If this was the early- to mid-fifties, canned spray paint was still a decade or so away from being used by the general public. Evidently it was invented in '49.
Tacking paper waybills to the sides of cars … sorting paper cards back at the office … standing in the field writing down car numbers on a paper switch list as they go by … walking through a yard with a 20 lb backpack style walkie talkie reading off car numbers to someone in the office who transcribed them on paper who passed them to someone else to type them up … squirting grease in journal bearing boxes … American companies actually manufacturing product to be packed in colorful graffiti-free boxcars with slogans on the side that inspired the imagination … This was filmed at just the right time to capture the last of an era before computerization, automation, and advanced materials changed railroading forever, and Class I’s became not much more than “precision scheduled” purveyors of two mile drags comprising sea containers full of Chinese bric-a-brac behind engines that all look the same with anonymous sounding alphabet soup Wall Street ticker symbol “names” painted on their sides.
That guy riding on top of the boxcar at 5:08! Seems like it might actually be fun but I'd imagine it wasn't fun and games when the weather was bad. One false move and you don't go home. Thanks for putting this up. A great look at vintage railroading. A lot of us foamers might reminisce about the good old days but I'm sure real life railroaders are glad things are different now.
@@DonFelixGallardo good question... yes they are paid very good... even back then... i have an old milwaukee road agreement book from 1958... a yard foreman on a switch engine in that year made $21.22/day... adjusted for inflation to todays money that's $315.00
Great video I like trains especially freight trains. I like to see the caboose at the end of freight trains. You see cabooses at the end of freight trains just at the state borders for long hauls nowadays. Other places they use a caboose once in a blue moon not too often. The deliveries they make are local runs. That's probably why you don't see cabooses that much anymore blah. 😂
Thank you very much for your video. Even though we now use computers instead of typewriters & The AT&SF has long ago been absorbed into The BNSF RR, I believe that for me that this video has been very informative. Thank you again.
No safety glasses, no hard hats, no safety vests although the smart ones usually wore Hawaiian--type shirts with loud colors to make themselves more visible. was there even and FRA around back then with all it's safety regulations or were these guys on their own?
@@rapman5363 I was told by a teacher recently that reading maps isn't even stressed in schools anymore because locations of places can be easily found in simple searches. I find that to be sad - I used to dispatch personnel to calls and work sites and most all of them were blindly dependent on GPS systems to tell them how to get to their destinations. I can read a headline about an event in Armenia or something and immediately pop up an image in my mind of about where in the world that is. I guess I'm just an old fuddy-duddy.
Nice to see cars that aren't ruined with shitty graffiti. Does anyone know exactly what year spray painting cars became a thing? And where did it originate? Probably somewhere crappy like NYC/NJ.
@@nicholasadams2908 I agree. But they're doing it the wrong way. As we know the train cars are someones property that they paid big $ for. What makes them think that it's ok to touch it letalone paint giant letters on it taking up the entire side of the car? One train enthusiast said he likes it because it gives him something to look at while stuck waiting for a train to pass. With that logic, I can graffitti his vehicle & justify it with "Well it gives me something to look at while I'm stuck behind/next to you in traffic." Also, not so fun when you're stuck at the tracks waiting for a train and a hopper goes by with a giant cock & balls & says "Suck My Dick" when you have children in the car with you. Yes, sometimes the art is cool. But damaging/ruining someone elses property is wrong and illegal. Next they'll start putting graffitti on the side of Delta & American Airlines jets.
@@jackshittle I don’t think they care to much about it otherwise the company would have it painted over. As far as the suck my dick on the side of it I’m sure kids have heard, seen, or said worse 😂. Probably be an upgrade for the planes though.
@@Glaze_TPF Agreed. Like Michael Douglas said in the film Falling Down (when questioned by a gang why he's on their turf and the gang member points to the scrib & says "Can't you read that?" - and Douglas responds with something like "Maybe if it was written in f'ng English I could."
