I've Been Working on the Railroad Part 2

The Manifest clerk

It wasn’t long after I started working at 17^th St Yard office that I was introduced to the position of manifest clerk. Early on in my career, there was an inbound manifest and an outbound manifest clerk whose desks faced each other separated by a double accessible rack of papers. Robert LaGesse was the inbound clerk and Sam Goldberg was the outbound manifest. The two could not have been more different in personalities. Sam was a happy go lucky guy who always had a big smile and a friendly word for anybody. He looked like and probably did enjoy life to the fullest especially as he was nearing retirement age. He was dedicated to his work but at that time, the job just wasn’t as busy as it used to be. It was Sam’s job to get the paperwork ready for all outbound freight trains leaving the terminal. 

In those days, each rail car needed to be accompanied physically by a paper document called a waybill. On the waybill was the information such as car initial and number, shipper’s name, receiver’s name, contents, (commodity code) routing, and freight charges, special handling instructions, hazmat instructions, etc.  Most rail cars must travel through many railroads and stations to meet their final destination. The waybill accompanied the car from the beginning and ended up at the destination with the car.

The waybills were filled in the rack between the manifest desks by the last two digits of the car number. When the rack clerk gave a list of an outbound train track to the outbound manifest, he needed to pull the waybills in train order, checking to make sure all was correct and the cars really needed to be on that train, the hazmat instructions were still attached to the original waybill, etc. Once the bills were pulled, a rubber band with some additional hickey cards were attached to make a neat package for the conductor. The outbound manifest clerk then went back to the rack clerk, got the deck of computer cards that corresponded with his train, changed the circuit board in the huge bemouth of the IBM 402 to Wheel report, inserted the cards and kicked the 402 to life. In most cases the cards fed flawlessly and a Wheel Report was printed quickly. However, cards jamb and get destroyed occasionally, decks get dropped, etc. Every effort was made to insure the wheel report was an accurate accounting of train order as some of the cars had movement restrictions on them such as because of their load, they could not be placed next to certain other types of cars for safety of the train and crew.  Once done, Sam would wrap it all up and wait for the conductor to pick up his paperwork. Normally during a shift this process would be repeated numerous times as the trains were ready to leave town. General freight trains, and the smaller local trains all needed to be handled the same way.

IBM 402 that was used by Outbound Manifest to run Wheel Reports

On the other side, as inbound train conductors brought in their paperwork, the inbound manifest clerk got busy. Bob LaGesse was a very serious dedicated employee who would have made a great teacher. I was living my dream job and highly enjoyed working with Bob as he patiently took the time to not only answer my questions, but explain in detail why things were done the way they were.  Though a little intimidated by him, I respected his knowledge and tried to soak it up like a sponge. He did have a dry humor to him as well.  From my younger perspective, Bob was Mr. Railroad himself! Unlike some of the other employees, Bob treated all the women coworkers with respect. That was Bob.

When he would receive the wheel reports and waybills from a conductor, his work started. Tearing apart the large package, checking the waybills against the wheel report, (even empty cars needed to have a waybill to get back to their originating road) and making sure everything was in order, Bob would then need to mark local destination tags, on the wheel report. The local tags that were used, would designate to the yardmaster which outbound train the cars needed to be placed on to get to their destination.  Each train was also checked into the yard by a yard clerk who physically verified the numbers on the side of the cars. Bob would also get this list and check it against the wheel report for errors. All cars into the yard needed to be accounted for.  Waybills were again checked on the inbound side for special instructions, to make sure the hazmat instructions were still with the waybill, etc.  Finally, the marked up list would go to the keypunch operator so the tags could be changed in the computer systems, new cards with local tags could be generated, and the paper train could be yarded in the corresponding track of the rack clerk.  When completed, Bob would then file the waybills in his rack so they would be available for the outbound manifest when needed.