i remember when......

apparently the ppc on the cs will be gone for at least 4 months after the first of the year. if it doesn't come back those of us who have enjoyed it will be able to say "i remember when". what are some of your favorite "i remember when" amtrak memories. i will start by remembering 8 or 9 years ago on the eb when there were train specific menus for the eb different both east and westbound. not to mention the hot big fresh chocolate chip cookies the sleeper attendant would bring around about 8 in the evening. or the shrimp and grits and crawfish ettouffee on the crescent. or reading the local papers slid under the door of our room in the morning. little stuff i guess but memorable

I remember riding it on the way home from a SP4449/SP&S700 excursion to Wishram, not sure the year. We went down stairs in the Parlor Car to watch the movie which was Cast Away with Tom Hanks. He's a Fed Ex employee marooned in the Pacific ocean when a Fed Ex plane hits some bad weather and goes down. Just at the part where the airplane was shaking violently and about to crash we hit some very bad track and were shaken up pretty badly ourselves. I dubbed it Shake-a-Vision.

My first sleeper experience was on Amtrak from NYP to TPA in a slumbercoach. And the buffet cars for meals that were used on the Silvers!

I remember when the CL had domes, the Broadway had slumbercoachs and you could smoke in the lounge and sleepers.

Just in the short 6 years I've been experiencing Amtrak, I have seen a few changes. Newspaper in the morning, Chocolates on your pillow at night, flowers on the Dinning Tables, ice by the coffee machine, but most of all - PRICES OF SLEEPERS!!!! My 1st trip was STP-WAS-CHI-SEA-SAC-CHI-WAS-STP for $2,200! But to this day, Amtrak's Magic Carpet Ride is my favorite way to travel!!! :hi:

I remember when the CONO had Bourbon Pecan Pie to go with the Cajun Specialties served in the Diner, the Slumber Coach on the Crescent that allowed for sleeping in an Affordable Lay flat bed on the Overnight Trip from WAS to ATL and having a Southern Style Breakfast in the Diner that included Virginia Ham and Grits and Real Coffee served in a China Cup!

Also I remember the Dome Cars on various Routes and most of all when made Connections between On Time Trains were a Regulr feature of LD Travel on Amtrak!

Also riding on the Metroliners on the NEC between WAS and NYP in style when it was THE way to go over flying on the Eastern Shuttle! They were more comfortable than the New Acelas that replaced them!!

Rail Freak said:

Just in the short 6 years I've been experiencing Amtrak, I have seen a few changes. Newspaper in the morning, Chocolates on your pillow at night, flowers on the Dinning Tables, ice by the coffee machine, but most of all - PRICES OF SLEEPERS!!!! My 1st trip was STP-WAS-CHI-SEA-SAC-CHI-WAS-STP for $2,200! But to this day, Amtrak's Magic Carpet Ride is my favorite way to travel!!! :hi:

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I remember when Hubby and I met YOU in the PPC on our way from LAX hoime to Oregon, and you told us about AU! Thanks!

:giggle: :hi:

And even if they get rid of all the amenities, Amtrak still beats a bus or a plane. But I will remember them quite wistfully...

oregon pioneer said:

Rail Freak said:

Just in the short 6 years I've been experiencing Amtrak, I have seen a few changes. Newspaper in the morning, Chocolates on your pillow at night, flowers on the Dinning Tables, ice by the coffee machine, but most of all - PRICES OF SLEEPERS!!!! My 1st trip was STP-WAS-CHI-SEA-SAC-CHI-WAS-STP for $2,200! But to this day, Amtrak's Magic Carpet Ride is my favorite way to travel!!! :hi:

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I remember when Hubby and I met YOU in the PPC on our way from LAX hoime to Oregon, and you told us about AU! Thanks!

:giggle: :hi:

And even if they get rid of all the amenities, Amtrak still beats a bus or a plane. But I will remember them quite wistfully...

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Let's make it a point to meet up again, soon!!! (Maybe GSC in August?!?)

And My Thanx to AU, this site has been so incredibly valuble over the years!!!! I'm still trying to figure out how I'm gonna steal Dave's Penthouse Suite!!! :giggle:

RF

When I could order real pan fried chicken in the dining car with real mashed potatoes and pan gravy. Strawberry shortcake was included in the price.

yarrow said:

not to mention the hot big fresh chocolate chip cookies the sleeper attendant would bring around about 8 in the evening.

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+1

And I'll add, I remember when I got to read the morning paper, on an overnight LD train.

My first Amtrak Long Distance was from Chicago to Norman on the Lone Star in 1974 when I was a lad of 15. I still remember Car 1514 Seat 41 (a Hi-Level Coach), writing my orders in the Diner, watching all the drunks in the Lounge and "sneaking" back to the Observation Car (a traditional ATSF Boat Tail) where the Conductor was hiding out. But instead of running me back to the Coaches, he was happy someone was back there and told me great railroad stories.

I remember when I took the Three Rivers from Akron, OH both east to NYC and several times west to Chicago. No more of that.

I remember when I chain smoked all the way from Minneapolis to Chicago in the lounge car. Would have been mid-nineties. Fun trip!

I remember "circus trains" running in and out of Chicago. The first year or two, when NOTHING had been repainted into an Amtrak paint scheme, and Amtrak chose what it considered to be the best equipment, and assigned it to various trains in unexpected combinations. U.P. E8 diesels in the east; B&O E8's in the west; GM&O E7's running through Chicago on Milwaukee-to-St. Louis trains. Then when the equipment started to be modified and standardized, the Broadway Ltd. was the first all-Amtrak train with a consistent paint scheme, pulled by Amtrak-painted E8's. Amtrak got some ex-Army hospital cars and turned them into lounges with a disgusting interior with (if I recall correctly) purple carpet on the walls. Christmas & New Years parties in those lounges (I was a lot younger then).

