Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1900-06-21

| lI6lSuI, anu the farmer, the merchant.
the tourist and the ubiquitous com
mercial traveller" are aboard the trains.
Thirty-ffve years ago, or thereab bouts.
q weary traveller worn out with sleep
less nights in the cramped cushioned
seats of an ordinary coach-luxurious
as it was then in comparison with the
ancient coach of twenty years before
conceived the idea that sleeping-car
was a necessity. Necessity became the
mother of invention, and the palace car
Of to-day and tonight is the outgroWth
of an inventive genius
| With the creation of the comfort fur
nished by the sleeping-car came a host
Of demands for more exciusiveness and
| luxury than was served in the ordinary
! day coaches The American travelling
public are free-born aristocrats by
birth and education. Nothing in a
railway train is too good for the Ameri-
can who has money, and he is willing
! to pay well for all that he demands.
provided that he gets it, If he dosen't
get it he kicks and rightly, too.
Following the sleeping car came the
exclusive car, for which an extra seat
fare is charged, for short and long
journeys by daylight then the dining
and lunch cars without which, to-day,
no railway line of any Importance is
unproVided. In most cases meals are
served la carte-pay a fixed price for
what one orders served-but there are
some roads which continue to charge @
dollar per meal, wheather it be an
eight-cOurse dinner or crackers and
cheese with bottle Of beer) luncheon
1t IS d matter of strife between roads
as to which shall provide the best food
properly cooked and served The cook
shop Of our American dining cars COM
pels enthusiasm from even our
saturnine English cousins.
Steam heat for all cars in trains
vestibuled cars and coaches, electric
lights in ceiling and at sides of cars,
| and at heads of berths in sleeping ears
(for those who are afflicted with
insomnia, or who wish to read after
their neighbors have retired for the
night are perhaps the latest additions
to the close of the century improve
mentS. What more that is new TO
follow in the twentieth century the
writer does not attempt to prognosti-
cate In his thirty-fiVe years of rail
way service in the passenger depart
ment, he has seen perfected the large
portion Of the various items herein
| recorded, besides many not referred to
at all
The consolidation OF many short, in
dependent lines into large railway
systems has been a boon to railway
travellers in that fewer changes of day
coaches occur on long journeys, while,
for illustration, a passenger can
traverse several routes across the
United States of America with not
more than one change of sleeping cars
en- route.
Speed of trains has been increased
from 10 miles per hour, in 1910, to an
average rate Of from so to so miles per
hour in 1899. At what rate shall we
travel ten years hence? Of what
service to our railway system will
electricity be when know its power
and how it can be utilized? May We
not look forward to the time when we
can breakfast in New York city and
dine in the early evening in Chicago?
| The mechanical contrivances which
make American railway travel safe,
| speedy, comfortable and luxurious, cali
forth the admiration not only of our
own people, but Of all the peoples who
populate the rest of the world.
And yet, these are only some Of the
items which show the development of
the railway passenger traffic system of
this the greatest of all civilized
| countries
The present system of booking or
ticketing passengers for short and long
distances is most complete. Nearly
every railway coupon ticket seller can
name the fare to the inauiring pass
enger from his station to any prirci-
! pal city in the world, and what is more.
can furnish the ticket with it's few or
/
the passenger has the price; he can be
| told the time he must start. the train
he must take, the railways. steamship
lines, or stage he must take to reach
! his destination, and the time, to an
hour, at which he will reach his
| journeys end. At least all this IS
printed il the time tables and rate
book with which the ticket seller is
furnished by his general passenger
i agent, and there is no excuse for his
not imparting information And the
passengers baggage will accompany
him all the way without having to be
hunted up at the transfer points The
American baggage checking system is
perfect.
In this connection it may not be i'm
proper to state that the railway pass
enger department excels many
educational institutions in teaching the
geography of the world by means of its
maps, time schedule, illustrated
pamphlets and books, which are used
as advertising mediums. Time was,
years ago, when every road had the
straightest line Con its map) between
any two or more competitive points
but now the public demands actual
facts and truth-telling maps, ana,
again, gets what it REQUIRES.
1t may interest some of your readers
to quote a few statistics gathered from
a recent report of the interstate COM