chalk, bunting, hardware, lamps, cotton and woollen waste, clocks,
brooms, and such metals as copper, pig tin, and antimony are only a
few of the many articles of diet which a railroad requires to keep
body and soul together, and give it strength to perform the great
duty it owes to commerce and the public. After they have all served
their purposes, such as cannot be worked over again in the shops,
and are not entirely consumed, are consigned to the scrap-heap
under the head of "old material"--an all-important consideration in
the economical management of any road. On many roads very little
attention is paid to the sale of scrap. As a general rule, the
purchasing agent has charge of it, and if he shows any shrewdness
in buying, he will exercise more or less ingenuity in selling. Most
railroad scrap has a fixed value in the market. Quotations for old
rails, car-wheels, and wrought iron are found in all the trade
journals; but as in buying one can usually buy of someone at prices
less than market price, so in selling he can often find a buyer who
is willing to pay more than the regular quotation. As it is found
not wise in the long run to purchase ahead on some prospective
rise, so in selling it is equally true that holding scrap over upon
the possibility of a rise in prices is not always for the best
advantage.
There has always been a demand for old iron rails, and recently
use for old steel rails has been found. They are worked over at
the rolling mills into crowbars and shovels, spikes, fish-plates,
bolts, and other necessary things to be employed in construction
and maintenance. Not long since an experiment with old steel rails
was successfully performed, whereby they were melted and poured
into moulds for use as brake-shoes. The result showed a casting
of unusual hardness which would outwear three ordinary cast-iron
shoes. This opens up an entirely new field in railroad economy,
for with ordinary foundry appliances accumulations of old steel
rails can be worked over and cast into all sorts of shapes and
patterns to better advantage than selling them at a nominal price
to outside buyers. While worn-out car-wheels will generally bring
more money from wheel manufacturers than they command in the open
market, it has not always been found the best policy to compel the
mill from which the new wheels are purchased to take too many of
them. It is apt to encourage the use of too much old material in
the manufacture of the new; and while the company may consider that
it is realizing much more money on sales of the old wheels than
the market price, it does not take into account the inferior stock
it is getting back, or the fact that possibly when the mileage
is reckoned the wheels have signally failed to run as long as
they ought. In the aggregate about ten per cent. of the original
cost of all supplies purchased is realized out of the sales of
old material. From cast-iron wheels and old rails, however, the
percentage is much larger, for while at present new passenger
car-wheels of this class, weighing about five hundred and fifty
pounds, are worth about ten dollars each, they will bring in the
market, when worn out after running say fifty thousand miles, about
twenty dollars per ton. Four wheels go to the ton, which represents
five dollars per wheel, or fifty per cent. of the original cost.
With old rails the percentage is even higher, in the present
condition of the rail market. Old iron rails are worth within four
or five dollars of the price of new steel, and the old steel about
seventy per cent. of the price of the new. These high percentages
assist in making up for the materials which are entirely consumed
in the service, and which never form a part of the ordinary
scrap-heap, such as oils, waste, and paints.
While the majority of general supplies just mentioned briefly may
be arranged for as required and purchased from month to month upon
regular requisitions, there are certain staple articles which are
provided for in advance by contract. Among them principally are
the engine-coal, rails and ties, stationery, passage-tickets, and
time-tables. More money is expended for such supplies than for any
others, and contracts with responsible business houses, for their
delivery at fixed prices for the limit of at least a year, are
generally made to insure, in the first place, the lowest market
rates and, again, to make the delivery certain.
Locomotive fuel is the largest single item of expense in the
operation of any road, the consumption of it running up as high as
a million tons per annum on some large roads; and while there are
a few exceptional cases where wood is used as fuel, coal is the
necessary element in nearly every case in America to-day.
