Nostalgia & History > 1930 Question for Passenger Train Experts

I was bidding on a dining car menu on eBay for a November 1930 convention move of the Radiological Society of North America from Chicago to Los Angeles.  The menu was jointly marked Milwaukee Road and Rock Island.  How do you think those two roads would have handled that train and routing?  What kind of equipment?  I am not assuming anything at this point would like to hear from the experts.

Thanks

Jim Wilson

My guess would be:

Milwaukee, Chicago to Kansas City
Rock Island, Kansas City to Tucumcari
Southern Pacific, Tucumcari to Los Angeles

For a convention of doctors it would probably be all Pullman (probably 12-1 sleepers), along with a diner and a lounge.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/10/17 09:28 by BobB.

That routing sounds good to me.  Could have started up state in Michigan/ Wisconsin or even St Paul.

Another route could have been the Rock via Denver,  then  SFE to LA, or via Salt Lake & UP  or even via San Francisco.

Being Doctors, would think a lot of all room cars would have been used, such a 6-3  or  7-2.  Those were compartment & drawing room cars.  But yes in the time period, 12-1's would have been used.

Conventions were very competitive among the railroads and that's one reason they had such a large group of passenger representatives all around the US, to grab that business.  I recall two in the 1960's.  In order to get a University in Iowa to the Rose Bowel,  CB&Q said we will provide a dome on each train.  For another one on the Santa Fe, we will give you all diesel power, no steam.

With the coming of the large jets, this all came to an end.
 

Maybe the Milwaukee supplied the equipment and the Rock the routing?

Chicago to KC line was a joint Milwaukee/Rock route, so can't really come up with any reasonable Milwaukee route that didn't have an equal or better Rock route.