Although U.S. rail passenger service was handed off to the National Railroad Passenger Corporation (Amtrak) in 1971, the private system's last days as a useful network may be marked on the calendar from the national airline strike in July-August 1966 and the end of the Railway Mail Service in September 1967.
On July 8, 1966 the Machinists struck major United States airlines, including all of the major carriers in the Northwest. At the time, I was saving almost every penny for college expenses, but was planning to make a weekend rail excursion to places that I had never been. But trains were full of disgruntled travelers diverted from the airlines. I followed strike news closely, negotiations proceeded, and on Friday, August 19th, the strike came to a close. On Saturday, August 20th, I was at Portland's Union Station.
My plan was to use the Northwest Triangle ticket, a special fare for travel Portland > Seattle > Spokane > Portland or the reverse direction. The problem was that I wanted a daylight trip from Spokane to Portland through rugged Snake River landscapes and only the Union Pacific (UP) offered that. That was a problem because their partner in the Seattle > Spokane segment was the Milwaukee Road (CMStP&P), which no longer offered passenger service. An expert on rail tariffs had tipped me off to the agreement that the CMStP&P had made for their tickets to be honored on the Great Northern Railway (GN) between common points.
So, with hope of a settlement in the air strike rising, on Thursday the 18th I found myself buying a ticket on the Union Pacific / Milwaukee Road with a 50 cent coach seat reservation on the GN's "incomparable" Empire Builder from Seattle to Spokane. I do not recall any difficulty with this. The Portland Terminal Railroad clerks were non-partisan masters of obscure sales in the pre-computer era.
The first leg of the trip was the familiar Portland to Seattle pool line (three railway companies sharing responsibilities). Union Pacific's pool contribution, Train 457, pulled out at 1l:07 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time, 37 minutes late. We had waited for Train 105, the Domeliner City of Portland from Chicago, due in at 10:00. The long streamliner had disgorged a sell-out crowd of diverted air travelers and regular vacation travelers; it took time to transfer baggage and steer connecting passengers to the right cars.
Typical UP coaches for the Pool at the Pullman Yard in Portland.
Despite the extra travel burden, my notes complimented UP for the cleanliness and good condition of the equipment. The scenery, though I had seen it before, was noted as appealing. My seatmate was a proletarian who was traveling to Seattle for a job hunt. He skipped lunch; his money, he said, should last a week. He was quiet and unpretentious, but articulate when speaking of friends in Seattle. We watched the haze-covered Sound panorama.
I had an hour in Seattle before the 4:00 p.m. departure of my train. I walked over from quiet Union Station into bedlam in King Street. The modern drop ceiling installed for the recent World's Fair traffic did not help. I went back upstairs and watched the old trolley coaches working their way through the off-kilter intersections where north and south street patterns failed to meet. The newsy at a corner stand was a character. He talked about our brave new world, "new angles, new ideas... yes, everybody has a new angle." I went back downstairs to board the Builder.
Settled in Seat 28 of Car 200, I watched the Afternoon International depart on time at 4:10 p.m. We followed it into the tunnel beneath downtown Seattle at 4:17 p.m. The conductor came along checking tickets.
"This is a Milwaukee Road ticket!" I explained and he looked it over, looked over the GN seat reservation, and then to my relief accepted the ticket. I was free to go up into the dome. Haze over the Olympics could not spoil the great view as we chased the International along the shoreline. I noted the attractive stations in Edmonds and Everett, and then we turned toward the wall of mountains.
Cows ignored our train as we clipped along toward Monroe. Motor route newspaper tubes at farm driveways showed that the Everett Herald carrier must have won the sales contests. And then, through Sultan, the mountains closed in. Houses, garages, buildings of all sorts here had steep pitched roofs. A recorded commentary filled us with information about the Cascade Tunnel ahead. It occurred to me that it would just be a big bore, so I made my way to the dining car. I was seated before we rumbled into the engineering masterpiece.
By the time we emerged into late afternoon shadows the waiter was serving the appetizer that I had selected. Pickled herring in a hotel silverplate "cocktail" cup was the start for a baked salmon dinner. By the time I tasted the crisp sweetness of apple pie it was dark.
I followed my father's advice and asked the brakeman to recommend a cheap hotel in Spokane. The suggestion came readily: the Hotel Couer d'Alene, a short walk from the GN station. For a few minutes I watched the switch engine working to combine the Seattle and Portland sections of the Builder, then headed out to discover Spokane.
Ducks quacking? Yes, the whole family was out for a late night paddle under the footbridge that led from the GN Station on Havermale Island to the mainland. I walked under the steel tangle of the Union Pacific's elevated line. Their Union Station had once also served the Spokane International (SI) connecting with the Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) and the CMStP&P, but now all was silent there.
No problem getting a room at the fraying-at-the-edges hotel. The $3.95 price was right. The high-ceiling room had two odd features. There were two sets of electrical outlets. It took a minute to remember that Spokane had one of the earliest downtown electrifications -- with Direct Current (DC). Alternating Current (AC) outlets had been retrofitted, but the DC outlets remained. The other problem attacked my nose when I opened the clothes closet. In it was a 4/5ths empty whiskey bottle, open. I was not going to have my clothes spending the night in that atmosphere, so tossed them over a chair.
