Re: [CBQ] Re: Special Day in Q History

["clipperw@gmail.com [CBQ]" <CBQ@yahoogroups.com>]

Doug, 

 There are only about 10-12 divisions between Denver and Chicago. They could 
have easily had a pilot for every division on board. After all, they had a 
Rocky Mountain canary (a donkey) on board. A few more people would not have 
made any difference. It would be interesting to know what arrangements were 
made for the trip with the various labor organizations. I would think that they 
would have had to have conductors and brakemen represented in addition to any 
pilot engineers. The 16 hour law would have applied at that time and they 
completed the trip in 13 hours, five minutes even though it covered more than 
one division. As for a road foreman operating the train, many of the Q steam 
excursion had road foremen at the throttle. I am sure with all the fanfare, 
special arrangements were made. They may have even invited union management 
along for the ride. Is there a list of people on board that trip available? One 
of the things that Ralph Budd was good at was PR, probably within the RR as 
well as the general public.
 

 When Union Pacific runs their steam locomotives over the system, they have 
both an engineer and a conductor pilot on board for every division. The steam 
crews are rotated out if the trip exceeds 12 hours.  
 

 Bill Barber
 Gravois Mills, MO