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The Pan American
For the U.S. passenger train, one era ends but another begins.
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Final Pan at Mobile, crew waving farewell |
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Frank O Lavernge, April 1970 |
On Friday afternoon, April 30, L&N's Pan- American-and dozens of
well-known "name" passenger trains of our nation's other
railroads- departed from their respective terminii for the last times. The
next day, May 1, new Amtrak streamliners of the National Railroad
Passenger Corporation made their bow on 21 intercity and long-distance
routes across the nation. A century-plus era of passenger service by
individual American railroads thus ended. But the inaugural runs of the
Amtrak trains signaled the dawn of a new era, with promise of brighter
days for U. S. rail passenger service. That service in L&N Land could
be said to have had its genesis with two small predecessor railroads, the
Pontchartrain and the Lexington & Ohio. Both roads were chartered in
1830 (rivaling each other as "first west of the Alleghenies"),
and both offered passenger service of sorts by the mid- 1830's over their
respective routes out of New Orleans and Lexing- ton, Ky. Another L&N-Land
pioneer was the State Oeorgia's Western & Atlantic, which was surveyed
1837. By the mid-l9th Century, the W&A was run- fling through
passenger trains over its newly Com pleted line from Atlanta to
Chattanooga; Just four years later, the Nashville & Chattanooga
dispatched its first passenger runs from the Tennessee capital to Lookout
Mountain and a connection with the W of A in downtown Chattanooga. Even
before its main line to Nashville was completed pleted, the L&N
provided a kind of passenger service first to Elizabethtown, then
progressively southward to "end of track," with stage coaches
taking passengers around the uncompleted gaps in trackage! Inaugural
passenger service between L&N's namesake cities began November 1,
1859, and our rail road's first public timetable advertised two trains
making the 185-mile trip each way in about nine hours. Then-on the eve of
the Civil War in April 1861-a Louisville-Memphis passenger service was
created. L&N trains from the main line at Bowling Green connected at
Guthrie, Ky., with the recently finished Memphis, Clarksville &
Louisville, which, in turn, joined the Memphis & Ohio at Paris, Teun.
These new rail services offered obvious advantages to travelers in speed,
convenience and dependability over competing stage lines and steamboats.
The nine- hour Louisville-Nashville schedules were three times faster than
those of the stages which took 27 hours for the one-way trip. Ads in 1861
Memphis news- papers declared that running times to Louisville- about 28
hours over the "new lines"-bettered the best river-packet times
between the cifies by 50 hours! Qf course, on-train amenities offered the
passen- gers in the 1860's and 1870's were spartan. Generous quantities of
soot and cinders showered in through open windows, and dining service was
virtually non- existent, except for whatever "vittles" the hardy
traveler could carry himself, or bolt down at in- frequent meal stops!
However, sleeping-car service was introduced on the L&N as early as
1869, when Rip Van Winkle palace sleepers began running out of Louisville
to Nashville and Memphis. With L&N's growth as a major
Southeast-region cairier m the 1880's and 1890's, our passenger ser- vice
was greatly improved. L&N introduced long- distance "name"
trains, featuring equipment which gave patrons much more comfort and
safety in travel than ever before. And railroads all across America were
fast becoming the prime movers of both passen- gers and freight. The
through-car~service of the L&N," proclaimed timetables of that
period, "is unsurpassed by any line in the South. Sleepers are the
latest-model Pullman vestibuled buffet cars, and coaches are equipped with
all modern improvements." By the late 1880's, two solid through
passenger trains steamed daily between New Orleans and Cincinnati.
Meanwhile, with completion of the Henderson Bridge across the Ohio River
in 1885 and standardiza tion of track gauges in 1886, the L&N started
a St. Louis-Nashville sleeping-car line. That was followed in 1892 by a
Nashville-Jacksonville, Fla., through sleeper, promoted by Major W. L.
