Chapter 54: RxR

Fr, Nov 20, 1970

Władziu Valentino Liberace, Little Richard & Art Garfunkel,
Day 4 of 6, RCMH, NYC, 8pm.

—
Casey Jones
By Jerry Garcia & Robert Hunter

I had asked Warren Buffett to look into Buying the Union Pacific Railroad, since it & Warren’s Berkshire Hathaway, were both HQ in Omaha, Neb. Why not Own both?

Warren said it would be a horrible Buy. In 1970, US Railroads still Carried Passengers, as well as Running Freight Trains. They made Money on the Freight, but were loosing more & more money with Passenger Service.

As Ralf, Union Pacific would Carry their last Passenger, May 2, 1971.

By then though, things had only gotten worse.

Amtrak was created to keep Long-Distance Passenger Trains alive in America, but the US Government Operated it at a Loss.

There just wasn’t enough demand, except for the Northeast portion of the US, the heavily travelled Wash, DC-Philly-NYC-Boston Run. There was enough demand, to Run Trains a few times a day.

Warren was dumbfounded, when I suggested we get Congress to OK a massive Reorganization of the US Rail System.

Why not make 2 Mega-Railroads. I thought the 2 Parent Railroad’s would be

1. Union Pacific, incl: Canadian Pacific, Southern Pacific, Kansas City Southern de México, Chessie System & Seaboard Coast Line.
2. BNSF, incl: Canadian National, Burlington Northern, Sante Fe & Norfolk Southern.

This would allow both Super-RxR’s to have Coast to Coast Coverage. In 1970, RxR’s had most of their Tracks either East of the Mississippi, or West of it.

That had happened after the Civil War. The War had halted any RxR’s West of the Mississippi. At the time, there were no Bridges over the Mississippi. Union Pacific would Build the 1st one, & it was considered an Engineering Feat. Carnegie Steel made it happen, creating better Blends of Steel, Iron, etc, to make the Bridge Strong enough, while not impacting Boat Traffic on the Mississippi River. It was an early Win for Andrew Carnegie.

Warren took my Ideas & ran with them, getting with all our top Transportation Heads. Adding RxR’s to our Intermodal Mix, would compete the Circle, Shippers, Containers, Trucks & Container Trailers, Ships, & now Rail.

In the mean time, I got Dick Nixon & Teddy Kennedy together for a talk. I Mapped out my idea for 2 Mega-RxR’s, asking them to help me do that. Both knew of the plight of the US RxR’s, so they agreed. Dick said he’d get Vice-President Gerald Ford, to Co-Sponsor it with Teddy Kennedy. We 3 Shook on it.

It would soon be known as the:

Ford-Kennedy Rail Act of 1970.

We parted, haven started the fix, although it would take some arm-twisting.

Sat, Nov 21, 1970

Władziu Valentino Liberace, Little Richard & Art Garfunkel,, Day 5 of 6, RCMH, NYC, 8pm.

Casey Jones-The Union Scab
Sung by Pete Seeger
Written by Joe Hill

These would be the 2 Big RxR Companies:

Union Pacific, HQ, Omaha, Neb, begun in 1862, by the Signage of the Pacific Railroad Acts of 1862, by President Abraham Lincoln.

Actually 2 RxR’s were formed, dividing up the RxR in 2.

Union Pacific would begin West of the Mississippi River, in Council Bluffs, Iowa. It would then Run Westbound.

A 2nd RxR was the Central Pacific. It Started at Sacramento, CA, & Ran Eastbound.

The weird thing was, it was a Race to Complete each part as fast as possible, as each RxR would be Paid by the USA, by being awarded huge amounts of Land, bordering their Right-Of-Ways. The Blocks of Land, was done in a hodgepodge way. The RxR would have so many Acres, South of the Tracks. Then the next Section, would be along the North Side. This allowed others to be able to Own the other Sections. The US Government often Gave away Land, via the Homestead Act. Each Person got 160 Acres, so a Husband & Wife would get 320 Acres.

By doing it that way, the US Government didn’t have to Subsidize the RxR’s to get started. By giving Land instead, saved the Government from having to fork out any Cash, which the US Government didn’t have. The North would Win the Civil War, but both Sides were weakened, w/o Cash.

Of course the Land they were giving away, was Owned by a number of Native American Tribes, causing all sorts of heartache, which Native Americans are still recovering from.

The RxR’s had to get Funds by Selling Stock in themselves, often creating Shell Companies to screw their Investors. It was a wild time for Speculation, creating many Robber Barons. Things don’t change much do they?

The Selling of Plots of their Easement Land to Settlers, that were following the Tracks West, would give the RxR’s Income, by Selling the Land given to it,.