Of the two general varieties--bituminous or soft, and anthracite
or hard--it is safe to say that bituminous coal is the more
economical, assuming that the grade employed is the best, this
economy lying both in the original cost and the fact that the bulk
of it goes to serve its purpose, there being comparatively little
waste in the way of ashes; while the anthracite produces many ashes
and clinkers, requires much more care and attention on the part of
the stoker or fireman, and costs, as a general rule, about thirty
per cent. more. Economy, however, should not be carried too far in
any branch of the service, and if the passenger traffic be heavy
the use of soft coal may be a great detriment. To a traveller
there can be nothing more disagreeable than the smoke and cinders
emanating from it; and if, besides this, the road be an especially
dusty one, the combination of dust, smoke, and cinders will be
quite sufficient to turn the tide of travel in some other direction
and over another route.
For freight service bituminous coal is decidedly the best, and
perhaps might not be out of place on short local passenger trains;
but the company that provides hard-coal-burning engines for
passenger trains, and soft-coal burners for freight, does about
the right thing, and economizes as far as practicable in this
particular. In making contracts for this important commodity the
necessity of careful tests in advance is very apparent, and such
trials are generally left with the best engineers and firemen;
otherwise it might be difficult to get at all the qualifications.
On some roads inducements offered to firemen have brought the
consumption of fuel down to the most economical point, and it is
surprising how much depends upon their good judgment in this matter.
Now that heating cars direct from the engines is coming into
general use, and State legislatures have given the subject their
consideration, the consumption of the domestic sizes of coal as
fuel in cars is growing less; but this, too, is still a very
important matter.
Stationery is not only a very significant item, but also an
expensive one. This includes all the forms and blanks used in
the conduct of the freight and passenger business, and there is
an endless variety of them--the inks, pens, pencils, mucilage,
sealing-wax, and envelopes, besides many other odds and ends.
Perhaps the envelopes represent one of the largest single items of
expense in this line. The hundreds of thousands of them used in
the course of a year, even at low prices, mean an outlay of many
thousands of dollars. Agents must send in daily reports, there
must be covers for all the correspondence passing between the
different departments, while the daily average amount of outside
correspondence is very considerable. It is surprising how many
dollars might be saved in this direction, not only by a judicious
contract, but by a careful use of the supply.
When a railroad company takes up the question of time-tables, it
has a matter of importance to handle which on many roads receives
very little consideration. When the passenger traffic is heavy, the
number of travellers during the year running into the millions,
the demand for time-tables is very large. This refers directly to
the time-table sheets or folders, which every company must keep
on hand at its stations, and in other public places and hotels,
for the convenience of the traveller, in addition to the printed
schedules which are framed and hung up conspicuously on the walls
of its waiting-rooms. A neat and attractive folder for general
circulation is very desirable, particularly if competition is very
strong. There is more virtue in a neatly made up schedule of trains
than one would suppose. One in doubt is apt to reason that the road
is kept up in a corresponding condition, and that the trains are
made up on the same plan, and consequently would prefer to go by
that route rather than by one whose trains were advertised on cheap
leaflets.
Fifteen thousand to twenty thousand dollars per annum for envelopes
alone is spent on some roads, and twice as much more perhaps for
time-tables.
Passage-tickets, including all varieties of regular and special
tickets, such as mileage books or coupons, family trip-books,
and school-tickets are also an item of large expense, the annual
consumption covering many tons, which once used are of no value
save as waste paper; yet they are absolutely indispensable in
the operation of the road. Yearly contracts for these are made,
and while the actual cost of a single ticket may not exceed _one
mill_, the aggregate on a road carrying fifteen millions to twenty
millions or more passengers per annum is considerable.
To induce the public to travel, and encourage shippers to send
their freight to market over any road, attention must first be paid
to the condition of the track and rolling stock.
It is not economy to allow anything to be out of repair, on
the supposition that it is less expensive than it would be to
spend comparatively little from day to day to keep it up. The
day of reckoning will come in the end, and the sacrifice will
be considerable. As the track is the fundamental feature, the
cross-ties or sleepers and rails should be the best. Iron rails are
practically out of date, and it is fair to assume that the time
is approaching when wooden ties will be things of the past. Where
the traffic is light, heavy steel rails may not be necessary; but
it has been generally found economical to put in use rails which
do not weigh less than sixty-seven or seventy pounds to the yard;
an even greater weight than this is not ill-advised--they require
fewer cross-ties to the mile, and in consequence the force of men
required to keep the track in condition is less. Light rails are
soon worn and battered out on a road over which heavy engines are
run and large trains are hauled. The powerful locomotives now built
require a well-kept track and a solid and substantial road-bed.
