Ok, this is a puzzle that has bothered me for years. I am hoping someone out there can solve it for me.
The Pennsylvania Railroad for years ran a Mail and Express westbound from Pittsburgh, through Indy to St Louis. The timetable of February 11, 1962 shows it as #13 (gotta love that number) with a coach only, leaving Pittsburgh at 10:44 a.m., arriving in Indy at 6:37 pm and St Louis at 10:35pm.
However, it shows no such train running back east, although I clearly remember seeing an eastbound Pennsy train of mail with one coach leaving Indy at about 6 a.m. every day for points east. (I had to be at work at 6:30 a.m. at a factory along the tracks east of Indy) and yes, there were people in the coach.
So if it ran westbound only, wouldn’t there be one heckuva jam of mail cars in St. Louis at some point? [:)] Seriously, why didn’t the schedule show an eastbound Mail and Express?
Well here’s a shot, I’m no Pennsy guy but; it could be that it ran back eastward as an extra every day, some railroads did this, or that the mail was in passenger consist as a passenger train by time table.
Could it have been routed east by anotherr line?
I’ve seen scheduals where there are only schedualed trains in one direction and none the other. The other direction was all extras. I have also seen them run one schedualed train the oppasite direction against many opposing schedualed trains and then run everything as sections in the one direction.
Train runs westbound as a scheduled run, consisting of mail and express cars and a single coach.
Mail and express cars are switched to Post Office and REA sidings at St Louis for unloading, reloading. The coach goes to the coach yard for cleaning.
The eastbound mail and express cars are switched onto eastbound trains, one or more to each of Pennsy’s scheduled eastbounds.
Sometime during the day the coach is also added to an eastbound train.
All of the rolling stock eventually ends up at the eastern terminal, having passed the next day’s westbound consist enroute.
I would not be unwilling to wager that Train 13 probably never had the same exact cars in its consist for every, or every other, run. The number remained the same, all else was subject to change based on availability of appropriate cars in the coach yard.
I would also expect the flow of mail an express to be Westward in nature…Consumer products and papers shipped to the ‘hinterlands’ by the manufacturing and financial centers of the East, with little if any return traffic. 50 years ago the manufacturing center of the country was much nearer the East Coast than it is today (of course today it is mostly in China).
To handle the imbalance in passenger traffic due to the migragation from the rural south to northern cities, the Illinois Central’s Creole ran only north from New Orleans to Chicago and had no southbound counterpart. At the same time the IC had an imbalance in the other direction of express and 2nd and 3rd class mail traffic largely because of catalog mail order shipments from Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward and printed matter from R. R. Donnely in Chicago. This was handled by the Southern Express an all stops mail and express train that ran from Chicago to New Orleans and had no northbound counterpart. The Creole’s equipment was deadheaded back to New Orleans on the Southern Express with a single coach open as a rider coach for the train crew and accommodate the very rare passenger.
One of the best ways to answer the question is to check the employee’s timetable matching your public timetable. Eastbound could have been a non passenger move. Or traffic might fall into place so that it could move in each of the east bound schedules from St.L or Indpls. without having to run a schedule.
I don’t have access to an employee timetable for the same time period, but I am betting, after getting the input above, that the eastbound ran as an extra. I do remember seeing it each morning as I arrived at work rolling past the plant with about 16 baggage/express cars and one coach. I do remember seeing people sitting in the trailing coach. Now, however, after getting input on this thread, I am fascinated about other “one way trains” like the Creole or Southern Express.
I know a lot of trains that ran one way with one name and back as another (for example NYC’s “Indianapolis Special” (eastbound) and “Sycamore” (westbound)), but it is interesting to investigate those that “vaporized” on their return trips, like Pennsy’s #13.