Excerpt from The Contractor, Aug. 1, 1912
We are sorry to report that “Blackie” McFadden met with a serious accident this last week. While wrestling with a friend he had the misfortune to fall and break a bone in his ankle. Paddy is the best hearted hobo catcher that ever worked the bad lands and all of his many friends sympathize with him. Doctor reports that he will be laid up for a month. We will miss him more than anyone as he is assisting us with an article on the “Gandy Dancers”…
McFadden explains that a “Gandy Dancer” is nothing more than a shovel stiff who works at track surfacing with a number two, putting gravel underneath the ties. Watch for his story in a near issue. It may bring back old times.
Excerpt from Mysteries of the Carnival Language by Charles Wolverton, The American Mercury, June 1935</
There is a Gandy Company in Minnesota, but it was not founded in 1936 to make a land measuring wheel. Today its products are agricultural equipment (seed and fertilizer spreaders), and turf maintenance equipment and a land measuring wheel.
I found an archived Old Tools Magazine thread from 2010 about the term Gandy Dancer and the Gandy Mfg Company of Chicago. Conclusion same as here. Origin of term unknown. No evidence the company existed.
I am not that familiar with trains or the 1800’s etc. I just happened across the words gandy dancer an then saw this post so I thought I would research it further an put my thoughts on here from a outside perspective. First for dancer that would be obvious the movements they made to accomplish the task in unison with other rail workers/section hands made them look like they were all dancing in rhythm to whatever rail road song they were singing to stay in sync with each other for the task . As for Gandy I believe this would most likely be a play on words or a corruption of GANDER. Gander in its proper definition is a male Goose but in the 19th an 20th century it became a slang term (informal) noun which means “take a quick look or glance” like a goose does when it stretches its neck out to take a look/gander, so they could have had to stop dancing to look at something like if it was in the proper spot or not. So if they were laying a new track they would obviously need to continually look at it to see if it was placed right at 4 ft 81/2 in(standard as of 1886 in US) an if they were re-aligning a track that used a non-standard 2ft-6ft since back then there was no standard yet then they would need to look or gander back to see if it was the correct gauge after they moved it. Considering both Gander and Gandy poped up around the same time as Slang/informal words(19th/20th century) that would be my bet but then you also have the word Dandy that it could be a play on words as well, Dandy meaning "a man who is excessively concerned about his clothes an appearance or the informal noun that something or someone is exceptional or first-rate quality. Combine Gauge + Dandy Because they are checking to make sure the Gauge is the perfect quality and you could end up with Gandy Dancer so it’s either slang meaning that their Gauge is Excellent/First-rate(Dandy) and if not they are Gandering(Looking) to insure it is first rate(Dandy) an fixing it(Dancing) if its not