I’m wondering what Brakemen and superintendents did. I think that brakeman controlled the train’s brakes before airbrakes but I don’t know what they did after airbrakes came on the scene. Did superintendents monitor and push along construction and mantainance?
Superintendents were brass, managers, officials, usually in charge of divisions or regions depending on railroads. They were the absolute authority for the division and reported to the General Superintendent of the railroad or to a designated vice president or the president depending on the railroad.
Brakemen started out exactly as you assumeed. There were no brakes controlled from a central location like with airbrakes so brakemen had to ride the roofs of cars, usually 5 to 10 cars assigned to the brakie, and he had to turn the brake wheel to apply braks upon whistle signal from the engineer. After air brakes, there were still braking jobs where retainers had to be set on cars and brakes applied on set outs or released on pick ups. On passenger trains brakemen were under the direction of the conductor in dealing with train operation and meeting the needs of passngers.
All of this, and more, were defined the same or different depending on the railroad. Lots of great books in the libraries on the subject or dealt with in histories, etc. If you have a chance to find a Book of Rules for any given railroad or the Standard Code of the Assocition of American Railroads upon which individual railroads based their books, you will learn lots…also employee timetables will help you understand.
Even after “modern” airbrakes were invented there were two sets of brakes on steam locomotives, to operate. The engineer would handle the air brakes in conjunction with the throttle, and brakemen would work the locomotive brakes (mechanical) when trains were going to come to a full stop.
Bruce
When necessary, brakemen would line switches, protect the train front and/or rear when necessary when the train was stopped. Passenger brakemen would handle baggage (if there was no baggageman on board) and assist the conductor in lifting transportation and boarding and detraining passengers, in addition to the other duties.
Bruce, did not Canadian locomotives have air brakes? All of the locomotives I rode (and ran) had air brakes, which were controlled by the engineer, using the independent brake valve.
I remember riding NYC commuter lines 50 years ago, some of the uniform crew wore a hat with the word “Trainman” on it. Did their job differ from a brakeman? Were there some duties that were unique to one and not to the other?
Mike, a “trainman” was a brakeman (usually a rearend brakeman, but if the passenger load on a particular run were great enough he would be concerned, usually, only with the passengers–a third brakeman, perhaps) in passenger service who not only had the same duties that a brakeman in freight service had, but assisted the conductor with his interactions with the passengers–lifting transportation (taking tickets), seeing to the comfort of the passengers, especially if there were no porters on board, assisting boarding and detraining passengers; almost anything that would make the trip more comfortable for the passengers.
After I wrote that I recalled that that had more to do with inter-city passenger trains than commuter and freight trains. It was how they got the silky smooth stops they were famous for back in the day.
But I am confused as to exactly which wheels were controlled with which brake. It seems like the tender wheels worked off of the train air. but the drivers had a separate control mechanism that was used in conjunction with the air, or a separate air control. I recall reading that going down mountain passes was a two man job as far as braking control in the cab went, and about passenger train station stops.
I’ve got a couple of books by Floyd Yeats a famous CP engineer and author. I will have to skim over them and get a clearer picture of what was going on.
Bruce
Superintendents usually interfered with construction & maintenance…[:-,]
Sort of on topic, but maybe not: there are new regulations coming down from the FRA that require a full certification of Conductors. It will parallel the Engineer’s certification and include eyes and ears and a certified training program. I wonder how this will affect the classification of the conductors in the eyes of the unions.
For our little scenic railroad we will piggy back in the training plan of the CN, but are seriously considering elimination of the Brakeman qualification. Our Brakemen handle inspection of the train, switching, coupling and nearly all the Conductor duties except track authority paperwork. We may have to upgrade this position to Conductor to simplify our training program.
