THE OPERATION OF THE PULLMAN CAR
On the magic carpet of Bagdad the fortunate travelers of a fabulous age
were transported to their destination, over valley, river, and mountain
with a certainty and dispatch that has been unparalleled in the annals
of passenger transportation. But the magic carpet, despite the
generous measure of its service, seems to have been lost to following
generations, and only its reputation, doubtless somewhat amplified by
the telling, remains to set a high standard to succeeding transportation
enterprises.
Service is a much-used and a much-abused word. It has manifold
significance. It may be a personal thing and carry the conscientious
effort of individuals eager to do for others offices which they desire
performed; it may be purely mechanical and consist only in the provision
of the "ways and means" to secure a desired end. It may be a combination
of both; a system or organization instituted for the accomplishment of a
duty or work beneficial to a community. A great railroad affords such
a service. Greater in its scope than any railroad, the Pullman Company
provides a more vast, intricate, and complete service to the people of
the United States, a service unequaled in all the world.
[Illustration: Pullman sleeping car, latest design, with outline drawing
showing how the car is supplied with light, water, and heat]
A study of the scope and ramifications of the Pullman operations
deserves more than passing comment; it is of interest to everyone, for
everyone is to some degree a traveler; an actual or a potential Pullman
patron. In preceding chapters has been traced the story of passenger
transportation in America; how the first railroads offered communication
only between a few closely related cities, and how later the growth
of the railroads brought into direct communication practically every
village and metropolis throughout the land. Then came the time when
the inadequacy of such complete but disconnected service struck the
imagination of a man who saw the endless miles of track of countless
railroads bound together by a supplemental system to which all railroads
contributed and from which they profited, and by which, most of all, the
public would enjoy a service of a scope which could otherwise only
be attained by an actual combination of these railroads into a single
company. But the vision of the founder of the Pullman Company did
not stop at the idea of a unified system. He had not only seen the
discomfort and inconvenience of countless changes from one train to
another at railroad junctions and the midnight gatherings on the station
platform; he had seen in tired eyes the fatigue of sleeplessness; he had
seen in the preponderance of male passengers the lack of a protection
sufficient to permit the free travel of unescorted women; he had
realized, and his realization ranks high with the thoughts of the
world's innovators, that travel was a hardship and that it could be made
a pleasure.
With the realization constantly before him that the most perfect service
could be given only by the most radically improved equipment and the
widest extension of this company's activities, Mr. Pullman identified
the early years of organization with a development of the passenger
car to a degree of comfort, convenience, safety, and luxury that passed
popular comprehension. Nothing was too good for the Pullman car;
too much money could not be invested in it. Hand in hand with this
development of the mechanical side of service he developed its extension
throughout the country, by means of which it might be put into the hands
of the greatest number of people for their greater convenience. Never
has history more completely justified a business that from its character
must be to a certain extent a monopoly. Never has competition more
promptly yielded to unification.
It is natural to think of the Pullman Company as housed in some
miraculous manner in the cars which it operates, as a company which
expends its restless existence in untiring travel from state to state.
But, as a matter of fact, the vast organization which makes possible
the movement of the seventy-five hundred cars which comprise the present
equipment holds an interest secondary only to the actual operation of
the cars themselves.
[Illustration: Front end of a dining room in a private car]
[Illustration: Rear end of the same dining room]
There was a day when the run from Albany to Schenectady was the longest
continuous railroad ride that a traveler might take. Today it is
possible to travel in a Pullman car without change from Washington, D.
C., to San Francisco, a distance of 3,625 miles, requiring one hundred
and eighteen hours, or approximately five days.
But distance is not alone characteristic of Pullman service; equal
attention is given to shorter "hauls." From Greensboro to Raleigh, North
Carolina, for instance, a distance of only eighty-one miles, Pullman
sleeping cars are regularly operated. Here, as in many other instances,
arrangements exist whereby the passengers may retire early in the
evening while the car is at rest on a siding in the station, and
arise at a reasonable hour in the morning. By such service hotel
accommodations are practically afforded and it becomes possible for the
travelers to have a whole day for pleasure or business at one place,
spend a night in which a hundred or five hundred miles are traversed,
and arrive without fatigue at another place the following morning.
The hotel desk corresponds to the ticket office of the Pullman Company.
