Morris tribune. [volume] (Morris, Minn.) 1880-2000, 1882-08-24
WEALTH ON WHEELS.

How the Railway Magnates Travel
over the Country-Mr. Vanderbilts
Cara Fast Traveler-Jewett's
Palace-The Wheeled Luxury of
Pullman and Willard.
A San Francisco dispatch announces
that President Leland Stanford of the
Central Pacific railroad, has ordered that
a palace car be built in Sacramento for
his wife. 1t is to be finished entirely &C
cording to her suggestions, and will cost
$4,000 or $4,000. Handsome as this
will doubtless be, it will not be the
most expensive private palace car in the
country. ...
1t is said that Mr.. VIM. H. Fanderbilt's
car is the most expensive private vehicle
of any kind in the world. It's cost is said
to have been $4,000. It is by no means
the most complete and serviceable, and
it has no need to be, for it suits the
pleasure of that railroad monarch to ride
only in the daytime. If he ever departs
from this rule, the Wagner sleeping car
Dutchess is coupled on behind his coach,
and nothing remains to be wished for
then by night or by day. His car is
named the Vanderbilt; and, whereas, the
exteriors of all other private cars are
modest in color and simple in ornament,
this is yellow, and bears on each of its
sides three oil paintings in panels. One
represents the Grand Central depot, an
other the entrance to the Fourth avenue
sunken track, another Niagara Falls, and
others High bridge and the Suspension
bridge.
1t is longer than Pullman car, and
its windows are wide and long. 1t was
built in the shops Of the New York Cen
tral railroad. The interior suggests
palmer taste, and though every appoint
ment is of the best, comfort was more
sought there than elegance. One-half
the interior is grand saloon, walled in
by big plate glass windows, tastefully
draped and furnished with table and
plush-covered armchairs and lounges.
The saloon serves as an observation
room and dining room at WILL The 9TH
er half of the couch is subdivided into
smaller apartments-a kitchen and pan
try together, a Baker heater in closet
by itself with pipes running from it all
around the sides of the car, passage
way, toilet room and private sitting
room, containing upholstered furniture.
One of the end platforms is very wide,
and when the lids over the steps are
shut down there is room upon it for sev-
eral arm chairs, in which Mr.. Wander
bilt aud his guests may sit out of doors
and get all unobstructed view of the
country they may be passing through.
Until very recently every private car
had an observation platform, as it is
called, but it has been found that its
looks promise more of enjoyment than
it yields. The rate Of speed does not
have to be tremendous to cause dust
laden undercurrent of air and smoke
and cinder-weighted upper current to
curve in at the end of the car and be
hurled upon that platform as though the
train were a prodigious suction pump
and that was its mouth. Pretty nearly
all the coveted advantages of the obser-
vation platform are gained in the later
patterns ofprivate cars, by windows that
reach to the floor on either side of the
back door.
Mr.. Vanderbilt has inherited his
fathers fondness for fast travelling. and,
in lesser degree, the old commodore's
partiality for what is known in railroad
pa ie'i.o0 t'o SoiiiS, SPSClai, WulCl Is
travelling. with a special engine, on special
time, and without regard to the trains
and traffic to the road. Jim Fisk, Jr.,
was noted for exercising his bilitv to
travel in that royal way. He had an
engine hitched to his special car on the
Erie railroad on two minutes notice, and
before he stepped into the car it was
his custom to pause at the cab of the
engine and say to the engineer. "Now,
50 as fast as you can" Then, as now, it
was sufficient evidence of carefulness
and judgment for an engineer to have
earned place in the passenger service.
and although "Uncle" Green to-day
wears the gold badge that Fisk
gave him for putting the famous
relief train through to Chicago in un-I
precedented time when that city had
been swept by fire, one passenger On
gineer is held to rank equally with an
other. In these days, however,, partly
play among the railroad men, and partly
because the rate of speed for passenger
trains has been greatly raised during
the past five years, special coaches al
most invariably run at the end ofregular
expresses.
Less than a month ago Mr.. Wander
bilt invited few friends to 60 with him
in his palace coach on a tour of his roads
by daylight. In distance the journey
was greater than if Europe had been
the destination. The party was to stop
at a hotel in some big city every night
and Toledo was to be the end of the first
days run. The distance is 694 miles, yet
Mr. Vanderbilt, although he did not
leave New York until nearly s o'clock in
the morning, expected to make it by or
before dark. It was. after 10 o'clock that
night before he reached there, yet the
run was remarkable one. So rsi
The passengers said that, though mile
after mile was made at the rate of a
mile minute, and fifty miles were fire.
ouently travelled in an hour, they could
not realize that they were going at any,
thing but an ordinary rate of speed.
, This is explained by the fact that the car
is mounted on paper wheels of extra
size, is strong, very heavy and well bal
anced. Much depends on the engineer.
who, if he slows little on curves and
in stopping, starting, and in altering,
7 the rate OF speed, moves gradually
/ may deceive the passengers with a COM
+ Portable, even motion. If he is clumsy
and thoughtless they will be all but
thrown from seats on curves, and rem
dered half sick by the tugging and jolt
ing of sudden changes in speed
Sea sickness" as the porters of the
private coaches call the illness that
rough riding in them provokes, is a COM
mon malady among the women in these
excursion parties. In the long journey
Mr.. Vanderbilt's guests enjoyed the
speed told on the muscles, which were
taxed by the constant and powerful
pressure that pinned every man to the
back of his seat when he sat down, and
made equilibrium uncertain when he