The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-02-18
oRDEALs OF THE ENGINEMAN.

What He Must Do to Prove His Eyes and Ears Perfect-No Greenhorn is Tolerated at the Throttle. Every healthy American boy nourish-
 es at one time or another large ambf. 1 ton to be seated on the right hand side of a locomotive cab when he is grown up" But it's dollars to doughnuts' that 1 he would not be so anxious to be an er. l gineman if he only knew of the ordeals i that the idol of his heart had to go 1 through before he attained to his high | seat, and has to go through from time to time in order to convince his superi-
 ors that he is still a fit man and proper to be entrusted with the safety of the train and the passengers behind him. 1 It is the fashion among railroads now adays not to employ as engineman--the
 new term for engineer--a man who has ] not run on the road as fireman No l greenhorn is tolerated at the throttle.
 Hence, he who aspires to become an en-
 gineman, and has his heart set on 1t,
 must first undergo the ordeals required
 of all applicants for the position of fire man. -&
 After the superintendent of the road,
 or the division, has decided from the
 mans personal appearance and conver sation that it is worth while to spend i more time on him, the applicant is
 turned over to the roads chief inquisi- tor, who is generally known officially unler the title of chief examiner, and popularly as ''the school teacher
 For this official the applicant, first
 thing of all writes out 8 detailed record
 of himself. If the penmanship is poor, ! and the orthography indicates a limited
 education, the examiner makes no bones
 about informing the applicant that it
 would be a waste of time on the part of
 both of them for the examination to be continued. Writing that is difficult to decipher and misspel1ed words might lead to serious results; have, indeed, caused more than one railroad catas- tropIle The railroads now pretty gem
 erally recognize that it is part of wis dom to see that only men who can
 write orders legibly and spell them cor- rectly, likewise reports, are taken on. i But if the applicant shows himself 1 proficient in this direction, he is straightway put through an ordeal that | lasts two hours or more. This is the i triple ordeal of vision, color sense and
 hearing. Not only does he have to un-
 dergo the opticians standard test for
 vision, both distant and near, but there
 are variations, all of which tend to in
 crease the severity of the examination.
 For examination, in place of the ordi-
 nary optical chart there is substituted
 chart bearing such figure as flag, a bugle, a chair, ladder a watering pot,
 g. table and scissors, all so drawn and placed as to make it impossible for any l except perfect eyes to identify them for what they are at a distance of twenty
 feet. Besides being harder to decipher
 than the lettered chart this figured
 chart prevents the railroad from being
 imposed upon by a crafty applicant
 with a good memory. More than one
 man, before the trick was discovered,
 studied up the positions of the different
 letters on the ordinary chart, which can
 be bought anywhere, and passed per- i feet examination when his eyes were 1 far from being perfect.
 This test is taken looking with both
 eyes, then with one eye at time, the '! eye not taking the test being covered