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Great Northern Pictorial Vol 3 by John F Strauss Jr
Great Northern Pictorial Vol 3 by John F Strauss Jr
Hard Cover
151 pages
Copyright 1993
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Bibliography 2
Publisher's Forward 4
Acknowledgements 5
Introduction 6
The Forerunners 10
The Postwar Streamliner 45
The 1951 Surprise 81
Incomparable with Great Domes 110
INTRODUCTION
The Great Northern Railway was somewhat tardy in joining the Streamlined Era, but when it did so in 1947, it became an aggressive participant with enthusiasm. Within a short and unbelievable 10 year period, 1947-1956, the Great Northern had completely modernized, streamlined, and domed its main line passenger trains. Great Northern's rapid passenger train service evolution shell-shocked the railroad passenger traffic industry, and once again Rocky's Railway was a superstar within that industry.
Along with its Northern transcontinental competitors, the Milwaukee Road and the Northern Pacific Railway, the Great Northern had been criticized editorially by the Northwest media during the late 1930s for its reluctance to join the parade toward streamlining. The critical editorials postulated that the Union Pacific Railroad's new 1936 CITY OF PORTLAND was the Northwest's transcontinental passenger train of the future. Also, the media wondered vociferously why the Great Northern and the Northern Pacific were so slow when their highly-prized Burlington Route had introduced its overnight 1936 DENVER ZEPHYR with considerable success.
This criticism was not meant to imply that the Great Northern had not been historically pro-passenger, but was intended to nudge its reluctant vault into the future. Ralph Budd, President when the Great Northern introduced the innovative and elegant 1929 EMPIRE BUILDER, had demonstrated the Great Northern's pro-passenger attitude when he stated: "The Passenger Department is the show window of the Railway, and contributes more to its successful operation than actual passenger revenues." On another occasion he had said: "It is more the train personnel than anything else that spells the difference between a train that is satisfactory and one that is not. I believe that a train, clean and well-maintained, and in charge of courteous people throughout, will make a better impression on patrons than will a fine new train with lack of friendliness, courtesy and tact."
Unfortunately for William P. Kenney, who succeeded Budd as President in 1932, the nation was in the depths of the Depression. Passenger traffic had nose-dived on Great Northern's trains, and declining revenues were very discouraging. Even though it was shortsighted at the time, Kenney's reluctance to air condition the EMPIRE BUILDER and the other passenger trains in 1935 was understandable. When other Great Northern officials prevailed with their forward thinking, their response to the pressure of the competition ultimately maintained the Great Northern's leadership in the passenger train business.
However, very few railroads catered to its passengers during the Depression as did the Great Northern. The EMPIRE BUILDER, as it passed eastbound and westbound through Stryker, Montana, picked up fresh Rocky Mountain Trout from the agent-operator to be served in its dining cars that evening. Creature comforts at their best! Also, there were not very many railroads in the nation which had their own greenhouses such as Great Northern's Greenhouse, located in Monroe, Washington. It provided fresh flowers to the Railway's Glacier National Park facilities, passenger trains and ticket offices.
In addition, prior to the Depression the Great Northern had gained significant experience with high speed train operations. Its Silk Trains set various records, and its FAST MAIL operated one of the most difficult daily transcontinental schedules in the nation. Between August 13 and 15, 1924, the Great Northern set speed records with two Silk Trains which were scheduled 12 hours apart leaving Seattle. Each consist included 10 baggage cars loaded with silk and a rider-coach. The second Silk Train covered the distance between Seattle and St. Paul in 38:50 hours, and the first turned in a 39:28 hour run. These two Silk Trains represented the fastest times between Seattle and St. Paul for all railroads in the history of the Silk Train Era. In his Standard Textbook of Railroads, C. E. Nichols commented about the Great Northern Silk Trains: "In special service the Great Northern in 1924 operated two of its Silk Trains from Seattle to St. Paul, 1,785 miles, in record time. One of these trains made the run in 38 hours and 50 minutes, a wonderful performance and faster than any other of the Northwestern railroads."
Nichols was even more fascinated with the FAST MAIL. "In mail service train #27, the FAST MAIL, introduced October 4, 1909, has a schedule of 47 hours and 30 minutes from St. Paul to Seattle. Train #27 made a record of on-time arrivals at Seattle for months at a time, notwithstanding delayed connections at St. Paul from the East. Delays ranged from a few minutes to several hours, but train #27 was on time at Seattle every day but 10 in 1931 when it was impossible to leave St. Paul on time on a single day. On October 20, 1931, train #27 was three hours and 20 minutes late out of St. Paul and reached Seattle on time." The Great Northern enjoyed the reputation of "arriving on-the-advertised!" The superintendent of the United States Post Office's Railway Mail Service Department in Seattle supported Nichols' appraisal of the FAST MAIL: "You can set your watch by the arrival of #27 (in Seattle). When you consider the train crosses two mountain ranges and carries generally eight, and frequently 10 or 11, cars filled with mail and express, and in winter months operates at times under the worst kind of weather conditions, its record of on-time performance on a fast schedule is most remarkable."
Even though World War II had begun in Europe, Frank J. Gavin, who succeeded Kenney as President in 1939, returned the Great Northern to the progressive track. Within a short time he committed the Great Northern to dieselization and recommended to the Board of Directors a new corporate image. The principal thrust involved the adoption in 1939 of Pullman green and Omaha orange with gold trim as the Great Northern's new corporate colors. By 1947 this color format was identified as Empire Builder Colors, or EB Colors for short. The first to carry EB Colors were the revolutionary road freight diesel locomotives known as the FTs which arrived in 1941. Almost everyone who observed an FT in EB Colors in either freight or passenger train service stated that Rocky's new image "was the most beautiful in the nation."
The Federation of Railway Progress Passenger Award was given to the Great Northern in 1951 in recognition of its passenger service improvements and quality of service. Within a short period of five years, 1947-1951, the Great Northern had progressed from a conservative position of having no streamliners to an aggressive one with 14 of them, two transcontinentals involving 11 consists and three short-haul streamliners which made eight trips daily.
John M. Budd, Ralph Budd's son, carried on the Great Northern's pro passenger philosophy, even when the Passenger Train Problem's pressures became great during the late 1960s to become freight service only. As President, Budd led the Great Northern through the 1951 and 1955 editions of the EMPIRE BUILDER, the 1951 WESTERN STAR, the 1952 BADGER and the GOPHER, the 1953 CASCADIAN, and the 1956 WINNIPEG LIMITED, picking up where Gavin had left off with the 1947 EMPIRE BUILDER, the 1950 INTERNATIONALS, and the 1950 RED RIVER Even though Budd was greatly concerned about the future of passenger train service, he stated very positively the Great Northern's philosophy regarding passenger train service in an address during a convention of his fellow railroaders and those involved in the passenger traffic industry. "The world judges the railways by their passenger services. If that is the window through which we are viewed, we must wash it and shine it, or else cover it up with a dark shade. Passenger service must be excellent or it should be given up."
The story related herein and in future Great Northern Pictorials, then, is about the rapid and fascinating development of "Rocky's Clean Window Trains". It is a story of the Streamlined Era on the Great Northern Railway, an amazing evolutionary 10 years during which it was developed, and the succeeding pressure-packed, competitive 14 years which culminated on M-Day, March 3, 1970, when the Burlington Northern, Inc., the BN, inherited all of "Rocky's Clean Window Trains".
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