Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 298, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 December 1914 — EARLIEST RAILWAY TICKETS. [ARTICLE]

EARLIEST RAILWAY TICKETS.

Old System Was in Line With the General Service Then Existing. The earliest railway tickets differs, entirely from those now in use. T'nbooking clerk was furnished with. a volume, the pages of which were di vlded down the center by a perform ated line, the outside half of each page was again divided into slip.' about four inches long by an Inch and three-quarters in width, on each of which was printed the name of t b r issuing station; spaces were proviJ r’ in which the clerk had to write thdestination, passenger** name, d n of issue and the time the train wa due to start. One of these slips, dnh filled in, was detatched from the bo~ and handed over to each would-b passenger in exchange for his farThe traveler, having thus obtained h i ticket, was passed on to the guard c the train by which he desired to trav el. This pfflcial was provided witly kind of waybill, on which he enter particulars of all his passengers t mttch the same way that a parcel i served nowadays. Incidentally, th similarity of treatment did not alwav end there; the third-class passengnhad to travel in an open .carriage, f? quently nothing more than a good truck attached to a train which ca' ried both passengers and goods, mor or less indiscriminately. ’ j ■ Cypress water tanks have bee; known to defy decay for more than i quarter of a century.