ROUSES_SeptOct2019_Magazine

Huey Long and tailgate train. "Ole War Skule" was a reference to LSU; photo: LSU University Archives Photographs Collection

liberality with the only prohibition falling on Election Day, a stipulation that restricted the putative voters in the Fitzmorris-Schiro race to beer only while the polls were open. Tennessee and Kentucky were a desert by comparison, allowing only beer and not on Sunday. But few surpassed Iowa’s vigilance against excessive joy, which limited sales to “near beer” only — and not even that on Sunday. The food served aboard a train was perhaps even more important than the booze, particularly on the longer hauls when passengers found themselves captive. Chefs labored over tightly packed galleys of gleaming, stainless steel counters, burners and ovens, turning out three meals a day for hundreds of passengers who could order from a surprisingly broad selection of menu items. They accomplished this feat without microwaves or the modern wholesale food supply chain, one that today yields almost any dish or component imaginable in pre-made, heat-and-serve freezer bags. An Illinois Central menu from the early 1960s featured five unique table d’hôte options for dinner including fresh fried fish, roast turkey, sirloin steak, smoked ham or breaded veal cutlet. And this was far less elaborate than what travelers found on dining car menus earlier in the century. Passengers ate from custom, silverplated

china that sat on white tablecloths and enjoyed a degree of style and service all but unattainable on even the most luxurious first-class airplanes today. This pleasant- ness came at a price, of course, with dinners costing roughly the modern equivalent of around $20. Not every Football Special train was soaked in alcohol or featured deluxe service, though. Universities often spon- sored student trips for special games. Among the passengers aboard such trains one found the team, marching band and the cheerleaders. When the University of Southwestern Louisiana (today’s University of Louisiana Lafayette) headed to Mobile on the Southern Pacific to play Spring Hill College, they even stopped in New Orleans, where the band staged a small parade down Canal Street. Photos taken at the time depict the excited students making the best of their long ride in coach seats. At LSU, the vaguely Orwellian-sounding “Morale Commission” sold as many as 600 seats over the course of the summer for a big fall game, much like it did in 1959 when the Kansas City Southern carried students and faculty to a contest against Baylor being hosted in Shreveport. Coffee and donuts greeted arriving passengers who later received a box lunch on the way to the event. The $15 ticket not only included

admission to the game, but also furnished a college memory most fondly recall decades later. It is sometimes hard to believe that we are today as far removed in time from the passengers who rode the Illinois Central to see Billy Cannon as those cadets who in 1893 rode to New Orleans for the first LSU game against Tulane. Football itself has changed considerably, and it remains to be seen how the game and the way we get there will change in another 60 years. Looking back, there is a temptation to quote Arlo Guthrie or Willie Nelson and lament our “disappearing railroad blues,” but our age for better or worse is a different one, far removed from the human mechanics, social infrastructure and political reasonings of domestic rail travel. Yet there was something to be said for joining 500 compatriots on a train trip to cheer on your team, void of the traffic gridlock and drunk driving; maybe the experience would just bring us all a little closer together.

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SEPTEMBER•OCTOBER 2019