Interestingly, the same was true for the Chicago & Northwestern. A 99 year
old friend of mine grew up in Clinton, Iowa and for a while his dad worked
for the Northwestern in Fulton across the river. The local employee
accommodation train was known as the "scoot" which is the C&NW equivalent of
"dinky" in the Chicago area for commuter runs.
I disremember all the terms used in Chicago but I know the Milwaukee, GM&O,
IC, PRR, and Wabash all had their own different nicknames for suburban
service trains and may have parallel usage for branchline / employee
accommodation service as well.
Charlie Vlk
> -----Original Message-----
> From: WPDiven@a... [mailto:WPDiven@a...]
> Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2002 9:59 AM
> To: Aeolus3@a...; BRHSlist@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: Re: [BRHSlist] question (revised)
>
>
>
> Greetings list:
>
> Noted several comments along the lines of:
>
> << "Dinky" was/is a Suburban Train. >>
>
> Ogle County 100 miles west of Chicago still isn't very
> surburban and was even
> less so in the older days. Folks in farm country, or at
> least some of my
> relatives born in the 1920s, called the mixed Oregon-Mount
> Morris turn The
> Dinky.
>
> Since they picked up the nickname as kids, I assume it
> predates the 1932
> abandonment of ex-Chicago & Iowa track between Mt. Morris and
> Forreston. No
> idea when the name came into use but suppose it could be a sarcastic
> reference--jargon picked up from a grumbling trainman?--
> given the way the
> line was downgraded after Oregon-Savanna replaced
> Oregon-Forreston as the
> main line in 1886. Maybe someone else can fill in the history of
> passenger/mixed service on the branch.
>
> Regards,
>
> Bill Diven
>
> ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
> ---------------------~-->
> Get your FREE credit report with a FREE CreditCheck
> Monitoring Service trial
> http://us.click.yahoo.com/ACHqaB/bQ8CAA/ySSFAA/8ZCslB/TM
> --------------------------------------------------------------
> -------~->
>
>
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
|