Heavier and faster trains have tended to reduce the average life of
rails, even though the weight of the rails has also been steadily
increasing. Circumstances vary on the different roads, but it is
safe to say that eight to ten per cent. of all rails in the track
must be renewed every year. This brings the average life of the
steel rails down to about twelve years, under ordinary conditions.
On some divisions, however, where the traffic is frequent, and in
yards where a good deal of switching is done, and the rails are
under pressure constantly, the average is, of course, very much
less--even as low as two or three years.
Aside from the durability of the timber employed, plenty of face
for the rail bearings, and uniform thickness and length, are
very important requirements in contracts for ties. While white
oak is generally considered the most durable for this purpose,
the growth of this timber is limited except in certain sections
of the country, so that cedar, cypress, chestnut, and yellow
pine are more commonly used than any other class. The millions
of them used for renewals and new roads each year are gradually
reducing our forests; and, like some of the European roads, we
shall some day fall back upon metal, which (while its life may not
be measured) will make so rigid a track that the traveller over
long distances will be worn out with his journey, and the rolling
stock will require frequent repairs and overhauling. The practice
of creosoting cross-ties is growing rapidly, and this tends to
increase their durability three or four times. While the first
cost of such ties may be double that for the unprepared timbers,
the result in the end is economical, for the labor alone required
to take out an old tie and put in a new one costs at least twelve
cents.
The general store-room is properly the intermediate stage, so far
as supplies are concerned, between the different departments of
the road and the Auditor, who charges up all material used to the
different accounts into which his system is divided. Properly,
everything in the nature of material, however small, directly or
indirectly passes through the Store-keeper's books. An account is
kept with each locomotive, station agent, switchman, and flagman,
so that to a penny everything consumed in the operation of a road
is accurately known. To accomplish this the Store-keeper, of
course, must be a good accountant, and at the same time be more
or less of an expert in railroad material. Under an economical
administration of his affairs he is able to save a great deal of
money for his company. By his system, with the aid of data from
the mechanical department, he can tell the average number of miles
run during the year to a pint of oil or a ton of coal; the number
of pounds of coal consumed per mile run, as well as the number of
pints of oil for the same distance. He can give in detail the cost
in cents per mile run for all the oil, tallow, and waste, fuel,
and other supplies consumed, and can account to a nicety for all
the lanterns, brooms, hardware, and other material which he has
received and distributed.
The following statement of averages represents fairly what it costs
to run a locomotive under ordinary conditions:
_Averages._
Number of miles run to pint of oil 15.32
Number of miles run to ton of coal 46.17
Number of pounds of coal per mile run 48.62
Number of pints of oil per mile run 0.06
_Cost in Cents per Mile Run._
Cents.
For oil, tallow, and waste 0.32
For fuel 7.42
For engineers 3.60
For firemen 1.79
For wipers and watchmen 1.25
For water supply 0.49
For supplies (miscellaneous) 0.10
For repairs 2.40
-----
Total 17.37
He will find that some engineers and firemen are more extravagant
than others, and that some station agents and flagmen do not
perform their respective duties with near so much regard for
economy as others do under exactly similar circumstances. In such
cases a report is made and a reminder from the Superintendent
follows, calling attention to such carelessness. The result is
apparent at the next monthly comparison.
Prompt payment of all supply bills helps to insure economy, and any
company unable to make its payments promptly and regularly, suffers
to a greater or less extent always; for a firm not able to know
whether its accounts are to be settled in thirty or ninety days
cannot afford to allow all the discounts which it otherwise might,
and this may mean an extra expense every year of many thousands of
dollars.
