Once again, someone thought it would be a good idea to “play” with a train. As usual, it was not such a good idea. Read about it here:
http://www.wane.com/Global/story.asp?S=6749721&nav=menu32_2
You just have to love how up to date and familiar these media types are. Cowcatcher, indeed.
Darwin Award Candidate?
“Cowcatcher” [%-)] You gotta love the media!
My guess is that the media reporter, or the editors, used the common term that parents might use in naming that part of a locomotive to their children. Notice that quotes were placed around the name, probably to alert the reader to the common usage, and for that person’s convenience (know your audience), but alluding to the possibility that its correct name is something else.
That’s enough said right there. Sad.
…How sad that speaks of teenage activity…
As for the reporter…Wonder why media news rooms don’t have a railroad “handbook” of terminology for use in writing of such RR activities. Everybody should know those types of articles are most always using wrong terminology in describing such.
I think there must be a special dictionary for the media, which, in addition to, “cowcatcher,” includes, “marshalling yard,” and, “tarmac.”
There are locomotives with, “cowcatchers,” but I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting to see them pulling freight in common carrier service. (A couple of them sometimes run in circles around the buildings of the Nevada State Railroad Museum, in Carson City.) “Marshalling yard,” is Brit for what we North Americans know as a classification yard. As for my pet peeve, tarmac (tar-stabilized MacAdam) is a paving material that has been obsolete for building aircraft ramps since the beginning of the jet age. (Yes, media mavens, the proper term is, “ramp.” Having spent the best part of a 26 year Air Force career on them, I believe that I’m in a position to know.)
Chuck
How about instead of cow catcher, we call it a Darwin Catcher?
Did the guy actually think the train was gonna chicken out?
I never understood why the term was “cowcatcher.” Seems to me that “cowdeflector” or “cowplow” might have been more accurate because the purpose was to deflect objects away from the train, not to “catch” them (last thing one would want).
I also find continued use of “tarmac” absolutely baffling. Modern airport ramps are concrete, and surely every person getting paid to write knows that.
Let’s remember that we can use any word we want, as long as we agree on the definition. Absolute technical accuracy is pointless if the word doesn’t convey the message to the public at large. “Tarmac” may not be technically accurate, but most people know what it means. The same could be said for “cowcatcher” or “marshalling yard”.
It is called a “Cowcatcher” because the one invented by Isaac Dripps (Chief Mechanic of the Camden and Amboy RR) in 1831 actually “caught” the cow. The Camden and Amboy was having a problem with cows wandering onto the railway and delaying the trains. The engineer would stop the train and the employees and passengers would have to chase the cow away by prodding it with sticks.
Sometimes the train would hit the cow and derail (remember the engines of the day were just a small verticle boiler on a 4 wheel flat car), then the crew and passengers had to re-rail the engine and cars, which took even longer.
One severe accident resulted in the suggestion that maybe they could put some pointy sticks on the front of the locomotive and they would “prod” the cow to move along, without the necessity to stop and have people do it. Issac Dripps welded several long square rods, sharpened to a point, to the front of the locomotive to act as “cattle prods”.
Apparently, either they didn’t consider the consequences of a pointy a stick aimed at a flesh and blood creature or the engineer didn’t understand he would have to slow down before the pointy stick contacted the cow; The first cow encountered was impaled on the sticks and the train was delayed 8 hours while it was removed and they argued with the farmer whose cow it was. The sticks then were pounded down to a single point, low to the tracks, in front of the engine, so as to maybe shove the cow to the side instead of “catching” it.
BTW, there are other accounts that Charles Babbage invented the cowcatcher in 1836, but I like the Isaac Dripps story a whole lots better! Besides those accounts also mention that Babbage (a prolific inventer of many railroad items as well as being credited with the invention of a the first mechanical computing device) was also quite a character and not above making claims th
Perhaps the boy, unfortunately like many people, was a tad overweight. But then they would have said bullcatcher right? But that would be describing the forums and people would really be confused.
G’day, Y’all,
When studying journalism, I was told you were supposed to write for the reader with an eighth grade education. Now we forum members are all literate men and women, but there are some who are not. If it had been me writing the story, I would have just said he was hit by the engine. I really think the modern name for the lower front of a diesel engine should be called the gene pool cleanser. But someone with an eighth grade education might not think I could spell jeans.
I would think that even if an 8th grader or someone with an 8th grade reading level would understand that the person was hit by the locomotive or the engine. If they dont know what those are, I am sure the pictures would help them out to learn what it is.
What’s wrong with “the plow in front of the locomotive”? Does not look like a cow catcher in the least.
My guess is that there are more people in today’s world who are familiar with ‘plow’ than who are familiar with ‘cow catcher’.
[quote user=“Semper Vaporo”]
It is called a “Cowcatcher” because the one invented by Isaac Dripps (Chief Mechanic of the Camden and Amboy RR) in 1831 actually “caught” the cow. The Camden and Amboy was having a problem with cows wandering onto the railway and delaying the trains. The engineer would stop the train and the employees and passengers would have to chase the cow away by prodding it with sticks.
Sometimes the train would hit the cow and derail (remember the engines of the day were just a small verticle boiler on a 4 wheel flat car), then the crew and passengers had to re-rail the engine and cars, which took even longer.
One severe accident resulted in the suggestion that maybe they could put some pointy sticks on the front of the locomotive and they would “prod” the cow to move along, without the necessity to stop and have people do it. Issac Dripps welded several long square rods, sharpened to a point, to the front of the locomotive to act as “cattle prods”.
Apparently, either they didn’t consider the consequences of a pointy a stick aimed at a flesh and blood creature or the engineer didn’t understand he would have to slow down before the pointy stick contacted the cow; The first cow encountered was impaled on the sticks and the train was delayed 8 hours while it was removed and they argued with the farmer whose cow it was. The sticks then were pounded down to a single point, low to the tracks, in front of the engine, so as to maybe shove the cow to the side instead of “catching” it.
BTW, there are other accounts that Charles Babbage invented the cowcatcher in 1836, but I like the Isaac Dripps story a whole lots better! Besides those accounts also mention that Babbage (a prolific inventer of many railroad items as well as being credited with the invention of a the first mechanical computing device) was also quite a character an
When I was a kid, 40 years ago, in Alaska, the common name for the plow on the front of the locomotive was “moose-gooser”.