Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 38, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 March 1906 — About the Monon’s Fast Trains. [ARTICLE]

About the Monon’s Fast Trains.

Last Saturday, evening’s Indianapolis News has an extended article about the various speed wars now in progress between different railroads, but pays special attention to that between the Monon the Big Four and the Pennsylvania, for Chicago and Cincinnati business. It seems that in this battle the Monon has the hardest row to hoe, because tne line of its Ciucin-. nati connection, the C. H. & D., is longer than the other lines and the Monon has to make it up by fast running between Chicago and IndL anapolis. The News writer predicts that the speed war has only -just started, and that, the time of four noure and fifty minutes now made by the Monon between these two cities will soon be reduced to four hours flat. 7 After describing the speed made across Indiana by the Lake Shore and Pennsylvania fast trains between New York and Chicago, two of the Monon’s fast trains are thus described:

The one other train that coiHW nearest making this time in Indiana is probably the Monon’s flyer, which leaves Chicago at noon and arrives in Indianapolis at 4:52 in the afternoon. The run from station to station—a distance of 184 miles—averages only about 37 i miles an hour, but the remarkable action of this racer is found in its performance in the 162 miles beHammond and the Massachusetts-avenue station, in Indianapolis. By ordinance, the compapy is required to use fifty minutes in clearing the twenty-two miles it runs through Chicago. At S6uth Hammond the large racing engine is put on the train and the rush for Indianapolis begins. Making allowance for the eleven stops in the‘l62 miles; this train averages 49.2 miles an hour. In entering Indianapolis there is another great loss of time —ten minutes, part of which is taken up in turning the train and backing it into the station. One oi the most sensational runs in Indiana is that of the Monon C. H. & D. newspaper mail train, which leaves Chicago at 2:45 in the morning and arrives in Indianapolis at 7:50. This flyer reels through the night like a drunken sailor, but is as safe and easy as a baby’s swaying cradle. This space annihilator, thundering through the night produces a weird effect and a sight of her rushing along in the gray of the morning is awe-inspir-ing. Many sections of the track have to be covered at a speed between seventy-five and eighty-five miles an hour. It was the popularity of the Monon train between Chicago and Indianapolis that caused the Big Four to open the present speed war from Chicago to Indianapolis and Cincinnati.