Danley, NC&StL; general passenger agent, as The Dixie Flyer. A com-
panion Nashville-Atlanta sleeper became The Quick- step. Success of those
services and the Florida resort boom led to a long-distance winter-season
train, launched by the L&N, the NC&StL and the C&EI in
December 1901. Called The Chicago-and-Florida Limited, the new train
became the first of a succession of superbly equipped and elegantly
decorated name trains to link the Midwest with beaches and resorts in the
Sunshine State. Year-round Midwest-to-Florida travel was further spurred
in 1908 when the C&EI, L&N and NC expanded the already popular
Dixie Flyer sleeper into a solid train, then ran it straight through daily
from the Windy City to Jacksonville. In 1910, on L&N's Cincinnati-Gulf
Coast main line, the New Orleans Limited became the premiere train over
that route. With the 1900's also came heavier, steel coaches and Pullmans,
steam vapor heating, electric lights, lounge and dining cars. (L&N's
first three diners went into service in 1901.) The zenith of passenger
service on America's rail- roads was reached in the 1920's. Rail travel
was "it" in the jazz era, and more people rode the crack
limiteds and expresses than ever before . . . or since. In 1921, over one
billion passengers were carried by the railoads, a record which was never
surpassed. Even so, in that busy, hectic decade, our industry began to
feel pinches from auto, bus and air competi- tion. The "passenger
problem" began to be mentioned with more frequency in rail
publications, including this magazine. L&N's most celebrated passenger
train, The Pan- American, was born in the 1920's. Inaugurated on December
5, 1921, the Pan was an immediate success, so a Memphis connection was
soon added. Then, in May 1925, the Pan became all-Pullman, with new cars
ordered especially for her consist and power- ful new locomotives
(delivered in 1926) to speed her over the hillier divisions of the
railroad. The Pan created an unforgettable saga, with on- train radio sets
and valet service in the '20's; air conditioning throughout in the '30's,
and more new equipment; the famed WSM trackside broadcast. Bwtween 1933 to
1945; and a dining-car cuisine which got rave notices from leading
gourmets. Perhaps the late, great country singer Hank Williams best summed
up the affection for our flagship train when he sang: "I've heard
your stories about your fast trains But now i'll tell you about one....
She's the Beauty of the Southland! Listen to that whistle scream It's the
Pan-American On her way to New Orleans!" Above and beyond the call of
duty. . How begin to term the role of the L&N, NC&StL, C&EI
our sister carriers in moving unprecedented numbers of military and
civilian passengers during World War Two In 1939, L&N trains carried
about 3.2 million pas- sengers; by 1944, our passenger traffic volume had
swollen to 12.4 million travelers. Extra cars on regular trains and
frequent "second sections" helped move troops and other
travelers. Extra seats and tables were added in diners to increase their
capacities, maximum utilization was made of all passenger equip- ment and
motive power. Included were 16 diesil electric locomotives, delivered in
1942, to wheel Pan Americans, Southlands and Dixie Limiteds lengthened far
beyond their normal consists by war-time traffic And great credit must go
to the tireless efforts over long hours given by train and dining-car
crews,porters, MOS 'N ANDY" AT 60 MPH-Lounge-car radios (complete
with individual headsets) ollered thrilled travelers on ? Pan tv~th their
favorite radio shows in the 1920's. Photo was reproduced from magazine
page. agents, and hosts of other employees who height- ghted L&N's
notable contributions in support of America's war effort. The age of the
streamliners dawned in L&N Land, in December 1940, with two
Midwest-Florida coach speedsters, the South Wind and Dixie Flagler More
streamliners undoubtedly would have followed had not the war curtailed
production of locmotives and passenger cars. In the immediate post war ~
years (1946-1950), new trains did come: the Humming Bird, from Cincinnati
to New Orleans; the Georgian, first operating from St. Louis to Atlanta,
then becoming a Chicago-Atlanta overnight train (via C&EI-L&N-NC&StL)
with a St. Louis section; the City of Memphis, NC&StL's bid for