A lot of teminology and names are grandfathered, kept but not with the same use as was back in the 1800’s. Books of rules will give the defnitions as they evolved from the 19th to the 21st Century. Couple that with railorad and regional variences, and you get a hodgepodge of definitions and assignments. Brakeman used to have to handle brakes as described elsewhere but after air was introduced, the name stayed while the duties changed. There could be a conductor, head brakeman, rear brakmen, flagman, trainman, and switchman on any train, even more than one of any of them except conductor depending on length of train; sometimes all than conductor were called trainmen, sometimes the conductor was also considered a trainman but not in the official terminology. It was dirty ground work on freight trains but a bit easier on passenger trains. Also passenger trains might have collectors and assistant conductors depending on railroad and type of train, more frequently on commuter trains, though. The Pullman Company often added their own Conductor along with a Porter on many routes. Again, each era and each railroad had its own definition and assignements for given job names. Basically, all passenger train personell assisted the conductor in dealing with passengers and ticket collection with assigned cars and doors. If the term rear brakeman were applied, he would work the tail end of the train and would double as flagman if such named employee was not otherwise assigned. Collectors were more likely found on commuter trains where long trains and many stops kept a train crew busy with passengers. There were also baggemen who, as the name suggests, handled baggage and other head end business (sometimes there might be a Railway Express employee usually called an agent or handler employed by Railway Express and not the railroad); sometimes this job was handled by the headend trainman or brakeman. On freight trains, the Conductor, rear brakeman, sw
Back in the late 80s I rode Amtrak’s Sunset Ltd. At the time I think Amtrak and SP were pointing fingers at each other for train delays. There was a blue uniformed SP “Trainmaster” riding the train, I suppose to make sure the RR was doing their part. My assumption was that the trainmaster was a sort of foreman of their company’s conductors. However, a google search gave various answers. What are his duties?
Again, books of rules will give you definitive answers per railroad and era. But in general a Trainmaster was a manger assigned to supervise trains and crews, assignments and operations at a given point or on a given section of the railraod be it a division or between two specific points or at one specific location like a yard or station. He could be one of several or have assistant trainmasters working under him.
FROM EXPERENCE …MID 40"S WORLD WAR II 1944-1946 BRAKEMAN WORKED FREIGHT
TRAINS AS HEAD BRAKEMAN RODE IN ENGINE (IN FRONT OF FIREMAN ON HIS SIDE OF CAB)
PICKED UP ENGINE AT ROUIND HOUSE ALONG WITH ENGINEER AND FIREMAN
LINED SWITCHES TO GET TO TRAIN CONNECTED ENGINE TO TRAIN RETURNED
TO ENGINE AND WATCHED BOTH FORWARD TO CALL SIGNALS CHECK FOR OBSTRUCTIONS
AND TO REAR TO OBSERVE TRAIN WATCHING FO SIGNS OF SMOKE (HOT JOURNAL)
OR SLIDING WHEEL (STUCK BRAKE) LINED ALL SWITCHES TO CHANGE TRACKS
MADE CONNECTIONS OR DISCONECTED CARS HANDLED E/R CARS LEFT L CARS PICKED UP
UP FROM SIDINGS OR SHIPPERS WHEN TRIP ENDED UNHOOK ENGINE AND LINE
SWITCHES TO RETURN TO A ROUNDHOUSE AND END DAY (BEFORE 16 HOUR RULE
(HOG LAW) AND SHUT US DOWN FUSE-
IF ANY ONE INTERESTED I WILL DESCRIBE DUTIES AS REAR BRAKEMAN AND
WHAT LITTLE PASSENGER SERVICE I HAD
I am always interested in hearing first person accounts.
@Fuse - great insight, but caps lock off, please.
Our tourist line isn’t changing anything regarding “trainmen” that I know of. They still have to be rules qualified, and being so allows them to do the bulk of what has to be done on the train. Becoming a qualified trainman is really the first step in training to be a conductor. At some point trainmen start working as “student conductors” anyhow. There will just be a couple more steps on the way to becoming an official student conductor.
We are working up our policies and procedures for certifying conductors. Everyone will be “grandfathered” in at first, then we’ll work through an actual certification for each over the next three years.
Since all of our engineers are also conductors (and do work as such on occasion), we’ll coordinate their recertification as an engineer with that of conductor, at least as it applies to the “off road” stuff, such as eye tests and record checks.
I’ll be right in the middle of it - I’m one of the “conductor supervisors” now.
Very interesting information from all and thanks. My grandfather was a freight and then passenger conductor for Frisco and I knew he started out as a brakeman. Back in those days, he would have had to ride the tops of the cars for the hand brakes. I have a picture of him standing on top of one of the cars by the brake wheel.
When friends and I took Pullman to CA on UP, we had a Pullman conductor and porter, but when we arrived at a station, the regular conductor employed by the host RR took over. I can remember when we arrived home and were backing into St. Louis Union Station. We were in the rear car and the regular conductor took over tooting the whistle as we backed in. The Pullman conductor had to stand aside and watch. That was my first and only experience on Pullman and seeing the division of power so clearly.
Bruce, steam locomotives were equiped with a “cut out” valve for the driver brakes. The engineer could close this valve so the driver brakes would not operate when decending a long grade so as to keep the driver tires from overheating. This could cause the tire to seperate from the driver center, a very bad thing! This would accont for the tender brakes being applied while the driver brakes were not.
Tim