Until 6:30 a.m. I slept soundly.
Coming next day, a trip to Paradise with the air passengers.
On July 8, 1966 the Machinists struck major United States airlines, including all of the major carriers in the Northwest. At the time, I was saving almost every penny for college expenses, but was planning to make a weekend rail excursion to places that I had never been. But trains were full of disgruntled travelers diverted from the airlines. I followed strike news closely, negotiations proceeded, and on Friday, August 19th, the strike came to a close. On Saturday, August 20th, I was at Portland's Union Station.
My plan was to use the Northwest Triangle ticket, a special fare for travel Portland > Seattle > Spokane > Portland or the reverse direction. The problem was that I wanted a daylight trip from Spokane to Portland through rugged Snake River landscapes and only the Union Pacific (UP) offered that. That was a problem because their partner in the Seattle > Spokane segment was the Milwaukee Road (CMStP&P), which no longer offered passenger service. An expert on rail tariffs had tipped me off to the agreement that the CMStP&P had made for their tickets to be honored on the Great Northern Railway (GN) between common points.
So, with hope of a settlement in the air strike rising, on Thursday the 18th I found myself buying a ticket on the Union Pacific / Milwaukee Road with a 50 cent coach seat reservation on the GN's "incomparable" Empire Builder from Seattle to Spokane. I do not recall any difficulty with this. The Portland Terminal Railroad clerks were non-partisan masters of obscure sales in the pre-computer era.
The first leg of the trip was the familiar Portland to Seattle pool line (three railway companies sharing responsibilities). Union Pacific's pool contribution, Train 457, pulled out at 1l:07 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time, 37 minutes late. We had waited for Train 105, the Domeliner City of Portland from Chicago, due in at 10:00. The long streamliner had disgorged a sell-out crowd of diverted air travelers and regular vacation travelers; it took time to transfer baggage and steer connecting passengers to the right cars.
Typical UP coaches for the Pool at the Pullman Yard in Portland.
Despite the extra travel burden, my notes complimented UP for the cleanliness and good condition of the equipment. The scenery, though I had seen it before, was noted as appealing. My seatmate was a proletarian who was traveling to Seattle for a job hunt. He skipped lunch; his money, he said, should last a week. He was quiet and unpretentious, but articulate when speaking of friends in Seattle. We watched the haze-covered Sound panorama.
I had an hour in Seattle before the 4:00 p.m. departure of my train. I walked over from quiet Union Station into bedlam in King Street. The modern drop ceiling installed for the recent World's Fair traffic did not help. I went back upstairs and watched the old trolley coaches working their way through the off-kilter intersections where north and south street patterns failed to meet. The newsy at a corner stand was a character. He talked about our brave new world, "new angles, new ideas... yes, everybody has a new angle." I went back downstairs to board the Builder.
Settled in Seat 28 of Car 200, I watched the Afternoon International depart on time at 4:10 p.m. We followed it into the tunnel beneath downtown Seattle at 4:17 p.m. The conductor came along checking tickets."This is a Milwaukee Road ticket!" I explained and he looked it over, looked over the GN seat reservation, and then to my relief accepted the ticket. I was free to go up into the dome. Haze over the Olympics could not spoil the great view as we chased the International along the shoreline. I noted the attractive stations in Edmonds and Everett, and then we turned toward the wall of mountains.
Cows ignored our train as we clipped along toward Monroe. Motor route newspaper tubes at farm driveways showed that the Everett Herald carrier must have won the sales contests. And then, through Sultan, the mountains closed in. Houses, garages, buildings of all sorts here had steep pitched roofs. A recorded commentary filled us with information about the Cascade Tunnel ahead. It occurred to me that it would just be a big bore, so I made my way to the dining car. I was seated before we rumbled into the engineering masterpiece.
By the time we emerged into late afternoon shadows the waiter was serving the appetizer that I had selected. Pickled herring in a hotel silverplate "cocktail" cup was the start for a baked salmon dinner. By the time I tasted the crisp sweetness of apple pie it was dark.
I followed my father's advice and asked the brakeman to recommend a cheap hotel in Spokane. The suggestion came readily: the Hotel Couer d'Alene, a short walk from the GN station. For a few minutes I watched the switch engine working to combine the Seattle and Portland sections of the Builder, then headed out to discover Spokane.
Ducks quacking? Yes, the whole family was out for a late night paddle under the footbridge that led from the GN Station on Havermale Island to the mainland. I walked under the steel tangle of the Union Pacific's elevated line. Their Union Station had once also served the Spokane International (SI) connecting with the Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) and the CMStP&P, but now all was silent there.
No problem getting a room at the fraying-at-the-edges hotel. The $3.95 price was right. The high-ceiling room had two odd features. There were two sets of electrical outlets. It took a minute to remember that Spokane had one of the earliest downtown electrifications -- with Direct Current (DC). Alternating Current (AC) outlets had been retrofitted, but the DC outlets remained. The other problem attacked my nose when I opened the clothes closet. In it was a 4/5ths empty whiskey bottle, open. I was not going to have my clothes spending the night in that atmosphere, so tossed them over a chair.
Until 6:30 a.m. I slept soundly.
Coming next day, a trip to Paradise with the air passengers.
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