Airbrakes on the Norfolk and Ocean View Railroad

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Airbrakes on the Norfolk and Ocean View Railroad
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"...Mr. C.E. Finch, agent of the Norfolk and Western Railroad, who had been seated on the last car of the train [the Norfolk and Ocean View RR, when it crashed into Tanner's Creek in 1895], testified that 'as

Hampton Roads Times Magazine
HamptonRoadsTimes.com

a matter of course the electric cars are lighter than those propelled by a steam engine; that the natural effect of an air brake applied suddenly is to stop a car quickly, but he did not think would make a car jump the track…. It is not considered prudent to run passenger trains regularly where the only brakes to be applied were in the forward car [i.e., the lead (motor) car] on a grade of eighty-five to 100 feet to the mile, but on a dead level he would do so. In a level country like this one, car with an air brake could control two additional cars.'..." (Landmark, Aug. 16, 1895)