February 1953 page 6

[left column]
each. Five of the seven on the S. C.
Division were built from their wheels
up in the railroad's Greenville Shops.

The caboose has been variously
called "cabin car," "conductor's car,"
"accommodation car," "train car," and
"way car." The history of their early
developement and use is somewhat
vague. One story credits their origin
to a conductor of a freight train who
directed operations from a load of bar
rels and other merchandise on the last
car of his train. The term caboose did
not come into general use until 1855 on
the Buffalo, Corning & New York Rail-
road.

The cupola is born

The advantages of a cupola were
first exploited by a resourceful con-
ductor on the Chicago & North West-
ern Railroad. He rigged a seat under
the skylight in his caboose. This en-
abled him to sit with his head and
shoulders through the top of the cab,
thus affording him an excellent view
of his train. He later suggested to the
master mechanic that an elevated, en-
closed skylight be built on his cab. This
was done, and the cupola was born. An
adaption fo the cupola principle was
made in 1923 when the first "bay win-
dow" caboose was built. This type af-
fords a side view of the train and is
nows in use on many railroads.

Caboose travel is far from luxurious.
Due to the nature of a freight train
the rear car usually gets the roughest
ride. It records all the jerks and sud-
den stops as senstively as a seismo-
graph records an earthquake, and its
springs function more like those of a
bulldozer than a cadillac. Even so,
cabooses enjoy the respect and affec-
tion of the men who ride them.

Although the little red caboose al-
ways comes in last, it has found a per-
manent and important place in the op-
erations of a railroad.

[right column]
NEW C OF C DIRECTOR

O. F. Ashburg III, P & N district
freight agent in Gastonia, was elected
to the Board of Directors of the Gas-
tonia Chamber of Commerce at the an-
nual meeting of the organization hled
on February 3.

Mr. Ashbury, in addition to serving on
the board, will head the Chamber's
Traffic and Transporation Committee.
The new director and committee chair-
man became DFA in Gastonia on Sep-
tember 1, 1951, succeeding D. C. McIn-
tosh.

A NEW HIGH IN SAFETY

Preliminary reports indicate that in
safety of operation the railroads in
1952 surpassed all records for any of
the 65 years in which official figures
have been kept.

For railroad passenger safety, the
best previous year was 1949 when, on
the average, one passenger lsot his life
for each 1,200,000,000 miles traveled.
This fatality rate of .08 per 100,000,000
miles traveled has never before or since
been even closely approached by any
other means of transport.

It now seems certain that in 1952
the railroads broke their own record
by a wide mrgin. In the first eleven
months of 1952, there was only one
fatality for each 2,200,000,000 miles
traveled or .045 per 100,000,000 miles,
and preliminary information for the
last month of 1952 indicates that the
figure for the full year will approach,
and might even better, this hitherto
unapproached record of passenger safe-
ty.

The gain in railroad safety over the
years is even more remarkable when
considered in relation to the amount of
traffic handled. As compared with 1939,
the safest year of the pre-war period,
railroads handled in 1952 nearly twice
as much freight traffic and half again
as much passenger travel.

FEBRUARY, 1953 7