Gremlins Ride the Rails

Up & down the U.S., ice, snow, winds and subzero temperatures last week slowed the greatest long-distance movement of holiday travelers on record. Rail-riding Gremlins (who were harrying railroad operations long before the Wright brothers ever flew) were out in force. They clogged switches with snow, short-circuited signal lights, froze steam connecting lines between cars, iced the rails on steep grades, drank all the coffee in dining cars. Morning after morning the swank Twentieth Century Limited slid into Manhattan two to four hours late. On many another train, four to 13 hours late, passengers stood in vestibules, slept in aisles, heaped baggage and bundles to roof tops.

Added trouble for the railroads was the new high volume of Christmas mail.

Trains waited at way stations five to 20 minutes while mountains of mail sacks, tons of parcel post were transferred on windswept platforms. At some stations mail loads were 75% greater than last year. Meanwhile the heroic railroads kept a firm grip on the vital flow of war freight moving to the dark, silent ships at icy ports, switched the daily average of 6,000 carloads of supplies to U.S. camps and plants.

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