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Re: (erielack) EL way freight operations

my father retired from that dept at westinghouse in 1972, served as a consultant for a few years thereafter - and those punch cards were the cause of many a late night at the end of the month and quarter due to a damaged or incorrectly punched card. Amazing they still used them in 88.
JimELHS 197


- --- On Fri, 10/3/08, Tim Stuy <njmidland_@_verizon.net> wrote:

> From: Tim Stuy <njmidland_@_verizon.net>
> Subject: Re: (erielack) EL way freight operations
> To: "EL Mail List" <erielack_@_lists.railfan.net>, "Chuck Yungkurth" <raildata@comcast.net>
> Date: Friday, October 3, 2008, 12:28 PM
> You are not showing age with the IBM punch cards.  My
> incoming Freshman
> class at Stevens were the last to use punch cards while
> learning Fortran IV
> in 1980.  About 1988 or so I was at the Westinghouse TV
> picture tube factory
> in Horseheads, NY where an IBM punchcard was being affixed
> to the back of
> each tube.  In order to keep the card punching and card
> reading/sorting
> machines going they had a guy that got newspapers from all
> over the country
> to find auctions of other companies selling off their
> obsolete stuff.  I
> never got back there but I would assume the cards must have
> been
> discontinued shortly after my visit.
> 
> Tim
> 
> On Fri, Oct 3, 2008 at 12:12 PM, Chuck Yungkurth
> <raildata_@_comcast.net>wrote:
> 
> > As risk of diplaying my "geyserhood", I
> started working at IBM during the
> > punched car era ( "BT"...before transistor).
> >
> > To mess around with punch card you would need a card
> punch. This was a
> > bulky affair like a small desk, although I think I
> recall a small hand punch
> > for doing a single card. It was pretty easy to read
> what was on the card by
> > simply examining the holes punched.
> >
> > To use a card system you also would need a card sorter
> and a card printer.
> > All these were big, electromechanical devices run by
> motors and controlled
> > by relays.
> >
> > Might add that starting back in the 1920s the
> railroads were one of the
> > largest customers for IBM card systems. The Lackawanna
> had almost a whole
> > floor of the depot in Scranton full of clerks working
> at machine to punch
> > data into cards.
> >
> > Chuck Yungkurth
> > Boulder CO
> >
> >
> >
> 
> 
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