work for me as firemen have evidently taken up the work awaiting some more congenial employment rather than as a life work.
While a few months roundhouse experience is of advantage to boys of all these classes, I believe it should be required of any who have never fired even a stationary boiler. In the roundhouse they should not be kept at cleaning and sweeping until they become discouraged and quit, but effort should be made to employ them cleaning fires, hoeing ash-pans, calling, firing stationary boilers, helping the engine hostlers and firing up locomotives. I call this training most valuable because a young man learns something of the details of railroading, such as the importance of promptness in the service, the results of good and poor firing as seen in the shape of fires in engines at terminals; he also learns the uses of the various parts of the boiler, he learns the signals, and above all else gains the confidence necessary to fire an engine properly. If he can help a roundhouse machinist or help the boiler-washer, it will also be of advantage; he may even have an occasional chance to fire a switching engine for a few hours in an emergency. The foreman should arrange to permit such boys as he judges will be recommended for firemen, to deadhead over the road two or three trips on an engine with a first-class fireman.
In the case of men starting in the shops and with others shortly before the probable rush period, send applicants to the company’s examining surgeons so that they will be immediately available in case of necessity for firing. The foreman of each terminal shop should have working under him few of such men and the authority to use them as firemen whenever needed. This is of great advantage besides saving considerable expense in deadhead time.
In so far as possible, all inexperienced firemen should start work on yard or way freight engines where there is apt to be less delay to traffic from lack of steam while they are learning the rudiments of stoking. If the company does not furnish a book of instructions on locomotive firing and combustion, keep some good but inexpensive book or correspondence course on hand, recommend it to all inexperienced men, even selling it to them at cost if necessary. What you are after is result; so, if you believe in a thing, carry it into execution.
Avoid, if possible, hiring men who are “broke.” New men do not understand that their first pay day does not come for over a month, and some small sum on hand to start with may prevent garnishment of their first wages and their consequent discouragement. Some of the best firemen that I ever had gave up the work on this account.
New firemen should not be regularly listed and given rank for the first six months of their service. The older man should be given the preference in work at his terminal by the foreman, but not the privilege of going to some distant part of the division to displace a man who is a few days younger in the service. During this six months’ period they should also understand that they are on probation. To gain full advantage in this respect, it is necessary to obtain such reports from division foremen, road foremen, and traveling firemen (see form No. 104) as will enable you to intelligently drop from the service inside of the six months, regardless of their relative age in employment, such men as seem the least adapted to the work or appear likely to become “disturbers of the peace.” Treat such unfortunates with courtesy and consideration, explaining to them their weak points and probable inaptitude which makes them less desirable than others. Give them passes home, if within reason to do so, and wish them well in their future occupation. The reputation of a fine gentleman, now a railroad president, but then the manager of a small road, is worthy of imitation:
An engineer, old in the service, had become involved in serious trouble, and was called to the manager’s office and the gravest discipline accorded. The “boys,” waiting outside, accosted the engineer, who, though serious, was anything but depressed.
“Well,” they said, “what did the old man have to say?”
“There,” he replied, “is the finest gentleman I ever met.”
“Why,” they said, “did he put you back to work?”
“No, indeed; he discharged me, but he talked to me like a father and explained things to me as I had never understood them before. I would rather be discharged by that man than to be put back to work by any other man I ever met.” It is needless to say that, with discipline so effectively received, he was not long out of the service.
After dismissing all undesirable men, if necessary to further reduce the list in times of slack business, have a “lay-off” list on which you place the youngest men first. Men on this list are given to understand that they will be re-employed, the oldest first, provided they keep you advised of their address. On the railway with which I am connected, for many of the men we find temporary employment on other divisions, where they serve without rank until recalled.
Both in hiring and in dismissing men one should bear in mind the future as well as the immediate needs, and endeavor to make a reputation that will be of growing benefit to himself and to his company. The company’s attitude will, whether you wish it or not, be considerably advertised, and ultimately result in the securing of better men in the years to follow.
