Attn: greyhounds. Several years ago there was a discussion: “Why did the railroads stop cattle trains?”
You noted that you had met a gentleman named William Gentleman. He is a prominent figure in a history I’m writing, and you are the first person I’ve found who actually met him.
I’d like to talk with you. What is the best way we can get together?
Thank you
I’ll allow greyhounds to answer your question.
The advent of trucks with their versality and capacity eliminated the need for railroads to haul livestock.
Plus livestock by law had to be taken out of the car, rested in pens, fed and watered after a certain number of hours. Which increases shipment time, unlike trucks which took less time to ship cows to the stock yards and meat packers.
Last load was Pigs on Conrail Autoracks heading to Oak Island Yard in New Jersey to be turned into Nathans Hot Dogs in the early to late 1990s. Someone at the Conrail Historical Soceity has info on this
Don’t forget many years ago meat packers were more consolidated in the large cities, like Chicago, Omaha, and Kansas City. Eventually much of the meat production moved closer to where the livestock was produced. Livestock didn’t need to move as far, which just gave trucks more advantage.
Livestock had to be unloaded for feeding, watering and rest every 28 hours. A shipper could sign a release to increase the time to 36 hours.
Jeff
The project I’ve been working on for the past three years is about an experimental cattle car. It was an 85-foot Ortner Steer Palace modified with feed and water facilities to allow cattle to eat and drink while the train was under way. The objective was to see how cattle fared on long-distance rail trips.
Most of the experiments were done by researchers at Texas A&M. The government (ICC or USDA, forgot which) approved the experiments as meeting the feed-water-rest requirements of the 28-hour law.
Between 1977 and 1984 the car made 10 trips. The first was a trial run on the Union Pacific between Idaho and Nebraska. The rest terminated in Amarillo from sources in Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama and Florida. Other than UP, no Western railroad provided transportation.
Participating Eastern roads included the Louisville & Nashville, Norfolk Southern, and Seaboard Coast Lines. Burlington Northern and possibly the Rock Island handled the car west of the Mississippi. The last trip in 1984 was a move from Iowa to Pennsylvania via the Miwaukee Road and Conrai.
Most of the information I have comes from agriculture scientific journals, and unfortunately the authors were not railfans. Their reports documented the condition of the cattle, not the rail line they were on. I’ve inquired of archives holding corporate records, and historical societies, but so far the pickings have been slim.
That’s a little surprising. In at least 3 trials in 1982, NS provided the business car Royal Arch to house scientists and their instruments. The car was coupled between the Ortner car and a flat car with a highway trailer modified with food and water. Has to be one of the oddest consists to ride the rails. Surely some railfan took note.
Effective Refrigeration.
Before it, livestock had to be LIVE arriving the slaughter and distribution area, otherwise it would spoil and rot before it could be sold and used.
I don’t see why anyone would waste time arranging to ship cattle on the hoof when the same amount of money applied to handle strategic packaged meat products could be far more lucrative and far less risky.
We’ve had whole threads on how to go about doing that.
That’s what killed the East India spice trade (and the clippers that carried it).
Based on what I’ve read, a prime use of the spices was to cover the taste of rancid butter. Once the refrigerated boxcar came into being, that need ceased to exist. The butter could be churned in remote areas and shipped to the cities.
When you don’t have the technology to handle a packaged meat product, you do what you have to do with the product and technology you have.
Refrigeration suitable for shipping butchered meat products didn’t exist until well after WW II. My early years as ATTM at Bayview Yard in Baltimore Esskay Meat Packing (Schluderberg Kurdle ) was getting two or three loads of hogs per night in the early 1970. Upon arrival, the cars would be pulled into a track known as ‘The Wye’ where a water stantion where the Car Dept would ‘hose down’ the hogs and the Yard Engine crew would go on down the the Esskay plant and deliver the load of hogs and pull the empties from the prior day. By 1975 or thereabouts the movement of hogs stopped.
Does Australia still have livestock trains on some routes?
Anyone care for a flashback of moving cattle in the old days? [C):-)]
FETV (Family Entertainment TV on cable) Broadcasts Rawhide at 2 PM & 3 PM Eastern daily.
I knew that Clint was on that show, but I didn’t know about Martin Milner. Also featuring the ever-sinister Dan Duryea. I miss all those Westerns from my childhood and there were so many.
Many of the Westerns are being shown on cable channels - Charge, METV, FETV and others.
Don’t I know it! Lady Firestorm’s addicted to “Rawhide!” She never saw the show growing up but she’s making up for lost time!
On the other hand “Rawhide” was required viewing at my house, Mom was crazy about Westerns!
Martin Milner wasn’t one of the regulars, he was a guest star along with Dan Duryea on that particular episode.
Oh yeah, the TV Western craze that began in the 50’s and didn’t begin to fade until the late 60’s. “Bonanza” and “Gunsmoke” were the last survivors.
Yes, important to remember that an iced refrigerator car could only get the inside temperature to a few degrees above freezing. It wasn’t until the development of mechanical reefers that you had cars that could be cooled to below freezing. Once that technology came along after WW2, meat packing companies could slaughter the cattle locally, and ship the frozen sides of beef to a main processing plant. Before that, you had to ship the live cattle to end plant.
It’s the same technology that created the boom in consumer frozen food in the same time. Iceboxes couldn’t keep frozen food frozen, it could only keep them cold. Mechanical refrigerators with a freezer allowed the creation of a market for frozen pizzas, TV dinners, etc.
p.s. Since the old Western TV shows came up, it’s kinda similar to the question ‘why did the big cattle drives of the 1870s end?’. When the UP was completed, it’s line was the only line anywhere near the big cattle raising areas - particularly Texas. Ranchers drove their cattle from Texas to Dodge City Kansas so the cattle could then be sent east by rail. Once railroads reached Texas, there was no need for the long cattle drives to the railhead.
Well, they have livestock trains of a sort…
Recall several years ago reading an article about a shipment of 100K sheep from Australia to Saudi Arabia that was rejected account excessive mortality of the cargo.