Page:Fagan (1908) Confessions of a railroad signalman.djvu/96

78 ture of railroad life at the present day? It is hardly fair to call it a lack of individual loyalty, for at heart the American railroad man is thoroughly loyal; but, unfortunately, the systems of labor organization and management under whose direction he works, practically call upon him to renounce his personal principles in the interest of schedules and agreements which constitute the machinery of the operating department.

It may, of course, be taken for granted that managers of railroads are well aware of the importance and value of practical loyalty in all branches of the service; and yet when one examines the evidence with a view to ascertaining what they actually do for its encouragement, one is driven to conclude that there must be some kind of a hitch somewhere. As an illustration let us take the following incident, which is almost an everyday occurrence:—

Freight train No. 1 pulls into a yard a few miles outside the terminal. The train and engine crew are on overtime; that is to say, every hour they remain out on the road means a great many dollars in wages over and above their regular pay. Before long, another freight train, No. 2, overtakes train No. 1. Instead of pulling into the yard and doing its work in turn, this second train runs up the main line and backs in ahead of train No. 1, thus putting it in a pocket. In this way train No. 1 is delayed