Radio Communications in Steam Era

OK, I'm familiar with radio communication between diesel engine conductors and yardmasters or dispatchers. But I wonder how it was in steam era? How steam locomotive engineer of fireman comunicated with yardmaster or dispatcher? I doubt they have some walkie-talkie, maybe later in 1940s or 1950s.

Sorry for possible poor question, but I never had heard about anything about that .

richardspitzer wrote:OK, I'm familiar with radio communication between diesel engine conductors and yardmasters or dispatchers. But I wonder how it was in steam era? How steam locomotive engineer of fireman comunicated with yardmaster or dispatcher? I doubt they have some walkie-talkie, maybe later in 1940s or 1950s.

Sorry for possible poor question, but I never had heard about anything about that .

Not by radio for the most part. They would stop at a wayside company telephone (private system, not connected to the public switched network). The telephone cabinets were located at stations, throats of yards, many signals, etc. Even well into the 1960's radio had not been adopted by many railroads as they continued to rely on the company telephones.

Interesting, thank you for your answer

Im not 100% sure specific to railroads - but going way back (30s,40s,etc) a part of what is now the AM radio band was actually used for two way radio

Some places like yards had loud speakers where the person in charge could tell a switchman how to long up a movement. Out on the road the railroad telephone system was used, but there were also used the station agents and operators. Now days we get orders directly from the train dispatcher. In the old days the dispatcher would either phone or telegraph an operator. The operator would put out a red order board. The train crew would get the order hooped up to them.

Engineer Spike wrote:The operator would put out a red order board. The train crew would get the order hooped up to them.

So the operator had several chances how to give an order to the train crew - at stations, yards, signals, etc. It also includes possible changes - to give a priority to other train etc...

how on earth would it even be possible to use a radio over the racket of a steam locomotive at full speed? You know, those guys stuffed cotton waste into their ears for a reason!

Isn't it the same question for engineers of diesel (especially the old ones) engines?

Quoting from
https://www.facebook.com/groups/abandon ... 939411812/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; :

One hundred years ago the first wireless messages were exchanged between stations in Binghamton, Scranton, and a train travelling 60 miles per hour between the two cities. Called aerograms at the time and sent in Morse code, in today’s terms they were text messages. The date was November 21, 1913, and the world’s first test of wireless communication between fixed stations and a moving train was a success. It was a great day.

http://nyslandmarks.com/treasures/13jan.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Interesting, thank you!