Tom, did you work at the P.O. or were you a clerk????LOL, just kidding! The best part of my day is pestering clerks (I've been a city carrier for 25 years). I loved to hear the old timers talk about delivering twice a day when there was a morning train and a noon train. Just how much $ did the railroads make from the mail contracts?
Tim--I SLAVED away as a clerk! I have some Frisco documents here someplace that may have some of that info, but they were after the Firefly was gone. Stay tuned. TG
With regard to mail revenue vs. passenger revenue, I don't have any information about the SLSF, but I was recently doing some research on the Union Pacific, and I do know the breakdown for that road and possibly it is instructive as a model. In 1960, UP passenger revenue was $27,519,034. Mail revenue was $20,743,000 and express business contributed another $4 million. Obviously the UP was a much bigger operation than the Frisco, but these number suggest that mail and express roughly equalled passenger revenue. However, the withdrawal of the RPOs may not have had an effect in quite the way one might believe. For example, in 1969, after the RPO routes were cancelled, UP passenger revenue was about $12.6 milliion while the mail contributed $13.4 million. This reflects mostly bulk mail (not express) which was shifted to freight trains, but the money was still there--it was just not getting credited to passenger accounts any longer. As to the photo that started all this, in the early 1950s, Frisco had three morning arrivals at St. Louis. These were #4 at 730A, #10 at 745A and #2 at 810A. MoPac, meanwhile (relevant because one of their trains is visible backing into the station) also had three AM arrivals. These were #32 (the Sunshine Special remnant) at 750A; Texas Eagle #2 at 810A; and Texas Eagle #22 at 820A. Make of this what you will, but I am betting the train in the photo is the Texas Special, as the MP and the Frisco were very competitive on this route, at least at the time this photo was taken. Greg Stout
Whatever train is in the pic (and I'm still betting it being #2, the Texas Special), it is headed up by our "Year 2010" E8 - Count Fleet, SLSF 2010! Have a good meeting everyone! Ken
