Savannah courier. (Savannah, Tenn.) 1885-1979, 1890-09-11
FREIGHT HANDLING.
ST. Louis Railroad Man Explains How
the Work Is Systematized

A st. Louis Railroad Man Explains How
the Work Is systematized.
A stranger might think that the bust.
ness of freight handler at railway
freight depot was OF slight conse-
quence. But the recent strike of the
freight handlers in East st. Louis
made manifest the Importance of hav.
ing men who were experienced in
working on the platforms. The large
majority of the strikers had been with
Their respective roads long time, some
as long as eight and ten years. The
work OF handling freight is thoroughly
systematized, like every other branch
OF railroad work. For instance, take
the handling of in-freight, which is up
loaded from the cars here. Aman calls
OIL the name of the firm to which the
box Is directed, and marks on it the
number OF the car with chalk.
The box is placed on n
truck, and the truckman, as he
passes the tallyman, is told where to
put 1t, whether in the East St Louis
pile OF freight, the Missouri Pacific, tho
transfer Company's and so on, wher-
ever 1t belongs. The unloading gang of
men work one car after another in this
manner There are separate gangs of
men for each delivery clerk, called the
loading gang" They receive dray
tickets from the delivery clerk, and
pick out the freight according to the
tickets, and load it on the wagons. The
dray tickets tell the firm name to which
the box is shipped, and the number Of
the car that carried it. The car mum.
Der is given so that if one firm, say. has
twenty-five boxes of freight distributed
through several cars, the boxes will not
be mixed up in loading wagon All
the boxes from one car are to be loaded
on the same wagon. AS to the out
bound freight, it is brought to the
freight houses by wagons and unloaded
by the drivers at different stations. The
dray tickets are handed to the receiv-
ing clerks, who tally the freight and re-
ceipt to the drivers tits IL en- taken by
a gang of men to the pile of freight
where it belongs. The duplicate dray
tickets are passed into the platform Of
flee and arranged in order by the plat
form foreman. When he has sufficient
quantity to start car he hands the
tickets over to the loading clerk, who
takes gang Of men and loads the
freight. Some skill is required in load
ing freight car for various stations
along the line. The freight for the
nearest station is loaded last, as it is
taken out first. The skill is displayed
in arranging the boxes of freight SC
that a Car will hold as much as
possible, and so that when one
part of the freight is taken out the
other portion will not tumble down.
This is called station order loading"
The man who picks up the freight
here and there and puts it on the trucks
and calls it off while the truckman
wheels it away, and the loading clerk
checks it off, is called picker" He
is more valuable man than the truck
man, and the railroads, in the strike
just ended, consented to pay the ''pick-
ers" $3.50 a day. 1t is easy to imagine
the inconvenience caused by gang of
inexperienced truckmen wheeling
freight just after strike. 1t was a
fortunate thing for the railroads that
the old men consented 10 come back,
although new men could be trained in
no great length of times Louis
Globe Democrat