Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-08-19
Written for The Star.

patcher are all right" said the tired city
ticket agent the other day, but he ism t
the whole thing when it comes to hard
work, and he doesn't see all the romance
there is in the railroad business. Yet to
read some of the newspaper articles about
the engineers and the dispatchers you'd
think the men who come In personal con-
tact with the passengers have nothing
whatever to do with the operation of the
railroads at all.
But 1 want to tell you that the ticket
agents, the train conductors, the Pullman
conductors, the tranmen, the porters, even
the walters, the stewards and the chef on
the dining cars, are all entitled to some
degree of sympathy and recognition from
the public. Oh, yes, l suppose there are
some black sheep among them. There are
a few lawyers, doctors. merchants, police
men, labor leaders-there are even some
Office holders W no are not altogether " mat
they should be. But the majority of men
in all walks of life are good fellows, hard
workers and eager to play their parts In
the game of life squarely. 1t Is so with
the men in every grade of rallr0ad paSsen-
ger service, too.
II suppose you think it's a cinch to sell
tickets all day over the counter of a rail
road ticket office. Well, let me tell you
differently.
Troubles of the Ticket Agent.
I'm fact, the ticket agents lot never was
an exceptionally happy one. Twenty years
ago, though. he had much easier time than
now. Then about all he had to do was to
hand out one little parallelogram of paste
board after another, with the names of the
stations at the beginning and ending of the
passengers journey printed on 1t, take In
the price in each case and keep his cash
straight. 1t isn't SO now.
Then most ticket agents had to sell tick
cts only over the lines by which they were
employed. Now in most offices-it is so
in the one l am lucky enough to have a
job in-tickets are on sale on twenty or
thirty or more lines, to say nothing of the
tickets to various destinations in foreign
lands. You can buy a ticket at the office
l work in to almost any place in the whole
world to which railroads or steamships
run.
when began there as office boy twenty
five years ago you could buy ticket to only
a few prominent places not on our lines
and as the price of every ticket We had to
sell was plainly indicated by printed sched
ules L could sell tickets about well as
the boss, only l couldn't make the change
quite as rapidly and surely.
Unless you have been a ticket seller
yourself you can't understand what a DIFF
ference the new way makes. From my
office 1 can sell tickets to San Francisco,
for instance, over several different routes.
(as to time) and unlimited tickets We
sell sleeping car tickets also and they are
now of two Notwithstanding and tour
ist.' Tourist cars are not much used in
the east yet, but you will find them on
many of the western lines where the dis
tances are greater, and there they are a
great boon to those travellers who do not
have any more money to spend than they
actually need.
1T is these through or long distance
tickets that make us work-yes, and study,
too. Many of them are several feet in
length, with sections to be torn off and
turned in by the conductors of the various
divisions over which the passenger passes.
And of course the computation of the prices
is sometimes an intricate arithmeticaI oper-
alton. 1t has taken me a full half hour
many time to figure out just how much
to charge a passenger and just how to send
him through with the least loss of time
without charging him more than he wants
to pay.
Studying Time Tables in Odd Moments
This brings to my mind the study of
time tables.
1T makes passenger good natured and
inclined to travel more freely If he is able
to make connections just as he expects to,
and it makes him a sore-headed stay-at-
home to spend a lot Of money and find him
self hundreds or thousands of miles away
from home with ticket that won't carry
him just where and as he expected to go.
so We have to make the most elaborate
studies imaginable of the railroad guides.
1t is a comparatively easy thing to get the
run of the time tables of one line, though
some lines have enough branches to make
your head swim. But It's a really difficult
job to familiarize yourself with a vast net
work of lines stretching from ocean to
ocean, north across the boundary into Can
ada, south across the boundary into Mex
leo. and out upon the seas over the steam
ship lines. Why, the first few weeks of
green ticket sellers life are positively mis-
cradle if he really tries to master the situa-
ton in a short time. Even the most ex-
perienced of us have to study nights, some
times, in the spring and fall, just after the
seasonal changes of schedules are made
The making out of our reports is an
other thing which has become extremely
complicated, and that often calls for night
work. We ticket agents are by no means
sticklers for just so many hours a day nor
are We able to get clear of work altogether
on Sundays and holidays, as you might
suppose.
CITY ticket agents have an easy time
of it in one way as compared with the sta
ton ticket agents, however
They are afflicted good deal more than
we are with the last minute passengers:
people who rush up to the window five min
utes before train time to buy tickets half
or all the way across the continent or to
some remote Mexican or Canadian point
and with impossible ideas as to stop-overs
ana time and expense. Were 1t not for the
bureaus of information that are now n
feature Of nearly every big railroad station
/ don't know how the station ticket sellers
would get along at all.
Travellers Joys and Sorrows.
do you never get in touch with the
romance of real life? Why, my friend I
have heard 1t so many times that OF all
people in the world the lawyer and the
doctor know most about the trouble of
their fellows, their hopes and their fears.
but don't believe either of them hears
many more hard-luck stories than the ticket
selier-or good luck Stories either, for the
matter of that.
when folks are going on journey to
attend funeral they always have to tell
the man who sells them their tickets all
about 1t, and SO do the folks who are called
home suddenly, or summoned peremptorfiy
from home because of the mortal illness of
some one near or dear Is the Journey un-
dertaken reluctantly because there's a dis
agreeable lawsuit at the other end, or be-
cause lot of money has been lost? Into
the ticket sellers ear the story Is ruthiessly
poured. with never thought that perhaps
he may have troubles of his own that are
about all he wants to know the details of
just then.
"But there are compensations. for. OF.