Imagine a hotel with 260,000 beds and 2,950 office desks, and a total
registration of 26,000,000 people each year. This is what the Pullman
Company does, however, and incidentally it does it often at a mile a
minute and in every state in the Union. The 2,950 offices where Pullman
berths, seats, drawing rooms or compartments may be purchased include
Quebec, Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Vancouver on the north; San Diego, El
Paso, New Orleans, Key West, and Havana on the south; San Francisco
on the west, and the seaboard towns of Maine on the east. Under normal
conditions the southern limit is still further extended to fifty-six
additional offices in the Republic of Mexico, as far south as Salina
Cruz on the Gulf of Tehuantepec, and approximately two hundred miles
from the boundary between Mexico and Guatemala, Central America.
The longest distance which it is possible to travel with a single
Pullman ticket is from Portland, Maine, to San Francisco, by the way
of Washington, D. C., New Orleans and Los Angeles. This cannot be
done, however, in one sleeper, and changes must be made at New York
and Washington. But a brief consideration of the perfect organization
necessary to provide such continuous passage with berths reserved at
each point of change by the mere purchase of a ticket at the starting
point, grants to the Pullman Company a measure of credit due. In actual
mileage the distance covered by this trip is 4,199.
[Illustration: ROBERT T. LINCOLN
President of the Pullman Company from 1897 to 1911]
As a rule the berths in sleeping cars and seats in parlor cars are on
sale at the terminals of the different lines, but to provide facilities
at intermediate points where the demand is sufficient to justify it, a
limited number of sections are assigned for sale at such stations and
tickets may be purchased from them on application. At stations of less
importance and where the demand is not sufficient to assign any definite
space, an arrangement exists whereby the vacant accommodations are
telegraphed by ticket agents or conductors from point to point in order
to accommodate passengers taking the trains at such stations. It is also
possible and a very common practice to purchase a single sleeping car
ticket between stations a great distance apart--for instance, between
Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Washington, to Los Angeles, San
Francisco, Portland, and Seattle, via any of the ordinary routes of
travel, by sufficient notice to the ticket agent to enable his reserving
the accommodations, and it is also possible to purchase under similar
conditions a sleeping car ticket in Havana, Cuba, for a berth, section,
or drawing room from Key West, Florida, to Seattle, Washington, a
distance of 3,923 miles, taking one hundred and thirty-three hours;
not, however, without change, but in connecting cars, giving continuous
sleeping car service over various routes.
During the year 1916, 16,398,450 tickets of various forms were printed
in Chicago and distributed to the various ticket offices, and in
addition, 8,150,000 cash-fare tickets or checks were issued by
conductors to travelers purchasing on the train.
In addition to offices where tickets may be purchased, arrangements
exist in many thousands of smaller points whereby the public may secure
sleeping-car accommodations by application to the station agent or other
representative of the railroad company, who will arrange by telephone,
telegraph, or letter the desired space to be called for, with a
reasonable time at a designated point.
In order to extend to the public every courtesy consistent with lawful
requirements and good business principles, the Pullman Company endeavors
to provide prompt and careful attention to all requests for refund of
fares where service paid for is not furnished, whether through the acts
of its agents or employees or the passenger, or due to interruption of
traffic.
Applications of this nature are usually made to the company's general
offices in Chicago, but when this is not convenient, a report made to
the company's representative in any of the important cities throughout
the country is forwarded to the central offices and receives the most
careful consideration.
It would seem of interest in this connection to state that during the
year 1916, 53,743 applications, amounting to $152,446.00, were received
for refund of fares, an average of one hundred and seventy-nine for
each working day. Of the total number received 48,025 were considered
favorably and paid, indicating the liberal policy of the company in
such matters. Regardless of the amount involved, great or small, it is
necessary that each case be considered on its individual merits, and the
result determined with due regard to fairness to the passenger and the
company, and not conflicting with legal necessities.
Probably seventy-five per cent of these requests for refunds are
occasioned by passengers changing their plans or missing their train.
Most frequent is the reason given that the wife has packed the tickets
in the trunk, that the cab or taxi broke down, or that the last act of
the theater caused unrealized delay. Often the tickets are lost, and not
infrequently they are turned in by others for refund.
[Illustration: Bedroom and observation section of a costly private car.
