Pullman Car
The first railroad sleeping cars appeared in America in the late 1830s. They were used between Baltimore and Philadelphia and provided berths for two dozen passengers. In 1856 Theodore T. Woodruff, a master car builder with the Terre Haute and Alton Railroad, patented a railroad car with three tiers: the lowest was made by moving seat bottoms together, the middle by folding up the backs of seats, and the top by lowering panels attached above the windows. These cars were quite popular until George Pullman (1831-1897) introduced his brand of railroad cars in 1865.
Pullman was born March 3, 1831, and grew up in Brocton, New York, but moved to Chicago in 1855. In 1858, Pullman arranged with the Chicago and Alton Railroad Company to remodel two of their boxcar-like coaches. The first few experiments were not successful, but in 1861 he designed a model called the Pioneer.
Pullman improved upon Woodruff's earlier design by eliminating the middle tier. He added interior decoration and improved riding comfort by reinforcing each spring with rubber cushions. He added a foot to the car's width and 2.5 feet (76.2 cm)to its height. This extra size, while more comfortable and popular, however, meant that existing bridges, platforms, and other standards would have to be altered to accommodate the cars. This could have become a problem except that the United States government chose one of Pullman's new cars to carry President Abraham Lincoln's body from Chicago to Springfield in May 1865. Every station and bridge between the cities was modified to accommodate the oversized car. People along the route praised the luxury and elegance of the car. By 1867, forty-eight of these luxury cars were in operation in Illinois, Michigan, Canada, and New York. Pullman soon founded the Pullman Palace Car Company. He also introduced the first combined sleeping and restaurant car. The first dining car followed in 1868 and the first chair car in 1875.
Some historians believe that Pullman's most important legacy was not the invention of Pullman cars, but the innovation of railroad comfort. His company also made contributions towards railroad safety by introducing such features as the vestibule in 1887 which allowed riders safe passage between cars. The Pullman Company also invented the ventilator, a fine screen that allowed air to circulate into cars while filtering out cinders and soot.
George Pullman died on October 19, 1897, three years after a major strike at his Pullman, Illinois, manufacturing plant. The strike sparked a sympathy boycott of his cars across the country and disrupted rail traffic for a time. The strikes ended bitterly when President Cleveland sent an army regiment to protect the flow of mail after strikers derailed a postal train made up of Pullman cars.
After the strike, the company eventually reestablished itself as an integral part of train travel, and by the 1920s there were nearly 10,000 Pullman passenger cars in operation in the United States, Canada, and Mexico, with a growing freight-car business as well. After Pullman's death, the company continued his business practice of controlling all aspects of first-class travel, and sought to limit the railroads' involvement with any of its operations. Thus the Pullman Company and not the railroads were responsible for the sleeping, dining, and parlor cars to the extent that it provided all maintenance, staffing, linens, and other luxuries. This worked well until 1947 when the government brought antitrust action against what it considered a monopoly. Pullman eventually had to separate its car-building function from actual operations, and with the emergence of the automobile and the commercial airliner, the Pullman sleeping car business began a steady fall-off. Pullman maintained its freight-car building business however, and at the end of the twentieth century it is still an on-going concern.
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