Tom

FormerOBS said:

I remember "circus trains" running in and out of Chicago. The first year or two, when NOTHING had been repainted into an Amtrak paint scheme, and Amtrak chose what it considered to be the best equipment, and assigned it to various trains in unexpected combinations. U.P. E8 diesels in the east; B&O E8's in the west; GM&O E7's running through Chicago on Milwaukee-to-St. Louis trains. Then when the equipment started to be modified and standardized, the Broadway Ltd. was the first all-Amtrak train with a consistent paint scheme, pulled by Amtrak-painted E8's. Amtrak got some ex-Army hospital cars and turned them into lounges with a disgusting interior with (if I recall correctly) purple carpet on the walls. Christmas & New Years parties in those lounges (I was a lot younger then).

Tom

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I remember the day that the "all Amtrak" Broadway left PC's 12th ST yard, I had worked for the PC and left just prior to the event, but my Amtrak position allowed me to be there.

Remember riding the last train out of St Louis before they moved into the "temporary" amshak, remember riding domes all the time on the Ann Rutlege and Misouri Mules, and often being the only ones up there on almost empty trains.

Riding the Super Chief in early 1970's (before the name change) I remember thinking if Amtrak can run all trains like this, it will be a big improvement. This was especially so for some of the eastern routes on the PC. Of course then it still had the same superb ATSF equipment, crews and Pullman porters as it did during my prior trip in '69. The crews had real pride in providing good service.

It is a toss up,,,,,

A wonderful night on the CZ in the early eighties sitting in the diner at 2 AM listening to a conductor of 40 years tell stories for three hours,,,,

or waiting for The EB in MPS the day in 88 or 89 with the greatest one day snow fall ever - thirty inches. It was the last of October and i had traveled with no socks and nothing but my old HS letter sweater. A buddy gave me a pair of socks and I pulled the old hobo trick of stuffing newspapers inside my shirt for warmth,,,,,the train was 8 hours late (my first late EB !!) but it turned out to be a wonderful trip ...

or the time the wonderful folks in Chi forgot to fuel the engines on the return of my honeymoon and getting stuck in nowhere for four hours,,,,

or maybe the gunfight outside the station in Libby late on a Saturday night waiting for the EB,,,,

or maybe ,,

I remember those purple lounge cars. Some of them even had a piano. I remember riding in the slumbercoach with my folks as a kid... and my dad entertaining the four or five kids in the car with a puppet Kangaroo I had. (Which gave him the idea, to start actually teaching his grade school students with that type of method.) The cranky old timer coach attendants that would shoo us kids back to our parents when we'd be running around a coach on a very late Broadway Limited. When you could see the public address announcer making announcements from the glass booth at Penn Station. Breakfast in the diner with my Mom. Later riding the Lake Shore Limited from Chicago to New York by myself when I was 15 or 16. One of those times camping out in the club car with a cute girl my age chain smoking, drinking mass quantities of Coca-Cola and just yapping. She was gonna write me, but never did. Riding the press run of the Capitol Limited when they equipped it with Superliners... and chatting with their PR people about an internship. (I applied, but it didn't happen, got lost in D.C. bureaucracy.) Heading west on the Empire Builder with my Mom to a family wedding in '97, sitting in the lounge late at night, listening to the radio, watching the small towns go by. It was great to look out the window and see the world.

FormerOBS said:

I remember "circus trains" running in and out of Chicago.

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Speaking of Circus Trains, the very first time I saw an Amtrak train is when Mom and Dad took me up to Wauwatosa WI to watch the Circus World Museum Circus Train pass through on its way from Baraboo to Milwaukee. Thousands of folks lined the tracks and just before the train was due, the Rainbow Empire Builder or North Coast Hiawatha passed through with the Conductor happily calling out IT'S RIGHT BEHIND US!

I traveled on the South Wind/Floridian numerous times between various points from Chicago to Louisville, Nashville, Birmingham and to Florida points between 1971 and October. 1978. The Amtrak train was much nicer than the L&N/SCL train with a Penn Central coach only connection of the 2 preAmtrak years. It had through Sleeper,full dining car, full lounge and a dome coach. Due to bad, track it had many re-routes out of Chicago from the original PRR Panhandle route to the Big Four Route to Indianapolis to the C&EI/L&N route via Evansville to the Monon Route over the Knobs to Louisville. Never very good on timekeeping, but always interesting.

This was long before AMTRAK, but I remember when you could see open air and the ties going by underneath the train when you flushed the toilet....there was a sign that said "Please do not flush toilet while at station"....any other old-timers remember that kind of thing? :giggle:

Tumbleweed said:

This was long before AMTRAK, but I remember when you could see open air and the ties going by underneath the train when you flushed the toilet....there was a sign that said "Please do not flush toilet while at station"....any other old-timers remember that kind of thing? :giggle:

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I'm not an old-timer but i do remember that too.

Another thing is when the Adirondack had domes in the 1970's, most times I was the only one (or one of the very few) up in the dome!

Amtrak still had those cars with the toilets opening onto the tracks until the 90s. Then somebody flushed while a train was going over a bridge in florida . A congressman iirc was sitting underneath the bridge fishing.

Steve4031 said:

Amtrak still had those cars with the toilets opening onto the tracks until the 90s. Then somebody flushed while a train was going over a bridge in florida . A congressman iirc was sitting underneath the bridge fishing.

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That's funny! I remember as a kid watching the rails and ties go by from the toilet! Those were the days folks!