This car represents the apotheosis of railroad travel]
[Illustration]
But one of the most convenient features of the Pullman service is the
ease with which the traveler may reserve in advance accommodations on
the train which he intends to take. In the ordinary railway coach it
is a rule of "first come, first served" and the late arrival is often
obliged to take a seat with a stranger. By the Pullman system, however,
a call over the telephone or a stop at the local ticket office is all
that is necessary to make as definite reservation of space as for a
theater, and the traveler is wroth indeed when in rare instances a slip
occurs and he finds his seat or berth has not been held for him and has
been sold to another.
Naturally so general a convenience has led to rank abuses from which the
passengers invariably suffer. Chief among them is the practice of hotel
clerks and porters, especially in large cities and at summer and
winter resorts, to reserve far in advance all the desirable Pullman
accommodations on popular trains in the names of supposititious
travelers whom they claim to represent, and later sell these tickets to
the hotel guests at a premium or for the tip which invariably follows.
By such practice the distribution of space is placed in the hands of
outside parties, out of the control of the railroads or the Pullman
Company, and the traveler is obliged to look to these irresponsible
individuals for his accommodations. In addition, the tip or extra fee
increases the cost of the ticket, errors in "duplicate sales" are made
more frequent, and a critical and unfriendly feeling is created in the
mind of the passenger who has been unable to secure a "lower" on early
application at the ticket office, but was able perhaps to secure one at
train time from the unused tickets turned in by hotel porters. Naturally
the feeling is created that the railroad or Pullman agents are holding
back space for a tip or a favorite, and "playing favorites" is never
popular with the public.
There are several good stories told of the action of the Pullman Company
in cases where they "had the goods" on the offending hotel porters. As
the company is in no sense required by law to make refund, but does so
only for a convenience to its patrons, it is possible to refuse to make
a refund if the case justifies the action. At a popular watering place
an enterprising hotel employee figured out that on the day following
Easter a large number of guests would leave on a certain popular train.
Accordingly, like the theater "scalper," he purchased outright a large
block of tickets on this train, in fact, every lower on the two Pullman
sleepers. Fortunately the local agent of the company sensed that there
was something "rotten in the state of Denmark" and made provision for
two additional sleepers beyond the usual two which travel warranted.
Being able to secure satisfactory accommodations direct from the agent
the passengers failed to patronize the hotel porter's be-tipped and
premiumed wares, and he, "stuck with the goods," tried a few days later
to throw them back for refund on the Pullman Company. Their refusal cost
him an even hundred dollars and broke up a peculiarly bad condition in
that particular locality.
Many, indeed, are the difficulties attending the operation of a
system of such magnitude, and it is only by a consideration of these
difficulties that the true wonder of a service so nearly perfect can be
appreciated.
The operation of a system of such magnitude as the Pullman Company
necessitates an operating organization letter perfect in its detail.
Such an organization cannot be built to order; it must be a development,
the result of years of wearying experience and costly experiment. In
the introduction to the official book of instruction provided to car
employees of the company, occurs, above the signature of the general
superintendent, this sentence: "The most important feature to be
observed at all times is to satisfy and please passengers." It is an
apparently simple commission, a natural expression of desire, but
a brief investigation of the requirements necessary "to satisfy and
please" twenty-six million passengers, traveling rapidly from place
to place, from north to south and from coast to coast, regardless of
climate or locality, discloses a service and machinery for the carrying
out of that service complete beyond the realization of the most
discerning traveler.
To comprehend more clearly the details of this nation-wide service it
must be considered in its two aspects--the material equipment which the
operation of the cars requires, and the personal service afforded by the
employees of the company. To give this service 7,500 cars of the Pullman
Company are operated over one hundred and thirty-seven railroads, or a
total of 223,489 miles of track, reaching practically every point in
the country from which or to which a person might desire to travel.
To operate these cars an army of over ten thousand car employees are
required, while seven thousand more are employed to keep the cars in
repair, and maintain them in a clean and sanitary condition.
The Pullman Company maintains, in addition to the great plant at
Pullman, six repair shops situated at various convenient points
throughout the country where cars are repaired and maintained in good
condition. In 1916, a total of 5,115 cars were repaired at these
various shops at a cost of over five million dollars. Only by such rigid
maintenance can the cars be kept in the almost invariably excellent
condition in which they are found by the public.
