The marvel of all this is that the terminal, which seems so intricate, so baffling, is under the control of one man—a man to whom it is as simple as the ten fingers of his hands. This man is keeper of the city gate. His watch-house is situated just without the big and squatty train-shed. It is long and narrow, glass-lined and sun-filled. Through its windows he keeps track of those who come and go.
“There’s Second Seventeen, with them school teachers coming back from the convention out at Kansas City. Put her in on Twenty-one so’s to give the baggage folks a chance. Them women travel with lots of duds.”
These are orders to his assistants and orders in that watch tower are rarely repeated. The assistants are in shirt-sleeves like their chief, for the sun-filled tower is broiling hot. They nod to one another, click small levers, and Second Seventeen—a long train of sleeping-cars coming into the city in the hot moisture of the early June morning—is sent easily and carefully in upon track Twenty-one in the train-shed of the terminal. There you have the explanation of that order that was meaningless to you but a moment ago. Track Twenty-one is nearest the in-baggage room of the station. With two cars, piled roof-high with heavy trunks, the thoughtfulness of the towerman in sending the special upon track Twenty-one will be appreciated by the baggage handlers. A vast amount of manual labor will be saved; and that counts, even upon a cool day.
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The Northwestern’s monumental new terminal on the West Side of Chicago
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The Union Station at Washington
This keeper of the city gate represents the survival of the fittest, the very cream of his profession. The chances are that he began his railroading off in some lonely way station on a branch line, developed qualities that brought him to the quick and favorable attention of his chiefs, then advanced steadily along the rapid lines of promotion that railroading holds for some men. He is one of three men, who, for certain hours, hold the keeping of the complicated city gate within their own well-drilled minds. The tower is the mind, the brain centre, the ganglion, of that city gate; but the tower is only wondrously mechanical, after all; the mind of the careful towerman is the mind that controls all the mechanism.