1978 Event RR clerks go on strike, halting more than 2/3s of rail service 1974 Event Explosion and fire destory Great Northern RR yard in Wenatchee, Washington 1956 Event Collapse of a RR bridge under a train kills 120 (India) 1950 Event 2 self-propelled trains of Long Island RR collide, killing 77 1950 Event President Truman orders army to seize control of RR to avert a strike 1939 Event Municipal Railway and Market St. RR begin service to Transbay Terminal 1935 Event 1st U.S. streamlined electric RR engine begins service 1929 Event Seatrain (RR cars on ships) service begins, New Orleans-Havana 1917 Event Federal government took over operation of American RR for duration of WW I 1913 Death Harriet Tubman, abolitionist, conductor on Underground RR, dies in NY 1912 Event South Pacific RR offers to bring Liberty Bell to Exposition, free 1909 Event White firemen on Georgia RR strike to protest hiring blacks 1901 Event Loop-the-loop centrifugal RR (roller coaster) patented by Ed Prescot 1894 Event American RR Union strikes Pullman Sleeping Car Co 1892 Event Homer A. Plessy refuses to go to segregated RR car (Plessy vs. Ferguson) 1883 Event Northern Pacific RR's last spike driven at Independence Creek, Mont 1882 Event Telegraph Hill RR Co organized 1878 Event California St. Cable Car RR Co starts service 1869 Event Golden Spike driven, completes Promontory Pt Ut-Transcontinental RR 1864 Birthday [John] Casey Jones, RR engineer, Ballad of Casey Jones 1863 Event RR and ferry connection between San Francisco and Oakland inaugurated 1859 Event Grading started for Market Street RR 1838 Birthday James J Hill, Canada, RR entrepreneur, Great Northern Railroad 1836 Event 1st Canadian RR opens, between Laprairie and St. John, Quebec 1828 Event Construction begins on B and O (Baltimore-Ohio) 1st U.S. passenger RR 1781 Birthday George Stephenson, Newcastle England, inventor, RR locomotive