Always amazed that some think it's ok to basically vandalize private oroperty. What do you think would happen if these same persons tried applying graffiti to truck rigs at a truck stop or to parked airplanes.
I don’t know. I would drive a while to see a working F unit. Not sure I would go around the block for a Geep And I have driven hundreds of miles to see a running steam locomotive.
Fs & Es are my favorite Locos some are still in operation to this day, NS used them on their Executive Passenger trains. Then they were sold to short lines & still running today on Reading, Blue Mountain & Northern passenger trains. They are one of the longest lasting model of Locos. in the history of Railroads. My HO Collection has more than 30 of them. They are much smaller than the behemoth Locos used today. But they are by far the most important Loco to me.
the New Haven rail road in Connecticut ran I believe it was a F9 (2 traction motors in the front truck and 3 traction motors in the rear truck) until a few years ago. Now it is still running in cape cod Massachusetts after being repainted in it's original colors.@@robertadams6606
The GP7 was the same frame as the F7, EMD just put a "different lid" on it but otherwise the two locomotives were the same. Same principle applied to the GP9, same frame, stronger internals/more HP aand little more Tractive Effort.
I well know that the diesel Locos are much more efficient than the old steam engines of the past. I like the humongous steam engines like UP's 4014 and the C & O's ( now absorbed) into CSX "Allegheny " and the other big steam engines even though at 75 I barely got to see steam engines on the rails doing a lot of the work.
No, that was Southern Pacific, about 3 miles to the north and on the east bank of the Los Angeles River. This was the Santa Fe yard on the west bank, between the San Bernardino Fwy on the north and IH 10 on the south. I don't know the name of the yard though. It's mostly all gone now, the Metro Rail shops are there now.
@@whiteknightcat Absolutely correct. This was the former Santa Fe *_First Street Yard_* located east of Santa Fe Avenue and mostly south of 1st Street, along the west bank of the Los Angeles River. Metro Rails' *Metro Division 20* shops occupy much of the site today.
5 man crew on that freight train. Five sets of eyes and guys looking out for problems and looking out for each other. Now its all about technology to increase revenue. Employees are now overworked and devalued. What's the old saying? This is no way to run a railroad.
Aren’t switch engines also called “yard goats”? There’s a Hartford minor league ball team by that name! 🥎 This was exceptionally concise - well done and thanks.
The most glaring thing when he watching these vintage railroad videos?
no damn graffiti on any train cars.
If this was the early- to mid-fifties, canned spray paint was still a decade or so away from being used by the general public. Evidently it was invented in '49.
Love it
cry more. the graffiti is the only interesting part of switching in the yard all night.
Great Alco S-type Switchers !!! 👍
Tacking paper waybills to the sides of cars … sorting paper cards back at the office … standing in the field writing down car numbers on a paper switch list as they go by … walking through a yard with a 20 lb backpack style walkie talkie reading off car numbers to someone in the office who transcribed them on paper who passed them to someone else to type them up … squirting grease in journal bearing boxes … American companies actually manufacturing product to be packed in colorful graffiti-free boxcars with slogans on the side that inspired the imagination …
This was filmed at just the right time to capture the last of an era before computerization, automation, and advanced materials changed railroading forever, and Class I’s became not much more than “precision scheduled” purveyors of two mile drags comprising sea containers full of Chinese bric-a-brac behind engines that all look the same with anonymous sounding alphabet soup Wall Street ticker symbol “names” painted on their sides.
A great Era !!!
yup. America is over. americans killed the golden goose
Very cool vintage production. My grandfather worked the train yard in Payson, Utah in the 1920's and 30's.
Loved "flat switching" in Kankakee West Yards.
Excellent vintage footage. 10:37
That guy riding on top of the boxcar at 5:08! Seems like it might actually be fun but I'd imagine it wasn't fun and games when the weather was bad. One false move and you don't go home. Thanks for putting this up. A great look at vintage railroading. A lot of us foamers might reminisce about the good old days but I'm sure real life railroaders are glad things are different now.
