Jonathan and List,
Growing up in and around railroaders through the 50's and 60's, the words
greybacks and redbirds were very common terms indeed. When the hotshots had
a SD-7 or 9 stuck between two pair of greybacks, the crews really thought
they had something. When the new red color began to appear, redbirds meant
newer, more powerful locomotives which meant getting back home quicker thus
redbirds was a word that conveyed a lot of meaning. Out of the roundhouse,
the cans of Dupont Gloss Black and smaller cans of the new "red" were used
on more things than locomotives. I don't ever remember any railroaders using
the term "blackbirds." Blackbirds might have been used early on but I never
heard the expression.
Bill
. ----- Original Message -----
From: "John D. Mitchell, Jr." <cbqrr47@y...>
To: <BRHSlist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2002 11:24 AM
Subject: Re: [BRHSlist] Re: Red-winged Blackbirds
> I don't beleive I heard the term, (and that was just
> among railfans) until the late 70's or early 80's. The
> railroaders, around here at least, just called them,
> "black motors", if anything!
> John D. Mitchell, Jr.
> --- jonathanharris@e... wrote:
> > If Russ, Loren and Ed all say the term "blackbird"
> > was not used on the
> > railroad, that's good enough for me. I suppose
> > there's a small chance it
> > was a geographically-restricted local term, but I'm
> > at least as prepared to
> > believe we railfans coined it. That still leaves the
> > question of who and
> > when. A simple search of our list archives turned up
> > the earliest reference
> > as January 1, 1999 (Message #475), the crucial
> > sentence being as follows:
> >
> > ".... Some time back, I saw a Stewart Q F-3 in a
> > hobby shop, and was
> > immediately turned off, because the "grey" appeared
> > dark enough for the
> > blackbird scheme...."
> > Marshall (jje corporation <zephyr03@xxxxxx.xxxx>)
> >
> > Marshall's phrasing here suggests that the term was
> > already commonly
> > understood by then. John Mitchell's The Q in the
> > Coal Fields (Burlington
> > Bulletin No. 35: April, 1999) also uses the term.
> > Could it really be this
> > recent -- just a few years old? Maybe these folks
> > could tell us where they
> > first heard it. Or perhaps the person who actually
> > invented it is still on
> > the list (step up and take a bow!).
> >
> > The term "redbird" I suspect is of very recent
> > origin, no doubt just an
> > extension, by analogy, of "blackbird."
> >
> > But my original posting really was more concerned
> > with the origin of the
> > black/gray/red/yellow color scheme itself, which in
> > its complexity does
> > closely match the markings of the American
> > red-winged blackird. I still
> > think it's plausible that whoever conceived it (and
> > I suppose we will never
> > know) was inspired by the bird's striking colors,
> > just as Raymond Loewy was
> > inspired by the cool forest greens of the Pacific
> > Northwest when he
> > envisaged the color scheme for the North Coast
> > Limited.
> >
> > Jonathan
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>
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