Nevada County picayune., 1888-03-28
TRAIN DlSPATCHINC.
A Position That Requires Men of Iron Nerve and Quick
 BrainS.

Accident caused by an ineompe
 ent train-dispat cher, |" remarked : gentleman in an uptown hotel. as h. lad down newspaper after reading an account of a railroad collision. - People are beginning to realize the fact that two trains cant pass each other on single track he remark ed, dryly.
 The gentleman was superinten- dent of Western railroad who had worked his way up from a telegraph operator, stopping for sixteen years in dispatcher's position before a superiutendcncy was awarded him. - To circle of friends he spoke of the dangers of travel and the duties of a train-dispatcher.
 Few people," he said, "even those who travel continually, know the dangers that they are in while rushing over mountains and through valleys at the rate of forty miles an hour. with trains in front of them. trains behind them. passenger, freight. excursion, construction, special and wild trains, laundering along on the same track. In the East. where nearly every road is double-tracked. the danger is mate rially diminished. but the great net work of roads that spreads like a fisherman net over the great West, is mostly single track. and requires men of iron nerve and quick brains to handle the trains. One of our virtually holds the lives of our passengers at the ends of his fingers.
 Suppose for moment dispatch CT should lose his head, what is the result: An awful catastrophe. But it is seldom. comparatively speaking, that an accident or collision occurs. and for this we can thank the lynx eyed, quick-wittcd and nimble-iin- gered man, who sits in his office hun dreds of miles away, and controls the movements of his engineers and conductors, by the aid of his servant, electricity. Before him lies train sheet, divided into subdivisions, with the names of each station, and col umn for each train, both east and west-bound. entered thereon. When a train leaves station, the operator reports it to the dispatcher as arriving and departing at whatever time 1t may be. which is entered on the sheet. Thus, by glancing at his train-shect. the dispatcher can tell where each train is. There are roads where dispatcher has charge of two freight divisions of one hundred miles each. On each division are thirty trains each way, making one hundred and twenty trains controlled by one man, with, possibly, one as sistant.
 We will suppose that train IS late. and cannot make it's meeting noint. This is time when the tel egraph must straighten things out, and if not done well snarl of trains will he the result. Train 10 is be- hind time. which happens from varl- ous causes. The regular meeting point with train z is at A. Not be- ing able to make it, the dispatcher sends an order first to Train at C' The following is the generally-accept- ed style of an order
 To Conductor and Engineer No { C.; Hold at C until Train 10 arrives Answor W. w. C.
 ~The operator at C then displays q signal, a flag by day and lamp by night. that warns the conductor of Train : not to pass C without as certaining what the signal is out Tor When the orders are delivered the conductor and engineer sign them and they are repeated to the dis hatcher. who, if they are correct an swors back %. K.' The dispatcher then sends an order to Train lo as fnllnuG.