Back before air brakes, brakemen had to run on top of moving trains and had to lay on the brakes
In spite of being careful, unfortunately a lot of brakemen got hurt coupling, uncoupling, and riding cars and locomotives back then.
@@ACLTony which is why back then switchmen were 100% uninsurable... they had to get insurance through the union
@@25mfdwere they at least paid well for their dangerous work?
@@DonFelixGallardo
good question...
yes they are paid very good...
even back then... i have an old milwaukee road agreement book from 1958...
a yard foreman on a switch engine in that year made $21.22/day...
adjusted for inflation to todays money that's $315.00
Loved the Dutch drop in the first 2 minutes of the video.
they just kicked a car. nothing special about that
Great video I like trains especially freight trains. I like to see the caboose at the end of freight trains. You see cabooses at the end of freight trains just at the state borders for long hauls nowadays. Other places they use a caboose once in a blue moon not too often. The deliveries they make are local runs. That's probably why you don't see cabooses that much anymore blah. 😂
Loved my time as a brakeman, making up the trains.
Thank you very much for your video. Even though we now use computers instead of typewriters & The AT&SF has long ago been absorbed into The BNSF RR, I believe that for me that this video has been very informative. Thank you again.
Railroaders today need more stylish hats like some of the guys in this movie!
No safety glasses, no hard hats, no safety vests although the smart ones usually wore Hawaiian--type shirts with loud colors to make themselves more visible. was there even and FRA around back then with all it's safety regulations or were these guys on their own?
Something like half to three-quarters of those jobs must have been replaced by circuitry.
Look at how those automobiles are stacked on their front ends. I know that this was tried in the 1970s. But I didn’t expect it to have been done here.
That's fantastic and terrific!!!!
"Here is the freight yard of a big city" ... that just happens to have Los Angeles city hall in the background.
Be thankful you can point it out, most Americans can’t find California on a map.
@@rapman5363 I was told by a teacher recently that reading maps isn't even stressed in schools anymore because locations of places can be easily found in simple searches. I find that to be sad - I used to dispatch personnel to calls and work sites and most all of them were blindly dependent on GPS systems to tell them how to get to their destinations. I can read a headline about an event in Armenia or something and immediately pop up an image in my mind of about where in the world that is. I guess I'm just an old fuddy-duddy.
@@rapman5363 Lol... there's a reason nobody wants to know where california is!
Generations of kids grew up knowing it as either the Daily Planet or Gotham City Hall.
0:48 A Baldwin Centercab!!
A friend of mine pose on the connections of the freight train she loved it
Knowing the railroad I’ll be willing to bet a few of these men are still working at the railroad
That Is some model railroad.
I wish this was remastered to bring the Color back !!! 👍
Big job.
Nice to see cars that aren't ruined with shitty graffiti. Does anyone know exactly what year spray painting cars became a thing? And where did it originate? Probably somewhere crappy like NYC/NJ.
No telling but some of those guys have serious talent
@@nicholasadams2908 I agree. But they're doing it the wrong way. As we know the train cars are someones property that they paid big $ for. What makes them think that it's ok to touch it letalone paint giant letters on it taking up the entire side of the car?
One train enthusiast said he likes it because it gives him something to look at while stuck waiting for a train to pass. With that logic, I can graffitti his vehicle & justify it with "Well it gives me something to look at while I'm stuck behind/next to you in traffic."
Also, not so fun when you're stuck at the tracks waiting for a train and a hopper goes by with a giant cock & balls & says "Suck My Dick" when you have children in the car with you.
Yes, sometimes the art is cool. But damaging/ruining someone elses property is wrong and illegal. Next they'll start putting graffitti on the side of Delta & American Airlines jets.
@@jackshittle I don’t think they care to much about it otherwise the company would have it painted over. As far as the suck my dick on the side of it I’m sure kids have heard, seen, or said worse 😂. Probably be an upgrade for the planes though.
