The City of New Orleans

[Bob Roberts]

We all know the song by Arlo Guthrie. Thankfully, its in my music curriculum for my 4th graders at school. I not only get to teach them little geography, but also some good classic folk music. I need help on the lyrics though...........

And all the towns and people seem to fade into a bad dream. And the steel rail still ain't heard the news. The conducter sings his song again, the passengers will please refrain. This train has got the dissapearing railroad blues

Forgive me, but I'm a child of the 80s and missed the whole hidden history behind this song. Can someone please explain the meaning of these lyrics so that I can teach my kids? Thanks!

[chippewa]

We all know the song by Arlo Guthrie.

Maybe it's just me, but I'd call it the song by Steve Goodman, made popular by Arlo Guthrie.

[comemonday]

http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=2878

[springparrot]

http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=2878

nice find

btw---Love that song

[RinglingRingling]

We all know the song by Arlo Guthrie. Thankfully, its in my music curriculum for my 4th graders at school. I not only get to teach them little geography, but also some good classic folk music. I need help on the lyrics though...........

And all the towns and people seem to fade into a bad dream. And the steel rail still ain't heard the news. The conducter sings his song again, the passengers will please refrain. This train has got the dissapearing railroad blues

Forgive me, but I'm a child of the 80s and missed the whole hidden history behind this song. Can someone please explain the meaning of these lyrics so that I can teach my kids? Thanks!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_New_Orleans

[bravedave]

Amtrak's origins are traceable to the sustained decline of private passenger rail services in the United States from about 1920 to 1970. In 1971, in response to the decline, the Congress and the President of the United States created Amtrak.

From the middle 19th century until approximately 1920, if a person traveled from one city to another in the United States, the trip almost certainly was by rail. By 1910, close to 100% of intercity passenger trips were made by railroad.[7] The rails and the trains were owned and operated by private, for-profit organizations. Approximately 65,000 railroad passenger cars were in operation in 1929.[8]

In 1946, there remained 45% fewer passenger trains than in 1929,[7] and the pace of decline quickened despite railroad optimism. Passengers disappeared, and so did the trains. Between 1946 and 1964, the annual number of passengers declined from 770 to 298 million.[citation needed] The number of U.S. commuter trains declined by more than 80%, from greater than 2,500 in 1954 to fewer than 500 in 1969.[citation needed] Few trains generated profits; most produced losses. Broad-based passenger rail deficits appeared as early as 1948[7] and by the mid-1950s railroads claimed aggregate annual losses on passenger services of more than $700 million (almost $5 billion in 2005 dollars using CPI).[8][9] By 1965, only 10,000 rail passenger cars were in operation, 85% fewer than in 1929.[8] Passenger service was provided on only 75,000 miles of track, a stark decline.[8] Passenger rail service in the United States showed the signs of underinvestment. Rail facilities suffered from decrepit equipment, cavernous and nearly empty stations in dangerous urban centers, and management that seemed intent on driving away the few remaining customers. The 1960s also saw the end of railway post office revenues, which had helped some of the remaining trains break even despite the dearth of passengers.

In the years leading to 1973, the freight railroad system of the U.S. was collapsing. Even after the government-funded Amtrak took over intercity passenger service in 1971, railroad companies continued to lose money. The giant Penn Central Transportation, formed in 1968 by the merger of the New York Central Railroad and Pennsylvania Railroad (and supplemented in 1969 by the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad), went bankrupt in 1970. Under Judge John P. Fullam, the bankrupt company threatened in mid-1973 to end all operations by the end of the year if they did not receive government aid by October 1, as otherwise it would have to liquidate. Congress quickly came up with a bill to nationalize the bankrupt railroads. The Association of American Railroads, which opposed nationalization, submitted an alternate proposal for a government-funded private company. Fullam kept the company operating into 1974, when, on January 2, after threatening a veto, President Nixon signed the Regional Rail Reorganization Act of 1973 into law. The 3R Act, as it was called, provided interim funding to the bankrupt railroads and defined a new Consolidated Rail Corporation under the AAR's plan.

sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amtrak
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conrail

[Caribbean Soul]

We all know the song by Arlo Guthrie.

Maybe it's just me, but I'd call it the song by Steve Goodman, made popular by Arlo Guthrie.