As is quite generally known, the Chicago & Northwestern, as one of the first to adopt it, has a system of first, second and third years’ progressive mechanical examinations. Each fireman is given the first year’s book of questions, together with the book of rules and time card immediately he is employed. As soon as convenient after the expiration of his first year’s service, he is given a written examination thereon by the traveling engineer or traveling fireman, who also examines him orally. If successful in passing this, he is given the second year’s book of questions, upon which he is examined a year hence in the same manner. At the end of his third year the fireman is examined by a joint board of examiners appointed for the whole system, which board sits in Chicago each spring and fall. Some of the traveling engineers and the air-brake instructor compose this board, and their favorable report makes the man eligible to promotion to an engineer whenever needed as such on his own division thereafter.
The failure to pass any one of these progressive examinations results in a second trial six months later; two successive failures drop a man from the locomotive service at once, as no men are permitted to waive their right to promotion.
When firemen have passed their mechanical examinations for promotion to engineers, they should, as soon as possible, be sent to the train department for time card and book of rules examination so as to be eligible for use as engineers at any time.
Just previous to the expected busy season, such firemen should be required to fire on runs where they can readily be had for running and new firemen put in their places; for, if they are permitted to take work where their lay-over is at outlying points, too much delay is occasioned in relieving them and getting them to the main terminals where needed.
If it happens that on any division promotion is so slow that a fireman has to fire for more than three years, it should be required that he fire in freight service at least three months immediately previous to being promoted, this because a long period of firing in passenger service is not good experience immediately preceding promotion to an engiwhere he will begin work in extra freight service.
During one busy season it was required as an experiment that each inexperienced man employed should take a certain course on firing and combustion, the cost of which was very small. That fall, among the seventy-five men hired, there was not a single instance of burned-out locomotive grates, and compared with the year previous, on the ton-mileage basis, a saving of over $60,000 in coal was effected, besides considerable in running repairs; for much of the boiler repairs to locomotives results from poor firing—usually too heavy firing.
I believe that the time is not far distant when the leading railroads of the country will demand a knowledge of combustion and at least the theory of firing, and have an examination covering those subjects which an applicant must pass before employing him for a locomotive fireman; also that he should know the signals and flagging rules. When we consider that a few weeks’ study and a small tuition will give a young man this information, there is nothing unreasonable in demanding this previous preparation for a position that pays from $70 to $100 per month; but there is a practical difficulty to-day, namely, with less rigid requirements, many roads find it impossible to obtain enough men who can stand the service, due to the advent of modern coal-burning locomotives of such great size. Nor can we look for marked change in condition until mechanical stokers of successful design are inaugurated and extensively used. When we have to hire “coal heavers,” we cannot expect to be getting much brains; hence I believe the railroads of the country are not paying sufficient attention to the use and development of these labor-saving devices for the fireman, for several of them are as efficient as some other apparatus when first applied to the locomotive, and it would not be unreasonable to expect great improvement therein, were sufficient inducement offered.
[Proposed form of report from Road Foreman and Traveling Fireman.]
Dear Sir:—
I have ridden with the above named fireman . . . . . . times and taking all points into consideration I would consider him to be a . . . . . . . . (Good, Fair or Poor) man.
His good points are . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
His undesirable points are . . . . . . . . . . . . .
The engineers and division foremen for whom he has worked think him a . . . . . . . . fireman, and . . . . . . desirable to retain in the service.
[Blank to be filled out by each fireman for the first six months of his service.]
Dear Sir:—
During the past month of . . . . . . . . I have fired principally as follows:
Engine No. . . . Engineer . . . . . . Did engine steam well? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Was engine light on coal? Were you able to have fires light and in good shape at terminals? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Have you improved and gained greater skill in firing the past month? . . . . . . . . . . .
Are you able to stand the hard work of firing heavy engines? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Do you make it a practice to obtain good rest and sleep when off duty? . . . . . . . . . . . .
[Form of letter to station agent.]
Dear Sir:—
About (date) . . . . . . . . . . . . . and thereafter we are likely to need more firemen on short notice. If you know of any young men of good character, reliable habits and at least an 8th grade school education, I