Nashville-Memphis travel; and the C&EI's Whippoorwill dayliner,
between Chicago and Evansville. 'The fast overnight Gulf Wind made its
debut on its Jacksonville-Pensacola-New Orleans route in 1949. Late that
same year the famed Crescent (which used L&N rails on the
Montgomery-New Orleans portion of its run from New York) received new
~~stainless-steel R.P.O's, coaches, Pullmans, and solarium-observation
cars. A fleet of stremilined reclining-seat coaches and sleepers (the
named after various types of Pines) purchased the mid- 1950's further
augmented our new trains and services introduced in the post-World War two
years Interstate Commerce Commission figures show that between 1945 and
'1958, American rail- roads and the Pullman Company spent more than $1.3
billion for new passenger locomotives and cars. Further, the railroads'
postwar bid for passengers with new trains was matched by faster
schedules, attractive reduced-fare schemes, stepped-up advertis- ing, new
stations, and many other innovations. Total expenditures for these
improvements-including the new motive power and equipment-were borne en-
tirely by the railroads themselves. By the late 1950's and early 1960's,
competition from automobiles, airlines and buses began to cut deeply into
rail passenger traffic. Growing subsidies from all levels of government
went toward new and improved highway systems and airports. The rails'
share of intercity passenger travel, as high as 73 per- cent during World
War II, fell below 30 percent after 1960. In 1946, L&N passenger-miles
traveled totaled 1.3 billion. By 1966, they had declined 85 percent to 203
million miles! There followed a very necessary reduction of pas- senger
services by railroads, the L&N included, as little-patronized locals
and branch4ine trains were dropped and other runs were consolidated to
provide essential service over principal routes. Regarding charges of
down-grading trains which were leveled at railroads after such service
reductions, President Kendall responded vigorously. This maga- zine
carried his remarks. Mr. Kendall pointed out that, with a diminishing
patronage, railroads were forced to take steps to reduce some services to
offset revenue A,' 1 losses while continuing enough service to accommo-
date remaining passengers. The public-he added- tends to overlook what
railroads actually did do to woo patronage hefore they had to initiate
service reductions. The shift of much mail and express traffic from
passenger trains to other modes in the 1950's and 1960's also hurt the
overall rail passenger picture. Further thrusts of subsidized highway and
air com- petition brought the railroads' share of intercity travel to
under 10 percent by the late 1960's. Those factors, plus mounting deficits
which cut deeply into overall revenues for all lines with pas- senger
services, led to creation last year of the Na- tional Railroad Passenger
Corporation. The Amtrak trains, launched on May 1, followed. Under the
Con- gressional Act which set up NRPC, railroads which joined the
corporation were then permitted to dis- continue (on April 30) all
non-revenue-producing passenger trains and/or those trains not designated
in the overall Amtrak system. As we bid farewell to the Pan and other
well-known trains, recognition surely must go to countless L&N; men
and women, living and deceased, who, over the years, gave life and purpose
to our passenger service. Over telephones, ticket and baggage counters, on
trains~ in dining cars and sleepers and in many other places little
observed by the public, these employees served our patrons ably and well
and caused praise to be heaped on L&N train travel. On April 30, 1971,
the Pan-American, the Geor- gian, Gulf Wind and many other great trains
high- balled into history. But in their wake roll the stream- liners of
Amtrak. Railroaders everywhere wish them well as they introduce a new age
of rail transportation. photo credits SO LONG, PAN-No. 8's crew wave
goodbyes as they bring famed flyer into Mobile April 30 for last time.
From top left: Engineer W. E. Harper, Fireman Melvin Maize; Trainman
Robert Christen; and Conductor C. B. Greene I SERVICE WITH
SMILE-Dedicatzon of Sleeping-Car Porter Frank 0. LaVigne made on L&N
exce'ptional.
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