[Illustration: Modern Pullman steel sleeping car, ready to be made up
for the night]
[Illustration: Modern Pullman steel sleeping car during the day]
Years ago the wearied traveler wrapped his great coat about him for his
midnight journey. Later a few "sleeping" cars of primitive construction
provided sheets and blankets which were stored in a cupboard in the end
of the car. As these were washed only at irregular intervals, it was
a lucky passenger who found clean linen for his bed, and if he did not
make up the bed himself, it was the brakeman who provided this domestic
service. Naturally no one thought of undressing for the night, and when
the Pullman car was first introduced it was necessary to print on the
back of the tickets and in the employees' rules book the warning that
passengers must not retire with their boots on.
Today the Pullman Company to provide clean linen nightly for each
passenger, keeps on hand 1,858,178 sheets, which are valued at
$980,553.00, and 1,403,354 pillow slips worth $186,475.00. In the twelve
months ending April 27, 1916, over two hundred thousand sheets, valued
at over one hundred thousand dollars, and nearly two hundred thousand
pillow cases, valued at over twenty thousand dollars, were condemned.
And during the same period 108,492,359 pieces of linen, including
both sheets and pillow cases were washed and ironed. In the matter of
condemnation, it is interesting to learn that the slightest tear or
stain is considered sufficient cause. These figures are staggering in
their immensity, but even more amazing is the system by which these
articles are provided, changed, washed, returned in traveling hotels, at
times hundreds of miles removed from the nearest supply station.
In the oldtime washroom a roller towel gave satisfaction to travelers
less particular than those of the present day. But now how things have
changed. Two million seven hundred thousand towels are needed to supply
an ever increasing demand. Three hundred and twenty-five thousand
dollars was their cost and each year seventy million towels is the
laundry order. When Brown has shaved in the men's washroom in good
American style, he will probably wipe his razor on a towel. It is not
his custom at home, but the traveler seems to have scant respect for
property. That one little cut will destroy the towel for future service.
Pullman towels rarely have a chance to wear out. Over a hundred thousand
a year are condemned chiefly because of such usage, and, sad to relate,
each year over half a million are "lost." A Pullman towel is a handy
wrapping for a pair of shoes, but the annual lost charge amounts to
nearly seventy thousand dollars. It is a charge that must be accepted by
the company. It will not do to question a passenger's integrity.
All told, the investment by the Pullman Company in car linen amounts to
$1,856,708.00, representing 6,597,714 separate pieces. And this is only
for sleeping and parlor cars and a relatively small number of buffet and
private cars, for the company no longer operates the diners. To provide
new linen to replace the lost and condemned costs an annual sum of over
four hundred thousand dollars.
But the quantities and the cost of other articles which the company
provides are even more impressive. These, for the most part, are
expressions of Pullman service over and above the service itself, but
it is unquestionably true that by such "over and above" service is the
whole service most truly judged. Who would think, for instance, that
in one year 5,819,656 women's hats were protected against dust by paper
bags provided by the porters. And yet these paper bags represented
a total cost of $14,549.00. Smokers in the same period consumed two
million boxes of matches, and over forty-two million drinking cups
costing nearly eighty thousand dollars gave the modern touch of
sanitation to the water coolers. Soap would naturally be considered an
essential part of the service, but a soap bill for one year of sixty
thousand dollars is a large order for cleanliness. So, too, is the sum
of $20,000 for hair brushes and a third of that amount for combs.
Back in the dark ages of blissful ignorance of germs, railroad coaches
were hallowed breeding places for sickness. But times have changed, and
today it is a pretty safe remark to make that the Pullman car is more
healthful than almost any place where people frequently congregate.
It does not take many gray hairs to remember the days of sleeping
cars furnished with heavy carpets tacked to wooden floors, of stuffy
hangings, and plush upholstery, of fancy woodwork rife with cracks and
crannies, and of washrooms and toilets that no amount of cleaning could
ever maintain entirely innocuous.
It is difficult to enumerate the countless little details that are
constantly incorporated into Pullman car construction. The berth light
has been frequently changed to embody some new idea to improve its
convenience and efficiency. The coat hanger, and the mirror in the upper
berth are minor details, but their convenience is attested by their
constant use by passengers. In the washrooms the design of the wash
basins has been frequently altered to afford a more convenient resting
place for the toilet articles unpacked from the traveler's bag. Even the
location of a coat hook receives a consideration that would perhaps seem
exaggerated to the casual outsider. Double curtains are now provided
on the newer cars, one set for the lower and another set for the upper
berth.
