Nostalgia & History > SP

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Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 02/11/15 06:04 by drumwrencher.

drumwrencher Wrote:
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> Okay, last for tonite. I thought some of you SP
> folks might get a kick out of some of this old
> stuff.
>
> 1: SP Trip Pass books, Bay Area
>
> 2: The back side. Did the SP really ever care
> about passenger convenience?! Back then, maybe...

Yes, SP put it's best foot forward trying to attract and keep customers until around the mid-1950's.

That $163.02 was pretty darn good money for a "half" in 1946. This illustrates what ultimately kept most of us foamers working for the railroad after much of the glamor of the job had worn off. I remember the San Francisco Freight Brakeman Extra Board in the late 1970's a having a "guarantee" (guaranteed earnings) of $1618/mo. I could barely comprehend that much money (and that I was actually making well over two grand), especially since I had, a few years before, been managing a hobby shop for $6.50/hour. The money is what kept me interested in the job on all of those long nights that I fought to stay awake while working in crappy, filthy conditions - being a foamer was not nearly enough for me, though I wish that it had been.


-E.O.