# Train Travel in the Olden Days **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 22, 2009, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210 "2009-12-22T17:03:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![LouisB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@LouisB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LouisB)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/21 "2009-12-23T00:58:18Z")
When I was a kid in Texas, we rode passenger trains from our home town on field trips to Austin to see the state capitol and on another occasion from our home town to see San Antonio and the Alamo. I believe it cost my parents maybe $15.00 round trip, but that was a special school rate IIRC. On another trip from Dallas to San Francisco(?) we took a train specifically because it went through the Feather River valley. We had sleeping compartments and it was a great trip; I don’t know the cost as I was only thirteen and was told by my father that it was none of my business. What a guy. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/22 "2009-12-23T01:30:22Z")
As I recall, Mark Twain (Roughing It) travelled from Kansas City, to San Francisco by stagecoach-how much did it cost? ---
**Author:** ![fiddlesticks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddlesticks/32/18129_2.png) [@fiddlesticks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fiddlesticks)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/23 "2009-12-23T02:08:58Z")
Here’s a [flickr](http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidwilson1949/sets/72157612955766880/) set of Chicago & Northwestern timetables from the good ol’ days (1957 to be exact). ---
**Author:** ![jasg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f0a364/32.png) [@jasg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jasg)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/24 "2009-12-23T02:27:53Z")
As always, google is our friend. This [link](http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,778477,00.html) says in 1945 NYC to Chicago was $36.93 (you could fly for $32.85!). This [link](http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/1945.html) says average wage was $2400/yr. ---
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/25 "2009-12-23T03:54:59Z")
> [@jasg](#): > > This [link](http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,778477,00.html) says in 1945 NYC to Chicago was $36.93 The above-linked calculator says that is the equivalent of $444 in 2009. ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/26 "2009-12-23T07:01:08Z")
Like anything else, it depends. I travel from Chicago to Kansas City on a regular basis. I fly when needed, but I prefer to take Amtrak. To me, the 1.5 hours the plane spends in the air is irrelevant, and is the smallest amount of time in the calculation. Amtrak gets me from downtown Chicago to downtown Kansas City. Southwest airlines gets me from Midway airport to Kansas City International. I have to include the much longer trip to Midway and the much longer trip from KCI (confusingly coded MCI). Getting on the train is ridiculously easy. They announce boarding, check my ID, take my ticket, get on train, take seat. The airplane…not so much. To board Southworst, I have to have my bags x-rayed, take off my shoes, etc and show up at least an hour ahead of time to get a decent seat. While Amtrak pretend to enforce baggage limits, I’ve never had to check my huge backpack. I wear it onto the train and put it in the overhead bin. When I arrive, I take it down, strap it on and walk off the train. The airplane? Waiting around for my backpack to show up, hoping against hope that they haven’t managed to rip some part of it. And the seats? On Amtrak, the seats are comfortable and have tons of legroom. I can open my laptop, an impossibility on a Southworst flight. All told, the downtown to downtown time for taking “The Greyhound Bus of the Air” is about five hours, and dramatically more expensive and uncomfortable than the seven hours spent on Amtrak’s “Southwest Chief”. All the other little things, like being allowed to bring my cooler with my own choice of food and beverages, an outlet at my seat (I managed to edit a 4 camera, 2 hour concert shoot on my return trip from Kansas City). It’s a civilized way to travel. ---
**Author:** ![Jim\_s\_Son](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19adc/32.png) [@Jim\_s\_Son](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_s_Son)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 10:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/27 "2009-12-23T10:35:19Z")
A few years ago there was a show on HBO about the NFL in the 1950s (“Game of their Lives” I think was the title). Back then teams would almost always take a train. Someone (Pat Summerall?) mentioned going from the East Coast to Los Angeles was three days by train. ---
**Author:** ![Oglomott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oglomott/32/3543_2.png) [@Oglomott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oglomott)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 11:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/28 "2009-12-23T11:01:46Z")
In 1948 there was no interstate highway system, so much of your car trip would be on two lane roads that went through every little city and town, which meant dealing with every traffic light, slowpoke, etc. ---
