Nostalgia & History > Crossing Bells and Manual Gates

Early last month there was a discussion about bells on crossing signals. Well, before automatic crossing signals there were crossing guards, hand rung bells and manually operated gates. The one that I remember best was near my home in St. Louis. It was located where the Missouri Pacific, Oak Hill line crossed Shaw Ave. The small guard house was mounted about 15 to 20 feet in the air. When a train was approaching, the guard would ring the bell, then lower the gates using a pneumatic or hydraulic system and a pump mechanism in the guard house. When the train had passed he would change some valves and pump the gates to the open position.

Something that I had not thought about at the time, I was only 8, is if he signaled the train crew in some way when the gates were down and the crossing was clear. Does anyone know if guards in locations such as this did in fact signal the train? It may have been as simple as a hand or lantern signal.

That particular crossing had 3 or 4 tracks. Two tracks were mainline, and the rest were industry lead tracks.

Ron Zimmer

The crossing watchman were usually a guy that had been hurt elsewhere and it was the only job he could do. He had a buzzer that would announce a train and he would do his thing. Later when the equipment became available for automatic gates, those positions were retired.


Nudge

That's exactly how I remember it. In around 1951 my folks would visit friends in Lockport, Il. The G M & O Abraham Lincoln would come flying through in the afternoon heading for Chicago. My dad would give me a cigar to give to the guy in the gate house so I could go up there. After awhile a bell would ring and all hell would break loose as he did gates and flashers at a half dozen crossings. Then came the rumble, whistle, vibration and dust. It was all so exciting, and I couldn't wait until our next visit.

How long did it take to drop the gates at 6 crossings? How many trains a day did these "manned" lines see?

Todd Clark
Canyon Country, CA
Trainorders.com

webmaster Wrote:
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> How long did it take to drop the gates at 6
> crossings? How many trains a day did these
> "manned" lines see?

Todd and All-
I grew up in Oakland, CA in a Southern Pacific family as most of you know---
Just a few blocks from my house was the "Fruitvale Station" also referred to as "Fruitvale Junction"... At this same location was the big Fruitvale Interlocking Tower---

FOUR(4) mainline SP tracks... WB Main, EB Main, WB Electric,
EB Electric... Sidings and set-out tracks... A WYE.. controlling Steam and Electric trains from West Oakland or San Leandro/San Jose, to and from Alameda, CA.

Up until 1936, there was also the double-track mainline of the "California Railway" (electric) which stub-ended at Fruitvale Avenue and which had crossovers for Interchanging with the TWO electric IER tracks in the vicinity of 39th Avenue, just South of Fruitvale.

The GATES at Fruitvale were MANUALLY-operated for many years. There was a large bell (gong) on the outside wall of the Tower facing the street. When a train was annunciated on the model board and came within range, the Towerman would operate a dpst knife switch under the front edge of the Interlocking machine to lower the gates. However, he pushed a button to operate the gong several times to get cars to stop, before lowering the gates.

The next grade crossing North of Fruitvale was 29th Avenue and the Del Monte Cannery traffic. Those gates/wig-wags protected SP and parallel WP and were automatic.

The next grade crossing North of 29th Avenue was 23rd Avenue.
The site I have spoken about many times in past years--one of the largest installation of GATES in the entire State and maybe more.
They were vehicular gates and pedestrian gates. It was a diaganol grade crossing by the old California Cotton Mills building where some four misc streets joined together and then crossed FIVE tracks of the SP and ONE track of the WP.
All of the various gates were MANUALLY controlled by the Towerman in the "23rd Avenue Tower"... That was the sole purpose of that Tower for many, many years. To operate this large cluster of gates.

One of the well-known local rails who has visited T.O. before stated, "that at night, when operated, the whole area appeared to be a Martian Landing in progress" ...

Hope this info is helpful to GATE fanciers!

KRK

Wow, this brings it back.
I grew up in Maplewood, MO which is a suburb of St. Louis. The MP ran through Maplewood and had two crossings there, Sutton Ave, and Big Bend and was protected by an elevated crossing tower at Big Bend. I used to hang out up in the tower and like was said, a bell would announce the approach of a train, the watchman would ring the bell outside the tower and pump the gates down, then up after the train cleared. MP had a ground level shanty at Southwest and Ecoff Avenues, which were east of Maplewood.
Wish I could plug in a USB cable and download all the memories, sights and sounds from my feeble brain.

I recall in the mid 1950's or a bit earlier seeing a similar elevated tower erected on twin I-beams on the east side of Main St. and just south of the mainline in Hutchinson, KS on the Rock Island. I don't recall ever seeing the action of any gate arms if there even were such at the time, but I imagine this was a crossing guard shack from earlier years. This was the only one I recall ever seeing on the Rock Island in Southwest Kansas. Thanks for the presentations, as I recall seeing pictures of such in rail magazines of the past.

Does this bring back some memories.

I grew up in Cincinnati and recall a rail crossing somewhere parallel to Spring Grove Avenue near the Procter & Gamble Ivorydale plant. Possibly at Mitchell Avenue. There was a small shack at ground level next to the grade crossing. When a train came along (there were a lot of tracks and a lot of rail traffic), a grizzly looking old man would come out and stop traffic with a stop sign on a staff. I do not recall any sort of gates or bells and I think there was a shack on only one side of the crossing. This was in the early 1950's when I was just a little kid and it was all automated long before I started driving in 1964.

My great grandfather put the gates up and down on the PRR in Spring City, PA. Got an old B/W photo of him and his shanty. Never actually saw him or the gates. Photo dated 1921. Always wondered how these employees knew when a train was coming. Looks like double track. Aaron 20

In my hometown of Whiting, IN, there were crossing tenders or watchmen who would lower the gates and then go out and swing a kerosene lantern to warn traffic. I seem to recall that even after the crossing gates were automated the crossing tenders were still there with the lanterns. Perhaps it was an interim solution prior to their retirement or move to another job. However, that was a long time ago -- I was young and not all that attentive to such things.

I recall a location (East Warwick, Rhode Island?) in the late 60's or early 1970's. I was a young kid and our family was visiting one of my dad's army buddies.

Anyway, my dad's buddy's mom knew the time the passenger trains came through (this was former New Haven I think) and she took me down where the gateman had a ground level crossing shanty but with crank gates! I saw a PC passsenger train come through with black E units. I took a photo of that with the train, crossing gates and gateman but alas the photo and negative got away. I hate it when that happens! :(

I kept begging Rob's mom to take me back and see another train. I said something like, "Didn't you say there was another train at such and such time"? And she remarked that no I had the wrong time but took me anyway. Guess what? I had the wrong time and there was no train. She was not amused. LOL

She had also told me before the first train that there was a RR bridge nearby. I had visions of the huge Hell Gate bridge! It turned out be a small masonry structure. LOL Oh youth.

In Indiana we had two crossing watchman at Peru, Indiana well into the 70's that used stop signs.