The Irish standard., 1894-07-28

These 1890 railroad companies were
the mainstay of 873,6O2 employees Of ell
grades, SO that one person in every ninety
of the population depends for live1i-
hood on railroad company. To equip
the ''plant," without which rot one en-
ploye could earn days pay, the execrat-
ed capitalists invested $4,000 600 600,
and received but $1UU 929 ,885in dividends,
or less than one per cent, although the
gross earnings were 1920, ISL 1874. The
operating expenses were $S27, ,921 ,299, so
that on rough calculation, out Of every
dollar received by the companies, IS
cents went into the pockets of either
faithful servants or men found by pact
to be traitors to their employers on the
one hand, and reckless of the consequen-
ces to their wives, children, and other
dependents, whenever the conditions Of
their pact demanded revengeful or 'sym-
pathetic" action.
TO carry all these passengers and move
the freight required 34,788 locomotives,
Of which 1857 were for passenger trains
and 1902 for switching. The road en-
gines drew 81 384 passenger cars and
1,047,577 'reight cars.
:, This transportion service gave living
to nearly 100000 men. The superintend-
ing clerical work, and other avocations of
the higher employees gave incomes to
1884 persons; 256, ,212 we're employed on
the ways and structures, and 175,464
mechanics and others were paid to look
after the rolling stock and otLer equip
ment.
1t is worthy of note that the armies Of
mon employed incidently in industries
which are germane to railroading, and on
which such service depends, are not fac
tors in these statistics.
Interesting data are found on analyz-
ing these figures. For instance, it is
found that each locomotive on the pas.
senger service drew in the year on the
average, 66268 passengers and travelled
1.6e6, ,601 passenger miles. Each freight
locomotive drew in the year 4O,062 tons
5,O31 ,S89 ton miles.
Turning the figures another way, the
number Of passenger cars to each million
passengers was So, and the number of
freight cars to Every million tons of
freight was 1913. The average journey
of each passenger was nearly "a miles,
and the average haul per ton Was a little
more than l25 miles. Passenger train
mileage was 535,6l8, ,77O, and freight train
mileage 508, ,719,6O6. The passenger ser.
vices brought in 28.49 per cent of the in.
| come and the freight services 66 q per
cent. Each 100 miles of railroad in the
United States was the source whence Sis
mon obtained money to live.
II second tracks, yard tracks, and slid
inge are taken into consideration, there
are more than 230,l37 miles of lines in
the country, of which 1O.051 miles are
second track. The increase of mileage
| in 1928 Of l,700 miles. The greatest
increase was in the State of Washington,
556.32; Montana, 409,066; Minnesota,
406.69, and West Virginia, 365 miles.
Forty-two companies in the United
States have mileage Of over ], ZOO miles,
and twenty six mileage of between 500
and 1000. Companies having a mileage
of $50 miles or less number 902. The AZ
big companies controlled 98,385.4 miles
of lire, leaving 1,84S companies controll-
ing out A % of the total active railroad
mileage.
The accident statistics show 2,727 era.
ployes killed and 81, ,729 injured. and 299
passengers killed and 2,229 injured. One
employe was killed to every 800 men en-
ployed, and l. was injured, while 81
escaped. Trainmen Jared the worst, as
10 per cent. OF them were injured in vari-
GUS ways. As to passengers, L out of
nearly 100000 was killed. ard one out
of 1882 injured, or killed for each
Al, ,5S7 1866 passenger miles run, and l in
jured for each 3,4C6,659 passenger miles
'rnn