**Author:** ![jasg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f0a364/32.png) [@jasg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jasg)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/29 "2009-12-23T16:23:38Z")
> [@Oglomott](#): > > In 1948 there was no interstate highway system, so much of your car trip would be on two lane roads that went through every little city and town, which meant dealing with every traffic light, slowpoke, etc. True for 400 of the 760 miles, but the Pennsylvania Turnpike opened in 1940 - 359 miles from Ohio border to Philly with no stop signs/lights. Also, with gas at $0.15/gal - a Model A Ford (which got 25mpg) could get you there for $4.56 in gasoline. ---
**Author:** ![jasg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f0a364/32.png) [@jasg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jasg)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/30 "2009-12-23T16:25:08Z")
oops, not all of the turnpike was open by 1948… ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/31 "2009-12-23T16:32:27Z")
I haven’t got my copy of _Roughing It_ handy, but this page gives the fares for stagecoach travel in 1863: [http://www.nebraskahistory.org/publish/publicat/timeline/stagecoach\_travel.htm](http://www.nebraskahistory.org/publish/publicat/timeline/stagecoach_travel.htm) > [@](#): > > In an August 18, 1899, letter to Jay A. Barrett of the Nebraska State Historical Society, Fulton noted: “I left St. Louis, Mo., in February, 1859, and came to Nebraska City by stage coach from St. Joseph, Mo. The ice being too soft to bear the weight of the coach the passengers walked across the river from the Iowa side.” > > Fulton further noted that the rates for transportation of passengers during these early years were high and the wayside accommodations poor. "The Overland Stage Company in 1863 charged $75 fare to Denver and $150 to Salt Lake City, while in 1866 they got the price up to $150 to Denver and $350 to Salt Lake City. The baggage of each passenger was limited to twenty-five pounds and there was a charge of $3 for every extra pound. At $1 each, meals, consisting of bacon, bread, and coffee, with sometimes game, such as venison, antelope, or occasionally a sage hen, could be obtained. Butter and eggs were unknown luxuries at stage stations, the former selling in Denver at $1.50 per pound and the latter at the same price per dozen. > > “We rode night and day in the stuffy, uncomfortable coach, journeying six days to reach Denver and eleven or twelve days to Salt Lake City, in marked contrast to the comfort, time, and cost of travel at present [1899]. At a cost of $14 the traveler is now carried in a Pullman car to Denver in twenty hours, and twice the time and $36 will take him to Salt Lake City. Should he prefer, he may make the round trip for one fare and a fifth, but in the old days a seat in the coach cost the same both going and returning, and its possessor reached his destination weary and travel worn. At that time a trip by stage was considered very grand, yet I have no desire to repeat the experience.” Richard Burton also traveled to Salt Lake via stagecoach, and describes it in his book _City of the Saints_. I don’t recall if he gives the fares. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/32 "2009-12-23T18:19:26Z")
**CalMeacham** , those stagecoach fares were astronomical! I don’t think crossing the Atlantic was nearly as expensive, and that would usually have been in considerably greater comfort, provided you weren’t prone to seasickness. ---
**Author:** ![fuzzypickles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/9d8465/32.png) [@fuzzypickles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fuzzypickles)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2009, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/33 "2009-12-23T21:33:46Z")
[Travel times in the 1800’s](http://www.uwgb.edu/DutchS/WestTech/xmodern1.htm) (including maps.) ---
**Author:** ![TV\_time](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f17d59/32.png) [@TV\_time](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TV_time)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2009, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210/34 "2009-12-26T00:38:40Z")
I remember that my mother was very uncomfortable about driving. It tended to be a male thing at the time. Yes, young women were more comfortable behind the wheel, but many women raised in the home as “homemakers” did not drive and chose not to even if a second car was available. Also, many times, at least here in the Mountain West roads still had a bit of a ways to go before being what they were to become in the '60s, '70s and '80s (granted they are returning to that again). So train travel was a pleasant alternative. I remember traveling with my mother on the train in the early '50s on the Zepher. It was wonderful - comfortable, great view, a chance to meet people in a pleasant environment, very few stops (and when you did, it was interesting), pleasant staff, good food as you traveled and clean bathrooms. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/train-travel-in-the-olden-days/522210.md?page=1)