Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 January 1911 — Locomotive “Conversation.” [ARTICLE]

Locomotive “Conversation.”

Tbq way locomotives “talk” is after this fashion; If the trainman should hear two long blasts from the whistle he would know it was a request for the releasing of the air brakes and that everything ahead was all right. Four short blasts of about a quarter of a second each would be instructions to the rear brakeman to go back with a red flag and protect his train from collision. Something had happened ahead which required holding it up. While the flagman is making haste to the rear he hears four long toots of the whistle, the engine telling him that the tracks have been cleared and that he is to return to the train as fast as his legs can carry him. If a train on approaching a signal finds it at danger the engineer cornea to a stop, and after waiting a reasonabel time for orders to proceed, which do not come, he gives four short snorts of the whistle, which immediately arrests the attention of the towermen or those who have in charge the particular signal that is holding the train up. Sometimes an engineer will become Impatient and the first four blasts will be followed by four others with only a few seconds intervening. He does not see why he should be kept waiting and manifests this impression by way of the whistle. Three long whistles, when the train la under way, fell the trainmen that a draw bar has pulled out or that a coupling has given way and that the train has been cut in two. This calls for hasty and careful attention, as all kinds of trouble threaten when this class of accident happens. If the first section is stopped too suddenly the rear one is liable to crash into it and strew the tracks with wreckage. Hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of property is destroyed every year because of the parting of trains.