Bismarck weekly tribune., 1889-01-04
THE FREIGHT BRAKEMAN.
pIsAGREEABLE FEATURES OF HIS
WORK IN STORMY WEATHER.

WORK IN STORMY WEATHER.
The Difficulties Of Handling Train on
Steep Grades-Twenty Degrees Below
zero-Braking in Storm of Rain, sleet
or Snow.
The disagreeable features of freight
brakeman's life are chiefly those depending
upon the weather. If he could perform his
duties in southern California or Florida in
winter, and in the northern States in sum-
mer, his lot would ordinarily be happy
one, though the annoyance of tramps is al
most universal in mild climates, and in many
cases takes the shape of positive danger.
These vagabonds persist in riding on or in
the cars, while the faithful trainman must
according to his Instructions, keep them of.
In some sections of the country they will
board train in gangs of dozen armed
with pistols, and dictate where the train shall
carry them.
The hardships of cold and stormy weather
are serious, both because of the test of en-
durance involved and the added difficulties
In handling train. The Westinghouse au-
tomato air brake, which has served so ad-
mirably on passenger trains for the last flf-
teen years, has only recently been adapted
and cheapened SO as to make it available for
long freight trains, but it is now so per-
fected that in few years the brakeman
who now has to ride on the outside of cars in
freezing condition for an hour at time
will be privileged to sit comfortably in his
caboose while the speed of the train is gov
erned by the engineer through the instanta-
neous action of the air brake. On the steep
roads of the Rocky mountains. and few
other lines, this brake is already in use.
''BRAK1NG By HAND"
But "braking by hand" is still the rule. In
running on ascending grades or at slow
speeds the brakemen can ride under cover,
but in descending grades, or on levels when
the speed is high, they must be on the tops
of the cars ready to instantly apply the
brakes, for the reason that there are gene
rally only three or four men to long train
weighing from 500 to 1000 tons, whose mo-
mentum cannot be arrested very quickly. In
descending steep grades only the most con-
slant and skillful care prevents the train
from rushing at breakneck speed to the foot
OF the incline, or to a curve, where it would
be precipitated over an embanknent and
crushed to splinters.
AS soon as the whole train has got beyond
the summit, and the speed is reduced to q
proper rate by the application of the brakes
on, say, one-third or one-half the cars, it will
perhaps be found that one or two brakes too
many have been put on, and that the train is
running too slowly. Some of them must
then be loosened. Or perhaps some are set
so tightly that Che friction heats the wheels
unduly or causes them to slide along the
track instead Of rolling; then those brakes
must be released and some on other cars ap-
piled instead; and all this must be done
sometimes for an hour when the tempera-
ture is 20 degs below zero, or the wind is
blowing a gale, just as under more favorable
circumstances.
AN UNPLEASANT SITUATION.
train moving at twenty miles an hour
against wind with velocity of thirty
miles increases the latter to fifty, so far as
the brakeman is concerned; and if rain or
sleet is falling the force of it on his hands
and face is very severe. If we add to this
the danger attendant upon stepping from one
car to another over gap of twenty to
thirty inches in dark night, when the cars
are constantly moving up and down on their
springs and are swaying to one side or the
other every few seconds, we get some idea of,
though we cannot realize, the sensations
that must at such times fill the minds of the
men whose pleasant berth seems SO enjoyable
on mild summers day.
z And this is not an overdrawn picture or
the worst that might be given; for rain and
snow combined often coat the roofs of cars SO
completely and solidly that they are worse
than the smoothest skating pond, and NOV
ing upon them is attended with danger at
every step. Jumping-it cannot be called
walking-from one car to another is in such
cases positively reckless. The brake appar-
atus will in snow storm be coated with ice
SO rapidly that vigorous action is required to
keep it in working condition. Even wind
alone, in dry weather, sometimes compels the
men to crawl from one car to another, grasp
ing such projections as they may. The
brakeman who forgets to take his rubber
coat and overalls sometimes suffers severely
from sudden changes of temperature In
spring or fall a lively shower will be encoun-
tered in sheltered valley and the clothing
will be completely drenched, and then within
perhaps half an hour the ascent of few
hundred feet brings the train into an atnos-
phere a few degrees below the freezing point,
so that with the aid of the wind, famed by
the speed of the train, the clothes are very
soon frozen stsfp.-B. B. Adams, Jr., in
Scribners Magazine