Railroad nicknames origins and such

[NW Mailing List]

In the FWIW department, I have accumulated maybe 450-500 quasi-official
nicknames for various railroads, so penned 'back in the day', not some
modern day whimsey of someone's spur of the moment fancy. I am sure the
railroads poked at at nothing to do with any of these cuties, or not so
cuties, however the case may be.

The "rules" for such inclusion in the list are quite simple - it has to be
vintage, original and not just the momentary modern whimsy of some fan or
wannabe.

To admit some of them are quite amusing, some biting, some not mention-able
in today's politically correct type climate and some rather ho-hum.
Examples - N&W was known as 'Nights & Weekends", RF&P - Rich Folks &
Pedigrees", NYC - Not Yet Cornelius and the Waco, Beaumont, Trinity &
Sabine was also called Wobblety, Bobblety, Turnover & Stop." A personal
favorite is Houston & Texas Central - "Hell on Texas Contractors", but all
of these have an older kind of history to them. There are maybe a dozen or
more which are definitely not fit for this list so I shall not even attempt
to mention those here. See me at shows for some of those yummies. The N&W
one I think came from the late Tom Dressler, a long-time N&W man I seem to
recall.

The Uncle Pete is not a totally new name as has been suggested, but one of
longer standing when its CEO/President's first name was Pete.

Better yet, see me at the N&W archives sometime. I've gotten some of my
cuter ones from former RR employees there, volunteers we regularly see at
the Salem Ave. facility.

'nuff said.

Bob Cob Cohen
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