Erie Brochure: Railroading in NY Harbor

The brochure shown below is a very good read and summarizes Erie's navy and associated operations in and around NY Harbor. It was produced some time after World War II according to the references in the text. There is a nice overview of the operations of the Erie around the harbor, and the last half is a description of a tug boat trip up to the East River and back to Erie's bustling terminal at Jersey City.

The tone of the piece is right in line with other written items of the time. There is a bit of boasting, a bit of American can-do attitude and a smattering of flowery speech. It sums up to evoke a nostalgic feeling of a lost greatness, honest industriousness, and conquering heroism that characterized the naive American approach to the world in the 50s. Compare this narrative to the plight of the individuals who were the muscle (in a couple of different ways) behind the brochure's narrative from On the Waterfront about union violence, corruption and general unpleasantness.

It was not easy work keeping NY Harbor moving, and many people suffered personally so that others could live comfortably, find opportunity and profit handsomely on their backs. So much has changed in the world since this brochure was produced, but equally as many things haven't.

US Testing Building

Located at 1415 Park Ave, Hoboken, this concrete frame building was the home of US Testing, an HBS customer. Now it is a parking garage.

Wordless Wednesday

Ephemera and Photos

Bethlehem Steel workers strike, 6 June 1947, Hoboken, NJ.

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I believe information is worthless unless it gets used, so as a matter of principle, I try to post any ephemera I acquire, and I do it in the spirit of the Creative Commons Copyright to share information freely for non-commercial endeavors. So, feel free to use anything I post with a courtesy credit as long as it is not for commercial endeavors. Its just the right thing to do, and I endeavor to be diligent in return.


These latest bits of visual information are a grab bag to catch up.

Bethlehem Steel workers strike (reverse), 6 June 1947, Hoboken, NJ.

Erie bad order card

Erie bad order card (reverse)

Erie Railroad NY Division & Side Lines schematic (no date)

A seat card from 1956 announcing the change of stations to the Lackawanna's Hoboken Terminal. The two railroads would merge four years later.

Inside a Seatrain Lines ship showing the multiple levels of storage in this stage of the evolution to containerized shipping.

A cut away view of the operation that was published in Popular Mechanics Magazine (http://books.google.com/books?id=0N4DAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA122#v=onepage&q&f=true). this would be amazing to model!