It's not just you...

BTW to get the story behind this line: "The conducter sings his song again, the passengers will please refrain." the best source is the book that comes with No Big Surprise: The Steve Goodman Anthology 2 CD set. That tale alone is well worth the price of the set.

[Bob Roberts]

We all know the song by Arlo Guthrie.

Maybe it's just me, but I'd call it the song by Steve Goodman, made popular by Arlo Guthrie.

Very true. Thankfully, the text book credits Steve Goodman as the composure and doesn't even mention Guthrie's name. Very good song, either way.

[rich_big]

I have known and loved that song for a while. I always thought it was an Arlo original. Learn something new every day.


I remember leaving a Grateful Dead concert and hearing someone say, referring to the encore Knockin on Heaven’s Door, how cool it was they 'covered a Guns n Roses song'.

[sonofabeach]

I like Willie's version the best.

[ejr]

There also is a thread somewhere on BN from a couple of months ago, where I cited and linked an article from The Chicago Sun-Times talking about the history of the song.

[Wino you know]

Fantastic song.

I have the versions by
Arlo Guthrie
Willie Nelson
Johnny Cash
AND
Jimmy Buffett (on a bootleg C.D.-Tinley Park, 9/29/01).

[Bob Roberts]

So.....

this train has got the disapearing railroad blues

was referring to the popularity of the train and the declining number of passengers


but I still can't figure out what this means..........

and the steel rail still ain't heard the news
the conducter sings his song again
the passengers will please refrain

[Big Jimmy]

So.....

this train has got the disapearing railroad blues

was referring to the popularity of the train and the declining number of passengers


but I still can't figure out what this means..........

and the steel rail still ain't heard the news
the conducter sings his song again
the passengers will please refrain

This is just a guess--- do not know... but maybe since the rail service was dying... the steel rail still ain't heard the news means that it really was dying... maybe there was less than 25 sacks of mail on the rail.

conductor sings his song again maybe its a song of sadness

the passengers will please refrain maybe its means refraining from riding the rails.

[chippewa]

"the passengers will please refrain"

Apparently the conductors used to have to remind passengers not to use the restrooms while the train was in the station. Which leads me to believe that the toilets on trains were nothing more than a hole in the floor.

much like a Dave Matthews tour bus

[rich_big]

here is another one on the 'is this a cover or orignal?' idea.

listening to 105.1 today, they said it is Johnny Russell's BD. then they said he wrote Act Naturally. I said, nooooooo, Buck Owens wrote that. for years I thought the Beatles wrote it, a few years ago I heard Buck sing it and it was credited it to him. now I find out the real author.....

[jimsig]

Amtrak's origins are traceable to the sustained decline of private passenger rail services in the United States from about 1920 to 1970. In 1971, in response to the decline, the Congress and the President of the United States created Amtrak. .......
President Nixon signed the Regional Rail Reorganization Act of 1973 into law. The 3R Act, as it was called, provided interim funding to the bankrupt railroads and defined a new Consolidated Rail Corporation under the AAR's plan.

sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amtrak
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conrail

Even after all of that with private companies not being able to make a dime from passenger service some idiot decided that AMTRAK was supposed to be for profit and out it into the law creating AMTRAK.

If you listen to Railroad Lady the lyric goes:
"South Station Boston to the stockyards of Austin
From the Florida sunshine to the New Orlean's rain
Now that the Railpax
Has taken the best tracks
She's tryin', just tryin' to get home again."

Railpax or Rail Passenger was originally the name of Amtrak.

As a railroad conductor I do like these two songs. I work on the Boston commuter system, I am the guy who says "All Aboard" and "Tickets please." I use to be with Amtrak when they held the contract to run the commuter system as well as working from Boston to New Haven.

[phjrsaunt]

History lesson, history lesson.

[dnw]

Love this song. Thanks for all the background information about it.

[Caribbean Soul]

"the passengers will please refrain"

Apparently the conductors used to have to remind passengers not to use the restrooms while the train was in the station. Which leads me to believe that the toilets on trains were nothing more than a hole in the floor.

much like a Dave Matthews tour bus

That's what Steve believed as well ... but apparently the train he was on used a different "system" to distribute the waste.