Jump Suits/coveralls vs. Bib Overalls... - Model Railroader Magazine
It was a matter of personal choice since the employee bought his own uniform. I liked the coveralls and wore levis and a tee shirt under them. Being sure to wear the new one to break in over the winter so that they would be cooler in the summer as they wore out.. Some of my friends wore the bibs, mostly from the old schoooolll (ex steamers). It really depended on the type of job. If I knew I would be working in the air room repairing air brake equipment, I wore old street clothes. If I was pulling head, liners and pistons or general running repair and or inspecting locomotives, it was coveralls.
Usually the coveralls and shirt and pants one wore underneath them were washed at a laundrymat in the washing machine marked "for greasers only"as the creater compound ( traction motor lube) was a tad gooie and stickey. It stuck to the inside of our washing machine. Of which my mind can still hear my late wife screeming as she was removing the white sheets, with those black creater poka-dots on them, seems I ran a load of coveralls beforhand..LOL.
Train crews wore street clothes as a general rule, however a few wore the nicer jumpsuits and a few of the old timer engeneers wore bibs.
Depending on the railroad, they swiched to plastic saftey hats. WP was in the Mid 70s.
Each craft (machinist, electricians, boilermaker, pipe fitters, laborers and of course the white hats, formen.) Painting your workers hats will give a bit of purpos to them
we really thought at the time those plastic hats were a pain to live with. We all wore the old tall railroad hats ( like a baseball hat, but the top was taller) Reason being the roundhouse was poorley lit, we stuck our flashlight under the brim of the hat so as we worked the light would shine on the work area. Really handy when working inside a F3 or F7 during maintaince and setting engine speeds in the govenor.
Hope this was of some help....John