Once a month a Committee on Standards, composed of the higher officials
of the company, meets at the big plant at Pullman. On a track near the
main entrance, stands a car in which every practical suggestion has
been incorporated for the inspection of the committee. Some of these
suggestions are quickly eliminated by their experienced verdict; others,
possessing apparent worthiness, are passed and are later incorporated
in the construction of the next cars manufactured, when the public will
become the final judge. Many of these improvements are of a technical
character, and primarily affect the construction of the cars; others are
of a more directly personal nature and contribute more to the comfort
and convenience of the traveler. All that are passed by the committee
serve to place still higher the standard that for fifty years has been
constantly uplifted by the company.
[Illustration: At the end of its journey the Pullman car is thoroughly
cleaned and disinfected. The first picture on this page shows the
bedding being given a sun bath. The next, the appearance of the car
when ready for fumigation, and the two illustrations at the bottom, the
vacuum machine at work.]
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
As a car-building material wood has had its day, and the concrete floor
of the Pullman car is tacit tribute to the sanitary properties of a
widely used material. On the floor of concrete the familiar green carpet
is lightly stretched to be easily removed at the journey's end, and
after the floor has been thoroughly scrubbed, returned after a complete
cleansing with vacuum cleaners. Instead of insanitary woodwork, the
smooth surfaces of steel which form the interior of the car offer no
lurking place for germs, and soap and water at frequent and regular
intervals maintain a high degree of cleanliness. Of course, the porter
with his portable vacuum cleaners and his dustcloth, can keep the car
tidy en route, but the real cleaning comes when the trip is over and
a gang of professional workers with every appliance to serve this end
attacks the cars. Then not only are the carpets renovated but the prying
nozzles of powerful vacuum cleaners suck up every particle of dust from
seats, berths and cushions. Each mattress is given similar treatment,
and mattresses and pillows are hung in the open air for the action of
that greatest of all purifiers, the sun. Blankets are given a similar
treatment. Water coolers are cleaned and sterilized with steam. In fact,
nothing that could harbor a speck of dust is neglected.
The slight, acrid odor sometimes noticeable in a Pullman car at the
beginning of a run is caused by the disinfectants which are liberally
employed. A jug of disinfectant solution is a part of the equipment of
every car and this is used for all car washing and particularly on the
floors and in the toilet and washrooms.
To protect still further the health of the passengers, the cars are
regularly fumigated with a gas which kills all disease-producing
bacteria. Whenever a car has carried a sick person it is fumigated as
soon as it is vacated, in addition to the regular monthly, weekly, or
other schedule of fumigation for various lines and terminals. In order
that the district offices may be promptly informed as to the necessity
of this extra fumigation, the conductor is required to note on his
inspection report the fact that a sick passenger has been carried, and
the car is immediately taken out of service and thoroughly cleaned and
fumigated. Moreover, if space occupied by a sick passenger is vacated en
route, it must not be resold until the car has reached its terminal and
has been fumigated.
To provide the necessary facilities for car cleaning, the company
maintains a cleaning force in two hundred and twenty-five principal
yards, and, in addition, at one hundred and fifty-eight outlying points.
These yards require the service of over four thousand cleaners.
Stationed throughout the United States, in nearly every city
of prominence, are six superintendents, thirty-nine district
superintendents and thirty agents. These men each week make personal
inspection of cars in operation with the sole purpose of keeping the
service up to the highest standard. In addition, a corps of electrical
and mechanical inspectors constantly inspect and test the cars and
their devices, at various places, and another corps of local inspectors
carefully examine every departing and every incoming train with
particular attention to the appearance and deportment of the car
employees and the apparatus for heating, lighting and water.
The Pullman Company is today the greatest single employer of colored
labor in the world. Trained as a race by years of personal service in
various capacities, and by nature adapted faithfully to perform their
duties under circumstances which necessitate unfailing good nature,
solicitude, and faithfulness, the Pullman porters occupy a unique place
in the great fields of employment. There are porters who for over
forty years have been employed by the company, and of all the porters
employed, an army of nearly eight thousand, twenty-five per cent have
been for over ten years in continuous service. The reputation of any
company depends in a large measure on the character of its employees,
and particularly in those concerns which render a personal service to
the general public is it necessary that the standards of the employees
be exceptionally high. Such standards of personal service cannot be
quickly developed; they can be achieved only through years of experience
and the close personal study of the wide range of requirements of those
who are to be served.