* * * * *
So far as the employees are concerned, it is for the best interests
of the company to have a fixed time for the pay-day. They need
their money and should get it regularly. Any road on which the men
are paid at uncertain times may be subject to incalculable losses.
It is apt to provoke dishonesty and carelessness. The road which
is bankrupt and forced to pass its pay-day to some indefinite time
is always hampered by some of the most inferior class of servants
in the market. Except in some instances where special laws have
been passed requiring railroad companies to meet their pay-rolls
oftener, once each month is generally recognized as pay-time, and
on large roads it would be simply out of the question for the
pay-rolls to be made up correctly and the men paid off sooner.
The paymaster is the wage-distributing medium, and by virtue of
his generosity will command as much respect as the President of
the road. No officer's face is more familiar than his, and surely
no one connected with the institution is looked for with more
eagerness by the hard-working employees. It is no easy task he has
to perform, and the responsibility for the millions of dollars
paid out in this way annually is very great. This responsibility,
however, has been very much reduced on some roads, where wages
are paid by checks entirely. Under some circumstances this system
will not work satisfactorily, especially on a road running through
a sparsely settled country. The employees may have to stand a
good round discount to some store-keeper or tradesman in order
to secure their money. The best and most satisfactory return for
services can be nothing less than solid cash; it encourages better
attention to business and relieves the men from possible annoyance
and inconvenience. The Paymaster's car, which is virtually a
moving bank or cashier's office, and arranged conveniently for the
payment of money to the men as they pass through, is generally
run "special," upon notice in advance to all foremen or heads of
departments, either by telegraph or, as on some roads, by the
display of special signal flags, which are carried on the front
end of the locomotive of some regular train the day before the car
is run over any division. In this way all men employed along the
line of the road, whether at or between stations, are notified of
the Paymaster's coming, and it does not usually require any other
inducement than this to bring them all out. There is nothing that
will prompt them to jump higher and run faster than the whistle of
the pay-train as it comes around the curve to the station. Men have
been known to forget their names, and do other foolish things under
the excitement of drawing their month's pay. The fellow who said
he could not write all his name when requested by the Paymaster to
sign the pay-roll, but offered to write as much of it as he could,
after some deliberation made a cross on the sheet with all the care
and nicety he could muster. Others who could not write have been
very slow to admit it, and have pleaded haste as an excuse for
not doing so. So far as Italians are concerned (and what railroad
service is now complete without its gang of Italian laborers?),
they are usually designated by numbers, and in some cases their
foremen have thought it well to name them after prominent statesmen
or other public men, or possibly some of the head officials of the
company. To run across twenty-five or thirty Daniel Websters on
the same road is not surprising, and the President of the company
himself is liable to have a half-dozen namesakes throughout the
different divisions of his road. A cage of jabbering monkeys is
not a more amusing spectacle than some gangs of Italian laborers
receiving their month's pay.
The pay-department can be made very systematic, and to promote
economy and accuracy it is absolutely necessary that it should
be. The Paymaster is not simply a medium through whom wages are
distributed. He may be one of the most important officers of his
company, and ferret out frauds and dishonesty which otherwise might
never be discovered. He knows all the men, and they, of course,
know him. In fact, he is the only one connected with the road whose
recognition among all the employees is absolutely certain.
Some idea of the enormous amount of money earned annually by the
railroad men in this country may be formed from the statement that
it requires about $1,000,000 per month to pay twenty thousand
men, and there are a good many roads on which the average monthly
pay-roll embraces from fifteen thousand to twenty thousand names;
in some cases even more.
