I was watching WGN last night, and I never miss their re-runs of, “The Honeymooners”. One of the episodes they had on last night was where Ralph & Norton were on a train to Minneapolis for a Raccoon Lodge convention, and instead of takin’ the train to Minneapolis they got on one goin’ to Norfolk!
Norton’s drivin’ Ralph nuts as always, and they get stuck in a pair of novelty handcuffs. Norton climbs into the upper berth and Ralph’s in the lower berth, while they’re still in the cuffs.
Norton asks Ralph, “Do you mind if I smoke?”, to which Ralph replies, “I don’t care if ya burn.”
Now THAT’S comedy!
Naturally, I assumed they were connecting in Chicago when they got on the train, because they said they’d be in Minneapolis in the morning, and the train was leaving at 11:15 PM. They instead got on a train going to Norfolk, so they somehow got on, probably, a C&O train headed east instead of a MILW, CNW or CBQ train headed west - sounds like the conductor screwed-up too when he checked their tickets!
Dang!! I was gonna watch that last night and forgot about it.
Did it specify it was Norfolk Virginia?? Maybe they ended up in Norfolk Nebraska on the Omaha Road (CNW). [D)]
BTW they could have been scheduled on a Soo Line or Chicago Great Western trains, or a Great Northern or Northern Pacific train too…even though the NP/GN train would be on CB&Q rails (with Burlington engines) from Chicago to St.Paul.
When Gleason later went on to do his variety show from Miami Beach, Florida he demanded (and got) the network to pay for a chartered train to transport the production entourage from New York City to FLA.
It really was a non-stop party onboard and my understanding is that some of the antics that occured in transit were legendary.
I don’t remember enough about the Honeymooners to know if they’d be going from Chicago or not.
Besides, I’m not sure you could ever get from Chicago to Norfolk on one train (or in one Pullman–guess there are books that could answer that for me). The C&O through cars (which would have used the Big Four between Chicago and Cincinnati) would have gone to Newport News. Close enough for television work.
Guess this is just another example of that other world known as Television-land, where anyone traveling anywhere would have taken the SP (or maybe UP or Santa Fe) to get there, because that was the line nearest the studio.
Or Movieland, for that matter. The otherwise excellent 1953 musical THE BAND WAGON shows Fred Astaire getting off a Santa Fe sleeper at Grand Central station. Pity, because there were some very good establishing shots of the 20th Century Ltd hauled by diesel-electric, and then electric-hauled at the point in Manhattan where it plunges underground (near 125th St IIRC).
I don’t remember when the service was discontinued, but the Pennsy and the N&W had through service, using a 10 roomette 6 double bedroom car that left Chicago in the early afternoon on the Union, was transferred to the Pocahontas in Cincinnati, and arrived in Norfolk the next afternoon.
As I recall, Ed and Ralph lived and worked in New York City, so they had to have gone to Chicago from there.
There was also a through 10-6 from New York to Norfolk that left New York in the evening and arrived in Norfolk the next morning after traveling over the Pennsy, RF&P, ACL, and N&W. Again, I do not remember when it was discontinued; I know it was before 1969 (as was the Norfolk-Chicago car).
For many years, the Chicago-Norfolk Pullman run didn’t terminate in Norfolk. Until the late 1940’s, it was forwarded over the original Norfolk Southern to the Cavalier Hotel in Virginia Beach.
ok, moving away from the Honeymooners, how many remember “That Girl” with Marlo Thomas? The opening credits were taken from the back of a Pennsy train coming out of the Hudson River tunnels in New Jersey, run backwards to make it seem like the viewer was going towards New York.
However our leading lady, Anne Marie, was from Brewster, NY, so she should have been coming down the New York Central’s Harlem line.
Yes, the conductor said they were going in the opposite direction to Norfolk, VA - that’s the reason Trixie and Alice weren’t on the same train. [:o)] I’d seriously doubt they’d take the CGW from Chicago and expect to get there overnight with an 11:15 PM departure, going via Oelwein, in a sleeper car. This episode was shot in 1956, and I’m not certain the CGW had overnight sleeper service between Chicago & Minneapolis - maybe?
In June of 1955, the only service the CGW had out of Chicago was an overnight coach train to Oelwein which returned the next afternoon. Indeed, by then, all the CGW trains were coach only.
Well, I was young and impressionable (not to mention some other hormonally-induced vulnerabilities) when “That Girl” was aired. I still have the “That Girl” theme song in my head; some have called them dang pesky brain-tunes “ear worms”.
Despite the cause, I continue to think and hear “That Girl” at times…at least for me, Pavlov was correct…
Well it’s better to have that theme song stuck in your brain, rather than, “Alone Again, Naturally”. If that were the case we might not have you with us today!
“Time” by the Allan Parsons Project always does it for me. I Like the song, just makes me glad I’m not by a tall cliff at the time. I had been told once that Seasons in the Sun was actually the guy’s suicide note, made you wonder why nobody asked him afterwards “Are you Alright?” Supposedly he is alive and well and living off royalties from the song, which by the way he didn’t write it was a cover.
You mean that song had lived before? And someone thought “hey this is great tune, I’ll redo it”… That was possibly the MOST depressing song I ever heard back in the 70’s, besides Gilbert O’Sullivan’s “Alone Again, Naturally”… Now, listen to those back to back…
I like “Time” by Alan Parsons, but I tend to go for more upbeat stuff… “Be Good To Yourself” by Journey, for example.
Wow, “Seasons in the Sun” was a cover, that is one piece of music trivia I can’t get over