The independent. [volume] (Lincoln, Neb.) 1902-1907, 1905-09-07
PAGE s



edifying to the American people, The Chicago
Tribune points out where the fault lies
Time and the enormous growth or railway
traffic have changed all this. There are now
trains which average sixty miles an hour
over runs hundreds of miles long and which
occasionally make spurts OF speed greatly
exceeding this. On tracks where thirty
years ago, there ran half dozen trains, there
now run dozens of them, and the engineer
before he enters his~cab, Is handed great
bundle of train orders, not one Of which he
can overlook or forget without imperiling
valuable property and hundreds of lives. In
stead of having regular periods of rest, as
formerly, he is frequently required, during
seasons OF heavy traffic, to work extra time,
and sometimes he is at the throttle inceSSant-
ly for from eighteen to twentyfOur hours
The speed he must make. the mental strain
he Is always under when making run, and
the mental and physical exhaustion from
which he suffers-these, the "old timer de-
clares, are the true causes OF q great ma
jOrty OF the mistakes engineers make. They
are not careless or reckless, but like other
men, they sometimes forget. Trains prob
ably will continue to be run faster and fast
err Traffic will grow heavier. Engineers
cannot be depended upon to become less for
getful or able to stand a greater strain
Wrecks may, nevertheless, be rendered less
frequent and terrible Air brakes, double
tracks, and the block system, IL generally
j0rity-of wrecks. The engineers hand and
mind would be less failible If railway man
ayers recognized the fact that he is a hui
man being, not part of his locomotive, and
that there are limits to his endurance
Thousands of people are injured and killed I'm
wrecks in the United States every year. not
because there are no known means of pre-
venting them, but because the railways do not
adopt means that are well known.
-
Of 81 per passenger and 81 per ton of freight
as desirable method on the railways of the
country. For the year ending June 30, 1906, the
gross earnings of all the roads were 1975, TIA
and the operating expenses 1888 ,S96,25S. The
roads carried 715,419,es2 passengers and hauled
], 3O9, 899,165 tons of freight The Kansan says:
Suppose that all the railroads belonged.
say to John d. Rockefeller, or John P. Nor
gan, even to Uncle Sam, and were oper-
ated as a unit 1t Is clear that fiat rate Of 81
per passenger, and 81 per ton OF freight would
have yielded bigger gross revenue than the
multitude of classificatiOns and rates actually
used did. Let us call each passenger dollar -
and each ton a dollar, and here is what we
have:
Passengers ......... .....$ 715419,6S2
Total $3.50. .......... 2,O25318,S47 =
Actual receipts ........... 1,972,174,019 n
-- q
Excess on fiat rate 1890. 50144 1928
II we deduct the actual operating ex-
penses from the supposed fiat rate the bal
ance in it's favor would be 1856, 412,594 In
stead of 663,277,776, a gain of $50,134,828.
But that Is not ALL Each OF the 4,104 rail-
ways has full corps of shoulder-strapped.
kid-gloved and silkstockinged Presidents
vice presidents and officers to De saaried and
pensioned to the limit which Rockefeller or
Morgan or Hill, or Uncle Sam would dis