When the pay-rolls are all turned over to the Paymaster,
properly approved by each head of department, he notifies the
Superintendent or Trainmaster of his proposed trip, mapping out
in detail the route, which is usually the same each month. The
signals or telegrams are sent ahead to the various foremen, and
the car is ordered ready for the journey. The funds are arranged
in denominations to suit the circumstances, with plenty of small
change, and enough money for a day or two only at a time is
provided. The pay for the flagmen at crossings, and switchmen on
the road, as well as for the agents at small stations, is generally
done up in envelopes, and, as the train speeds by, the packages
are handed or thrown out at the proper places; and sometimes, to
warrant a safe delivery, a forked stick is used, into which the
envelope is put, thus giving it plenty of weight and saving it from
being tumbled about promiscuously on the ground. Much time is saved
in this way, and the pay-train is able to keep well out of the way
of any regular train which may be following. So the pay-car flies
along, only stopping at some large station where the number of
employees engaged is sufficient to warrant it. These are quickly
paid off, however, and the journey is continued. Perhaps at some
junction a freight crew is met; and as these fellows have to get
their money when they can, a stop is made on the road to give them
a chance to do it. At some stations are found two or three gangs
of section or track men, a watchman, an agent and his assistant, a
pumper, and possibly a mail-carrier. Perhaps a discharged trainman
will turn up also, who may have part of a month's pay coming to him.
Later in the day it may be a shop gang of five hundred or one
thousand men, consisting of carpenters, painters, machinists,
and boiler-makers, and these are paid in order, each set of men
by itself. There is no noise or disturbance, everything goes
like clock-work, as all pass through in regular order, each gang
or class preceded by its foreman, and the men arranged in line
in the order in which their names appear on the pay-rolls. When
night comes, and two or three hundred miles of road have been
covered, the balance of the funds is carefully locked up in the
safe on board, the car run in upon some convenient siding, and
the engine housed for a wiping and a thorough preparation for the
next day's run. The car is generally provided with comfortable
beds for the Paymaster and his clerks, and during the paying-off
time they practically live in the car. This insures early starts
in the morning, and on large roads the necessity for haste is very
apparent, where possibly two or three weeks are consumed each month
in paying off the rolls.
* * * * *
The average traveller, spinning across the country at forty miles
an hour, is not apt to think of the countless details involved in
the make-up of the train in which he rides or the track over which
he is wheeled; but when he considers how safely the millions of
passengers are annually carried over the one hundred and fifty
thousand miles or more of railroad in this country alone, he may
be brought to realize that quite as much depends upon the quality
of the material entering into the construction of the train and
tracks as upon the efficiency of the engineer in the cab, or the
conductor, brakeman, switchmen, and train-despatcher who perform
their respective responsible duties in connection therewith.
Feeding a railroad, then, means a great deal more than the majority
of mankind supposes.
THE RAILWAY MAIL SERVICE.
BY THOMAS L. JAMES.
An Object Lesson in Postal Progress--Nearness of the Department
to the People--The First Travelling Post-Office in the United
States--Organization of the Department in 1789--Early Mail
Contracts--All Railroads made Post-routes--Compartments for
Mail Clerks in Baggage-cars--Origin of the Present System in
1862--Important Work of Colonel George S. Bangs--The "Fast Mail"
between New York and Chicago--Why it was Suspended--Resumption
in 1877--Present Condition of the Service--Statistics--A
Ride on the "Fast Mail"--Busy Scenes at the Grand Central
Depot--Special Uses of the Five Cars--Duties of the Clerks--How
the Work is Performed--Annual Appropriation for Special Mail
Facilities--Dangers Threatening the Railway Mail Clerk's Life--An
Insurance Fund Proposed--Needs of the Service--A Plea for Radical
Civil Service Reform.
At the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia, in the Post-Office
exhibit, was a double picture showing the postal service at the
beginning of the century and as it is to-day. On one side was a
postman--perhaps Franklin--on horseback, jogging over a corduroy
road, "through the forest primeval," making a mile or two an hour;
and on the other a representation of the fast mail train, the
"catcher" taking a pouch from the "crane" as it passes at the rate
of fifty miles an hour! Standing in the foreground is the pretty
daughter of the village postmaster with the mail pouch just thrown
from the car in her hand, a group of rustics, with ill-concealed
admiration in their eyes, watching her as the swiftly passing train
goes on its journey. This picture is not, perhaps, a work of art,
but it is an "object lesson," giving at a glance the progress that
our country has made in a hundred years.
[Illustration: Postal Progress, 1776-1876.
(Facsimile of a print in the Post-Office Department.)]