@Number 90 posted:Unofficially (and in violation of Operating Rules) there have been, and are, train and engine service employees who have a pistol in their bag. However, it is not the majority of employees who do this. Normally, it is for protection, and almost never is shown to anyone. When there were open agencies (stations) and towers, many Clerks and Operators had a hogleg in the drawer in case of trouble. Agencies which sold passenger tickets had a cash drawer with a fair amount of money in it. Being alone at night, in a 24-hour office or aboard a stopped train, sometimes exposes railroad employees to increased risk of personal danger, and there are a few armed assaults or robberies every year. Many Officials and Signal Maintainers who have to go out onto their territory at night, have a pistol under the seat of their vehicle. I never asked our Track Supervisors or Signal Maintainers if they were armed. Likewise I never asked any crewmen. It is not a problem.
Except for a shooting between two employees over a woman in Silsbee, Texas, around 1975-80, I do not personally know of an employee discharging a firearm at another person. It is very rare.
When railroads ran pay cars, and paid employees at remote locations in cash*, the pay car was accompanied by at least one railroad Special Agent, who was armed. Pay cars disappeared in the 1950's.
* Such as traveling bridge and track gangs, as well as some remote locations where there was a telegraph office but no town and no bank.
This doesn't surprise me. There's a saying -- "Better to be judged by 12 than carried by six!" which is the mindset behind carrying a firearm against law or policy. Just sayin'
