Tks for sharing great memories from the past Pete. Given the CGW
train I saw ( a short local), the brakeman would not have been taking
signals to the engineer but as your other option offered, was probably
moving to where he would be making a cut to drop off a car or two in
Waverly.
When I went thru Brakeman training (as part of my Safety Mgr regimen)
on C&NW in "78, all were required to know hand signals as radios could
& did fail. As for the Q(BN) radios were not yet available to all
local crews as late as 1979 or "80, A very veteran crew (all former
Q) that handled traffic from Aurora to West Chicago and the General
Mills plant there (plus interchange with C&NW) were still using hand
signals as they had no radio.
The real challenge was on the one curve south of the plant where it
might be necessary to have a man on the ground to relay signals front
either end of the train when the waycar & loco were out of the line of
vision. (the cars were 50' XM including the Q series of 1&1/2 plug
doors with the little white grain inspection door cut into the
otherwise Chinese Red doors (accurately redone in the Athearn
model). Gerald
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