--------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Fred Frailey <ffrailey@kiplinger.com>
To: "texaszephyr" <texaszephyr@sw.rr.com>
Cc: Gblatham@aol.com, railspot@yahoogroups.com
TZ, just a couple of points I'd like to make. You said:
"However, what most didn't know was that although the USPS had announced
on
Sept. 1, 1967 that it was planned on removing all US mail from the rails
within the next two years, no mail had been removed from the TZ by the
time
that the last trains ran ten days later. As a matter of fact the TZ had
swelled to an average of 12-13 cars in each direction by August 1967."
In writing "Twilight of the Great Trains," I had to do a lot of research
on the removal of U.S. mail from first-class passenger trains. Across the
entire Burlington system, and across the entire U.S. rail system for that
matter, virtually all first-class mail was removed in the fall of 1967,
mostly between mid September and mid October of that year. I don't know
the source of your remark that the postal service meant to do this over a
two-year period. Maybe it did say that, but in fact 90% of the deed was
done immediately afterward - so rapidly that Santa Fe president John Reed
says he was stunned and shocked. It is inconceivable to me that of all
the
trains in the U.S., the remaining pair of FWD trains would be exempted.
Had they remained into mid October, they would have been threadbare of
storage mail and definitely without a Railway Post Office.
Then you said:
"At least the TZ was allowed to complete its final runs. Menk killed off
the
Lincoln-Billings train out in the middle of nowhere and made the
passengers
detrain and walk to the nearest town."
Lou Menk remained president of the Burlington for only a year, from mid
1965 to mid 1966. He then left to become president of Northern Pacific
and
later, of course, of Burlington Northern. The Billings train-off case
occurred in 1967 or 1968 - I forget which. So to say he committed this
gaffe regarding the Billings train would be unfair to Lou's memory. (It
was actually a suggestion made by the Q's VP-law, to which nobody in
authority objected.) Nor, for that matter, was Menk still around when the
decision was made to take off the last Denver-Dallas train.
Otherwise, your comments seem fair and accurate. Lou Menk was no great
friend of the passenger train - he'd tell you that to your face. Love him
or hate him, you couldn't call Lou Menk a hypocrite, because he always
said what he thought and hang the consequences.
Fred
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