in 1883, with a capital of
$1,000,000, and experienced considerable popularity due to their unique
arrangement, which has been described in a previous chapter.
In 1883 the Erie Railroad realized the long entertained ambition of
entering Chicago on its own rails. To accomplish this, the Erie had
leased the New York, Pennsylvania & Ohio Railroad and built the Chicago
& Atlantic. Through connection was actually made May 15, on which date
freight traffic was begun.
The train by which the Erie inaugurated the passenger business over the
new trunk line was probably the most complete and elegant train ever to
that time constructed. All of the cars were of Pullman manufacture
and consisted of a baggage car, second-class coach, a smoking car, and
first-class coaches and sleepers that were "models of perfection and
beauty, as might be expected where the Pullman Company had _carte
blanche_ to produce the best possible." Each coach was lighted with the
new Pintsch lights. The smoking car deserves more than passing mention,
for it was the first one ever constructed of Pullman standard. The car
was equipped with upholstered easy chairs, and a "refreshment buffet"
moistened the throats of the smokers.
Early in 1889 the Pullman Company acquired the control of the Mann
Boudoir Car Company and the Woodruff Sleeping Car Company, including
the entire car equipment and plants. By this acquisition a long step
was taken for the unification of sleeping car service, and the further
development of a uniform and widely extended scope of operations.
For years the success of the Pullman Company's service had been too
generally acknowledged to escape the notice of enterprising railroad
men, and these two companies were fair examples of the numerous
competing companies that were organized. But the success of the
Pullman service was based on an idea of too wide conception ever to
be successfully imitated. The success of the company engendered
competition; its success resulted only in a comparison of service
injurious to the imitators. Behind all this lay the fundamental reason
for Pullman supremacy. Created to give a standardized service everywhere
for the convenience of travelers, it was quickly apparent that
competition was but a reversal to the old order--the more companies, the
less uniform service.
About a month previous, the Mann Boudoir Company and the Woodruff
Sleeping Car Company had joined hands and formed the Union Palace Car
Company. By the purchase of this combine the Pullman Company added about
15,000 miles of road to that already operated, and by that many miles
extended its through car service. The only remaining sleeping car
companies of any importance outside of the Pullman Company were the
Wagner Company, belonging to the Vanderbilts, and operated over the
Vanderbilt lines, and the Monarch Sleeping Car Company, which operated
entirely in the New England States with the exception of one Ohio line.
A newspaper of the time commented on the merger, and closed with the
verdict: "While this will add to the volume of the Pullman business, it
will also render the service upon the absorbed lines far more efficient
and satisfactory for the traveling public."
[Illustration: The first step in the building of the car. The center
construction in position, and the framework assembled]
In 1888, Mr. Pullman had put in operation his vestibule trains, which
immediately met with extraordinary favor and patronage. In a very few
days the Wagner Company also advertised a vestibule train and were
promptly met with an injunction holding the Wagner appliances to be
an infringement of the Pullman patent. After another hearing, the
injunction was superseded, the Wagner Company giving an unlimited bond,
signed by the Vanderbilts, to pay any damages ascertained by the courts.
After months occupied in taking the evidence of travelers, expert
mechanics, railroad officials, prominent citizens, and others, a final
hearing was had. The judges, owing to the vast interests involved and
the legal difficulties presented, took ample time for consideration,
but finally adhered to their first conclusion. The main feature of the
Pullman vestibule system was the Sessions patent, without which the
vestibule system was worthless. The court declared this invention to be
of the highest order of utility, not only as shown by the testimony in
the ease and the adoption of the patent by the principal railroads of
the country, but also by the acts of the Wagner Company in appropriating
the device, and in the tenacity with which they clung to it in the
courts under an immense bond for any damages to result, and so, in
April, 1889, the United States Circuit Court delivered its opinion in
favor of the Pullman Palace Car Company in its long and stubborn fight
with the Wagner Palace Car Company.