March 25, 2015

by Jerry Ginther
NP Columnist

As stated in my first article, the conductor is the boss.
Every member of the train and engine crew is subordinate to him, and the engine crew is under the direction of the brakemen/trainmen. The engineer is strictly a power operator and moves the train only when instructed to do so by a trainman or the conductor. The fireman, when they were used, was under the supervision of the engineman. Post steam engine era the fireman’s position was used to train future engineers or fulfill a union contract.
When the train picked up or set out cars at stations along the line, the conductor handled the business end of each transaction with the station agent. This business mostly amounted to the exchange of the waybills for cars left and those added to his train. A waybill contains a description of the car’s lading, weight, and destination and one must accompany each car in the train’s consist. It also contains the name of the shipper, point of origin, and the consignee. The conductor is responsible to know the total number of cars, whether they are loaded or empty and the total tonnage of his train. This information had to be provided by the conductor to agents or telegraph operators at predetermined stations along the line. Those operators would telegraph that information to the train dispatcher. Without this knowledge, the dispatcher would be unable to plan meeting places between opposing trains. At sidings used for the meeting and passing of trains, one of them would have to fit between the switches of the siding.     Login or Subscribe to read the rest of this story.