WHO REMEMBERS RAILWAY EXPRESS?

At the small town depots that I worked at, I was the freight agent, ticket agent, Railway Express agent, and Western Union agent; four accounts and most of them never had much cash in them. When making change, it was a case of borrowing from Peter to pay Paul.

WU was a PITA; you got 10 percent of what cash you took in, and most telegrams were sent collect and received prepaid; ergo no cash and 10 percent of zero is not much cash.

Railway Express was 10 percent of inbound and outbound, whether collect or prepaid; a much better deal. The express shipments were handled by the baggage car. Our branch line had an up one day and back the next so there was little express there; when there was something, it would be in the LCL (less than carload lot) car.

Yes, I remember Railway Express.

Art

Bullet Bob, the small stations were only open during the day, 6 days a week, so night letters were really not an option. I was never on the Western Union payroll; I was led to believe that the terrible 'rate of pay' was negotiated by the ORT (Order of Railroad Telegraphers) and WU.

At Summit, near Chicago, there was a quite large Spanish community. Copying a telegram in Spanish (I had 3 years of Latin but no Spanish at that time) was really more like copying code, except the spacing was sure not uniform.

Art

To add to Richard Smith's Air Farce posting, I think it was the Readers Digest that ran the following:
Mr. Jones has been promoted to a detective on the Police Farce.

Mr. Jones wrote to the paper and demanded a correction. They obliged. 'We regret the error. Mr. Jones is a defective on the Police Force'.

My brother was in the US Army Air Force during WWII; at times I have my worries.

Art