@@Glaze_TPF Agreed. Like Michael Douglas said in the film Falling Down (when questioned by a gang why he's on their turf and the gang member points to the scrib & says "Can't you read that?" - and Douglas responds with something like "Maybe if it was written in f'ng English I could."
Always amazed that some think it's ok to basically vandalize private oroperty. What do you think would happen if these same persons tried applying graffiti to truck rigs at a truck stop or to parked airplanes.
5:50 ah yes, the GP7, the first ever General Purpose model. Much better than the “barns on wheels” that they replaced (FT’s F2’s, F3’s).
I don’t know.
I would drive a while to see a working F unit.
Not sure I would go around the block for a Geep
And I have driven hundreds of miles to see a running steam locomotive.
Fs & Es are my favorite Locos some are still in operation to this day, NS used them on their Executive Passenger trains. Then they were sold to short lines & still running today on Reading, Blue Mountain & Northern passenger trains. They are one of the longest lasting model of Locos. in the history of Railroads. My HO Collection has more than 30 of them. They are much smaller than the behemoth Locos used today. But they are by far the most important Loco to me.
the New Haven rail road in Connecticut ran I believe it was a F9 (2 traction motors in the front truck and 3 traction motors in the rear truck) until a few years ago.
Now it is still running in cape cod Massachusetts after being repainted in it's original colors.@@robertadams6606
The GP7 was the same frame as the F7, EMD just put a "different lid" on it but otherwise the two locomotives were the same. Same principle applied to the GP9, same frame, stronger internals/more HP aand little more Tractive Effort.
These old flims are cool, it's strange none of these cars have gerfitte on them.
Learned a lot verry interesting
I well know that the diesel Locos are much more efficient than the old steam engines of the past. I like the humongous steam engines like UP's 4014 and the C & O's
( now absorbed) into CSX "Allegheny " and the other big steam engines even though at 75 I barely got to see steam engines on the rails doing a lot of the work.
Does anyone know what year this would of been filmed?
What are those freight cars… WITHOUT graffiti ❓
Is the loud test pattern tone necessary?
Apologies. Fixed.
1950's for sure
hey man, aside from me, who loves Alcos?😁
Id so much rather watch these old school vids on frieght yards .
Is this Taylor yard?
No, that was Southern Pacific, about 3 miles to the north and on the east bank of the Los Angeles River. This was the Santa Fe yard on the west bank, between the San Bernardino Fwy on the north and IH 10 on the south. I don't know the name of the yard though. It's mostly all gone now, the Metro Rail shops are there now.
By the sixth street bridge
@@Crash9908 Correct
It is the former *Santa Fe* _First Street Yard._
@@whiteknightcat Absolutely correct. This was the former Santa Fe *_First Street Yard_* located east of Santa Fe Avenue and mostly south of 1st Street, along the west bank of the Los Angeles River. Metro Rails' *Metro Division 20* shops occupy much of the site today.
1:11 *PUT TARPS OVER THAT SHIT!!!!!*
5 man crew on that freight train. Five sets of eyes and guys looking out for problems and looking out for each other. Now its all about technology to increase revenue. Employees are now overworked and devalued. What's the old saying? This is no way to run a railroad.
Clever
Most of these labor jobs are gone.
I'm lost here🤷
C'mon, man. Edit out the ear-splitting tone in the first four second.
No. That removes it's authentic vibe
C’mon man you sound like Biden
@Jimi Krentkowski my first thought when I read that comment as well! 😂 #letsgobrandon
@@DC9Douglas So you think that Joe Biden is against ear-splitting noises in TH-cam videos. OK. Now explain to me why that's a bad thing?
Apologies. Fixed.
this is outdated? cabooses are no longer used. I'm sure millennials don't even know what a caboose is.
I was hoping for something from the 21st century.
I know, city hall was the first thing I noticed
Aren’t switch engines also called “yard goats”? There’s a Hartford minor league ball team by that name! 🥎
This was exceptionally concise - well done and thanks.
odd watching men back then on tops of cars today that is verboten....