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[Ispolkom]

Also note that back in the 1920's and 1930’s, sleeper fares even if "inexpensive" (by today's standards) were way out of reach for the "average" American! And a little off topic, flying was just the opposite. Not until the main airlines used jets did flying become affordable for many. And that's about the same time that train travel started to go downhill!

Lets take a look at fares way back in the late 50's and early 60's.

Looks like the sleeper fares were only a small fraction of the coach price.

It only looks that way because that's a slumbercoach fare, not a sleeper fare. Sleeper fares started with a higher base Pullman or First Class fare, and then added the room charge on that. A New York-Chicago roomette on the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1967 was $67.38 Pullman fare + $16.61 roomette charge = $83.99. Coach on that same route was $42.16.

Look at this fare table to compare apples to apples. Traveling Chicago to Washington, coach was $32.53, a slumbercoach was $39.13, a roomette was $70.32

In both cases a roomette costs about double what a coach seat does. If you use any of the inflation calculators, you'll see that Amtrak's coach prices are generally much lower than what private railroads charged.

 

[PacificStarlight]

on the topic of menus, in the EDM station there's an old menu from the empire builder which shows a 3 course meal for $1.50