Nostalgia & History > The 12:00 whistle

A concurrent thread featuring photos of the Milwaukee Roads huge shop facilities in West Milwaukee brings back memories of my growing up in South Minneapolis, a mile or so from another Milwaukeee Road yard and shop facility.  Not as large as the West Milwaukee shops, but nevertheless large and capable of doing any type of work on steam locomotives and rolling stock.

From my earliest memories until I was through high school I recall that there was a large steam plant associated with the shops that supplied heat and power to the shops, and even to heat the Milwaukees coach yard, passenger station and freight house in downtown Minneapolis up to two miles from the the steam plant via an underground steam pipe.  In winter, one could easily trace the pipes route, as the snow would melt showing bare ground.  Must have been terribly inefficient!.

At exactly noon every day, and probably at other times as well (crew shift changes and breaks?), a large whistle atop the steam plant sounded and could be heard for miles.  I remember the 5:00 whistle - it reminded us kids playing ball in the schoolyard that we should head home for dinner.

I've always wondered if that whistle was on some sort of mechanical timer (a steam powered clock?), or whether some persons job description included pulling the cord.

-LD



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/04/21 08:19 by LarryDoyle.

Good memories!  I grew up close to several places with whistles back in the 40s-50s.
Frisco's Lindenwood roundhouse would blow at shift changes and would blow to call out the derrick/wrecking outfit.  So many blows for main line, for River Division and the yards.
Laclede Gas had a shift whiste, Tretolite chemicals had one,Mississippi Valley steel and we could hear the one from Scullin Steel Foundry.  There were a couple in the distance that I never knew who they were.
Happier days for me since the MP and Frisco both still ran steam and the music was great when the Frisco was uphill from the yard of the MP was running for Kirkwood Hill.

When I worked at Albina for the U.P. during the 60's, they still had a "hand blown" steam whistle in the boiler/powerhouse! It was blown for every shift and for lunch and even if occasional emergencies arose. I was told it came off of a steamboat that used to run up and down the Columbia River.

Last time I was in San Bernardino, Santa Fe's shop whistle was still sounded at noon.

2-10-2 Wrote:
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> Last time I was in San Bernardino, Santa Fe's shop
> whistle was still sounded at noon.

Yep, working on air now but it still blows.

Back in the 1970s, 1980s a large quarry near me would blow the noon and 5pm whistle.   That ended some time in the late 1980s.   The fire alarm in a neighboring town still get tested at 5pm daily though.

Here is an audio clip of steam locoomotives moving around the ICRR shops at Paducah, KY. As the clip ends the noon lunch whistle blows.
It was recorded by William Steventon of the Railroad Record Club but itwas never included on any of his records. It's a nice bit of railroad audio history.
Enjoy,
Ken Gear

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PHall Wrote:
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> 2-10-2 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Last time I was in San Bernardino, Santa Fe's
> shop
> > whistle was still sounded at noon.
>
> Yep, working on air now but it still blows.

About 2014 as an exterminator, I could hear that whistle faintly at noon all the way in Highland in the right conditions, reminded me how much work I still had left to do!

But it also reminded me how whole towns would be employed by the railroads, and how many folks lives or schedules depended on those big whistles.

One day in 2014 or so, I was driving right by that whistle off Mt.Vernon Ave, my windows were down, and it was very Startling how damn loud that thing really is!

Jim Baker
Riverside, CA

I don't know if this was for a steam whistle, but this was at the WM shop facility in Hagerstown MD,  taken 8/30/82.

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Sounded pretty good. I think they probably didn't drain it as it sounded like it was gurgling in the very beginning.

Many small towns had a noon whistle at a major local business. We used to blow the volunteer fire whistle at noon in Mojave in the 1950s.

Bill Deaver
Tehachapi, CA

Bloch Brothers Tobacco in Wheeling, WV still blows the noon and 12:30 whistles. A lot of the steel mills used to join them.

Once upon a long-ago time, coal mines blew a long whistle after day shift to signal there would be work the next day.

Rebecca Morgan
Jacobsburg, OH

My hometown still blows the fire whistle at 7-12-13:00 and 18:00. They quit blowing it for fires about 20 years ago.

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