Track Pan Blues
Posted: Tue Feb 23, 2016 8:28 pm
Track Pan Blues Riding the Blinds 02/23/16
Guitar Trash, Train Freeks, Blues Lovers, Assorted Others,
We're about 100 miles west of Detroit on the old Michigan Central Railroad, later owned by the New York Central. There’s a retired local policeman who is a fellow train freak. Pam and I went to a talk a couple weeks ago at the city library he gave on the history of the various railroads here – it was cool! I subsequently sent him an electronic copy of a photo of the round house in 1900, which included my great-grandfather.
Yesterday he loaned me some photos to scan of various local railroad things. Both my grandfather and great-grandfather worked for what ended up being the NYC RR Western Division Car Shops here.
I used to go out to the track pan on my bike as a boy to watch the trains take on water “on the fly”. They didn’t do this on western railroads, but the NYC had two track pans between Detroit and Chicago, one of them about a mile east of town. Trains would slow down to 65, lower a scoop, and fill the tender from a long pan between the tracks, no stopping under the water tank like in the western movies. I didn’t have any photos of track pan facilities so Steve graciously let me copy what he has.
Which brings up the old blues and hobo songs talking about “riding the blinds”:
Casey Jones before he died, fixed the blinds so the bums couldn’t ride... (Casey Jones, Wallace Saunders)
I asked the brakeman, could I please ride the blind
He said my good man, you know this train ain’t mine (Freight Train Blues, Brownie McGhee)
(mp3 attached)
There is some dispute about what riding “the blinds” or “the blind” actually was. Some say that hobos would try to ride between passenger coaches outside the accordion-like canvas “blinds” that connected the cars so people going from one to another wouldn’t be out in the weather. Others say that it involved riding the rear of the tender, in the “blind spot” of the engine crew as well as the conductor and/or brakeman.
The attached photo is of an eastbound Hudson taking on water at the local pan. They could take on 500 gallons/second. In the photo the scoop wasn’t raised in time to avoid over filling the tender’s tank. To keep from blowing the transom out the back they had a flap that would open at the top, spilling out the overflow. Getting hit by that volume of water at 65 mph could well wash you off to your death. Don’t expect many ‘bo’s rode behind the tender on the NYC.
Reference:
http://aamrc.org/hvrrhs/trackpans
http://www.michiganrailroads.com/RRHX/W ... onMenu.htm
http://jimquest.com/writ/trains/pans/Track_Pans.pdf
Guitar Trash, Train Freeks, Blues Lovers, Assorted Others,
We're about 100 miles west of Detroit on the old Michigan Central Railroad, later owned by the New York Central. There’s a retired local policeman who is a fellow train freak. Pam and I went to a talk a couple weeks ago at the city library he gave on the history of the various railroads here – it was cool! I subsequently sent him an electronic copy of a photo of the round house in 1900, which included my great-grandfather.
Yesterday he loaned me some photos to scan of various local railroad things. Both my grandfather and great-grandfather worked for what ended up being the NYC RR Western Division Car Shops here.
I used to go out to the track pan on my bike as a boy to watch the trains take on water “on the fly”. They didn’t do this on western railroads, but the NYC had two track pans between Detroit and Chicago, one of them about a mile east of town. Trains would slow down to 65, lower a scoop, and fill the tender from a long pan between the tracks, no stopping under the water tank like in the western movies. I didn’t have any photos of track pan facilities so Steve graciously let me copy what he has.
Which brings up the old blues and hobo songs talking about “riding the blinds”:
Casey Jones before he died, fixed the blinds so the bums couldn’t ride... (Casey Jones, Wallace Saunders)
I asked the brakeman, could I please ride the blind
He said my good man, you know this train ain’t mine (Freight Train Blues, Brownie McGhee)
(mp3 attached)
There is some dispute about what riding “the blinds” or “the blind” actually was. Some say that hobos would try to ride between passenger coaches outside the accordion-like canvas “blinds” that connected the cars so people going from one to another wouldn’t be out in the weather. Others say that it involved riding the rear of the tender, in the “blind spot” of the engine crew as well as the conductor and/or brakeman.
The attached photo is of an eastbound Hudson taking on water at the local pan. They could take on 500 gallons/second. In the photo the scoop wasn’t raised in time to avoid over filling the tender’s tank. To keep from blowing the transom out the back they had a flap that would open at the top, spilling out the overflow. Getting hit by that volume of water at 65 mph could well wash you off to your death. Don’t expect many ‘bo’s rode behind the tender on the NYC.
Reference:
http://aamrc.org/hvrrhs/trackpans
http://www.michiganrailroads.com/RRHX/W ... onMenu.htm
http://jimquest.com/writ/trains/pans/Track_Pans.pdf