The Union Pacific & the Central Pacific Mapped Out vaguely which Route to take, as no-one knew the best way, especially through the Rocky Mountains, plus Crossing Rivers, etc.

Both RxR’s agreed on the basic Route East & West, mostly to ensure they’d finally Meet-Up. That would change, depending on how far each RxR had gotten when they met.

Promontory, Utah, near Salt Lake City, was where the 2 RxR’s finally met up, May 10, 1869.

Eventually, the Union Pacific & the Central Pacific world be merged together. Each RxR was Paid in Land, depending on how many Miles of Track each had laid.

Union Pacific laid Down 1,087 Miles of Track, opposed to the 690 Miles Laid by the Central Pacific. That was due to the Sierra Nevada Mountains, that the Central Pacific had to engineer around. They Tunneled through some of it, causing huge increases in Costs.

The Union Pacific used mostly new Irish Immigrants, while the Central Pacific used Imported Chinese Laborers. Both groups worked under harsh conditions, especially the Chinese, as they were considered expendable, less than human to many. Really f/u.

In 1980, Union Pacific had a total of 9,299 Miles of Track. After some mergers, by 1993, they had 17,385 Miles. By the 2020’s, they had a total of 32,200 Miles of Track.

They have 8,300 Locomotives too. At Union Pacific’s Bailey Hump Yard, North Platte, Neb, they use 5 Million Gallons of Diesel Fuel EACH MONTH!. That will be my #1 Task, if we can arrange the Deal, I’d s/o to 100% Propane, as UP’s Fuel Source. Talk about helping stop Smog, stopping the Burning of Fossil Fuels, except for Propane. We’ll leave the Oil to make Plastics with.

Until we can perfect it, Airplanes would still use AvGas, high in Octane, & Jet Fuel, which is basically Kerosene. We needed to have Propane Powered Engines be as safe as the ones already in use. Planes with more than 1 Engine, we could experiment with, as we’d have another in case of ones failure.

As Ralf, Union Pacific merged with Southern Pacific in 1995, in response to Burlington Northern’s merger with Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway, becoming BNSF.

Southern Pacific, HQ in San Francisco, CA, had been formed in 1865.

I wanted to combine a couple more RxR’s into Union Pacific too, if possible.

Kansas City Southern Railway, HQ, Kansas City, MO, begun in 1887. It started Kansas City Southern de México, in 1996, adding the North part of Mexico to it Routes.

Canadian Pacific, HQ in Toronto, Ont, was formed in 1881. It would merge with KCS-Mex, in 2023.

Chessie System, HQ in Cleveland, OH, was a merger of the Chesapeake & Ohio, HQ in Cleveland, OH, started in 1869; & the Baltimore & Ohio, HQ in Baltimore, MD, & begun in 1830. Chessie wasn’t formed until 1973 though, so we’d merge them ourselves, if possible.

Seaboard Coast Line, HQ in Jacksonville, FL, began in 1900. Seaboard & Chessie merged in 1983, to form CSX, HQ in Jacksonville.

CSX had its Tracks East of the Mississippi, while Union Pacific was West of the Mississippi. Combined, would allow Coast-to-Coast Operations. This would save on Costs, Duplicating Operations, a Seamless System.

Sun, Nov 22, 1970

Władziu Valentino Liberace, Little Richard & Art Garfunkel,, Day 6 of 6, RCMH, NYC, 8pm, Live @ Radio City, CBS-TV, 9-11pm.

“Went down and got a job with the Rural Electrification in the Navajo Indian Reservation...  Running electric power lines into all the Navajo outhouses.
I was one of the first people to wire ahead for a reservation

Finally, I ... I’ll tell you about the worst job I ever had in my life. Worst job I ever had in my life was working for the ... For the uhh ... Was it the Santa Fe? ... Yeah, it was the Santa Fe Rail-Road south of Las Vegas, Nevada. That’s the old Mormon Muddy Mission you see, way out in what the Navajos called the “boonies”, out in the desert. Now, the job was gandy-dancing. Now, gandy-dancing used to be in the old days. Gandy-dancing was ... Uh, when the Irish were building the rail road. Of course, the first transcontinental rail road was built by Irish laborers, and they used these long handled shovels called uh, “Irish Banjos” that were made by the Gandy Shovel Company of Chicago. Now, the Irish laborer would take the wide end of the shovel (when he could find it), and he would jam it in under the rail or a tie, and he would climb out on the long handle ... do a little jig step out there. And they would lever the tie up and the rail up they’d push gravel up underneath it, and tamp it down; and that levels the road bed. See, that’s what gandy-dancing is ... leveling the road bed, so the damn train didn’t fall off as it goes by ... which is just a big drag for everybody