To inspire in the car employees, conductors as well as porters, the
ambition to satisfy and please the passenger, rewards of extra pay are
made for unblemished records of courtesy; pensions are provided for the
years that follow their retirement from active service; provision is
made for sick relief, and at regular intervals increases in pay
are awarded with respect to the number of years of continuous and
satisfactory employment.
One characteristic of the Pullman business that is peculiarly
significant is the average length of service of the employees. In a
general way it may truly be said that from the car porter to the highest
official every man who enters the business enters it as a life work. In
most lines of business there is a variety of concerns operating along
similar lines, and it is a natural step for a man to pass up from one
company to another. But the unique position held by the Pullman Company
has eliminated such a situation, and a man entering its employ looks
forward to a personal development in this one concern.
[Illustration: JOHN S. RUNNELLS
President of the Pullman Company]
During the half-century which has seen the sure and perfect development
of this vast and complicated organization it is but natural to expect
among the names of those who have guided its destiny many that must rank
high in the business history of the country. A glance at the list of
past and present Directors of the company confirms the expectation. Here
are the names of men who have found high places in a variety of business
activities not only in Chicago but in other great cities. The list
includes:
George M. Pullman
John Crerar
Norman Williams
Robert Harris
Thomas A. Scott
Amos T. Hall
C. G. Hammond
J. P. Morgan
Marshall Field
J. W. Doane
H. C. Hulbert
O. S. A. Sprague
Henry R. Reed
Norman B. Ream
William K. Vanderbilt
John S. Runnells
Frederick W. Vanderbilt
W. Seward Webb
Robert T. Lincoln
Frank O. Lowden
John J. Mitchell
Chauncey Keep
George F. Baker
John A. Spoor
In this same period but three men have occupied the office of president:
George M. Pullman, the founder of the company, who held office from
1867, the year of incorporation, until his death in 1897, and Robert T.
Lincoln until 1911, when John S. Runnells, the present president, was
elected.
Pullman service has revolutionized the method of travel. Night has been
abolished, the sense of distance has been annihilated; fatigue has been
reduced to a minimum. In the oldest districts of the east, along the
valleys of western rivers, on the wide-spread plains, among the remote
peaks of the Rockies, in the deserts of the great southwest, the Pullman
car, served by the same trained employees, furnishes the same comforts,
and gives the same nights' repose. Improved each year in its mechanical
construction, amplified in its service, better served by its attendants,
it has set a high standard to the world in the development of railway
travel, and in the fifty years of its development it has contributed
more to the safety, comfort, convenience, and luxury of travelers than
any other similar contribution that has been given to mankind.
INDEX
Berth construction, Mr. Pullman's new and radical, 99, 100
Boudoir cars, the Mann, introduced in Europe, 64, 81
_Bygone Days in Chicago_, its story of the locating of the Pullman
shops, 91
_Chicago Tribune_, the, eulogy of the first Pullman cars, 46
Cleaning the cars, 152-154
Colebrookdale Iron Works, cast the first rails, 4
Construction of Pullman cars, 123-129
_Detroit Commercial Advertiser_, the, comments of, on the hotel car,
49
Dining car, the first designed by Mr. Pullman, 52;
he constructs "The Delmonico," 104;
railroads adopt the, 104;
its operation given up by the Pullman Company, 105
Electric lighting of cars, 112-119;
in England, 113-118
England, introduction of Pullman cars in, 61-63;
reception of cars in, 66;
"The Pullman Limited Express," 68, 69;
electric lighting of Pullman cars in, 113-118
Erie railroad, gets the through Pullman service, 78, 79, 82
Europe, the Pullman car in, 61-69
Flower Sleeping Car Company, 81
Gates Sleeping Car Company, competitor of the Pullman Company, 75
Gauge, railway, standardized, 48
Heating, early, 22, 31;
by locomotive steam, 119
Hotel cars, the first in service, 49, 50, 52, 103;
give way to the diner, 104
_Illinois Journal_, the, comments on the first Pullman cars, 45
_Illinois State Register_, the, describes the new type of car, 43, 44
Knight car, used on eastern roads, 80
Lighting, 31, 112;
the Pintsch light, 82, 112;
electric, 112-119
Linen, requirements to supply the cars, 147-149
Locomotive, the beginnings of the, 5-9;
the American, 11, 12
_London Telegraph_, the, comments on the dining car, 67;
on the introduction of electric lighting in Pullman cars, 115, 116
Mann Boudoir Car Company, incorporated, 81;
acquired by the Pullman Company, 83
Mann, Colonel, designs a sleeping car, 63;
his "boudoir cars" installed in Europe, 64;
his Company acquired by the Pullman Company, 83
Monarch Sleeping Car Company, competitor of the Pullman Company, 84
Napoleon's field carriage, 2, 3
Operation of the Pullman car, the, 133-158
Parlor car, or reclining chair car, the first, 58
Porter, the, of the Pullman car, 155, 156
Presidents and directors of the Pullman Company, 157
Pullman, A. B., assistant of his brother, George M., 47
Pullman car, the first actual, 32-34;
rise of the great industry, 39-58;
first trip of, to the Pacific coast, 53, 54;
first through train from Atlantic to Pacific, 54-57;
in Europe, 61-69;
shop for making, established in Turin, 65;
reception of in England, 66-69;
imitation of, and competition from others, 73-85;
acquires the Mann and Woodruff companies, 83;
wins suits against the Wagner Company, 85;
rapid expansion of business, 89;
locates new shops at Chicago, 89-93;
berth construction for, 99, 100;
vestibuled trains of, 106-111;
electric lighting in, 112-119;
heating of, by locomotive steam, 119;
how the cars are made, 123-129;
the first all-steel, 123ff.;
trucks for, 126;
fittings, 128;
operation of the, 133-158;
travel distances possible for, 136-139, 146;
tickets sold yearly, 140;
linen required for, 147-149;
other furnishings for, 149-151;
cleaning, 152-154;
the working force, 154;
the porters, 155
Pullman, George M., birth and early years, 24, 25;
first activities in Chicago, 26, 27;
first sleeping-car work, 28-32;
his first Pullman car, 32-34;
the second car, 40;
incorporates the Pullman Palace Car Company, 47;
his purpose, 48;
introduces the hotel car, 49;
the first dining car, 52;
visits England, 61;
installs his cars there, 62, 66-69;
establishes shop at Turin, 65;
puts vestibule trains in operation, 84;
locates new shops at Chicago, 89-93;
builds town of Pullman, 93-95;
his radical changes in berth construction, 99, 100;
introduces the dining car, 103-105;
invents the vestibule for trains, 106-110;
his vision and achievement, 135, 158;
president of the company till his death, 157
Pullman Palace Car Company, incorporated, 47;
establishes shops in Detroit, 57;
its business, 137, 140, 141;
list of directors and presidents, 157
_Pullman, The Story of_, quoted, 94, 95
Pullman, the town of, 89-95
_Railroad Gazette_, the, on electric lighting of trains, 113
Railroad restaurants, the oldtime service, 101-103
Railroad transportation, birth of, 1-15
Rails, the first iron, 4
_Railway Review_, the, describes vestibuled trains, 109, 110;
on trial of electric lighting in English trains, 116-118
Railways, the first in England, 4-7;
in America, 7-15;
change gauge to suit Pullman cars, 48
Reclining chair car, or parlor car, the first, 58
Repairs and repair shops, 146
Sleeping car, the evolution of the, 19-35;
the early, 22, 23, 99;
Mr. Pullman's first, 28-32;
rise of the industry, 39-58
Stagecoach, the English, 2-4, 6
Steel, the first all-, Pullman cars, 123ff.
Stephenson, George and Robert, and the first steam engines, 5, 7, 9
_Trans-Continental_, the paper published by Pullman car tourists in
1870, 54
Transportation, birth of railroad, 1-15
Trevithick, Richard, experiments with steam locomotive, 5
Trucks, the, used for Pullman cars, 126
"Twenty minutes for dinner," failure of the system of, 102, 103
Vanderbilts, back the Wagner car, 76, 77, 84, 85
Vestibule invented, 106, 107;
vestibuled trains in service, 109;
trial trip, 110;
welcomed in Mexico, 111
Wagner Palace Car Company, competitor of the Pullman Company, 76-79,
84;
loses to the Pullman Company, 85
Wagner, Webster, founder of the Wagner Palace Car Company, 76
Woodruff sleeping car, 81;
acquired by the Pullman Company, 83
[Transcriber's Notes
All words printed in small capitals have been converted to uppercase
characters.
Duplicate chapter headings have been removed.
The following modifications have been made,
Page 129:
"carrry" changed to "carry"
(will carry from coast to coast)]
End of Project Gutenberg's The Story of the Pullman Car, by Joseph Husband