The Silver Streak | |
---|---|
Directed by | Tommy Atkins |
Written by | H.W. Hanemann Jack O'Donnell Roger Whately |
Produced by | Glendon Alvine |
Starring | Charles Starrett Sally Blane Hardie Albright William Farnum Irving Pichel Arthur Lake |
Cinematography | J. Roy Hunt |
Edited by | Fred Kundtson |
Music by | Al Colombo |
Distributed by | RKO Radio Pictures |
Release dates | |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
The Silver Streak is a 1934 American black-and-white film drama from RKO, loosely based on the record-setting "dawn-to-dusk" run of the Pioneer Zephyr on May 26, 1934. [2] The film stars Sally Blane, Charles Starrett, William Farnum, and Hardie Albright.
The original Zephyr train was used for the film's exterior shots, while interior scenes were filmed on a Hollywood sound stage. For the film, the "Burlington Route" nameplate on the train's nose was replaced with one that read "Silver Streak". One of the film's promotional items was a small book called The Story of the Silver Streak, illustrated with black-and-white film stills. [3]
In 2006 Con-Cor International, Ltd. produced scale models of the Pioneer Zephyr. A limited number (350 HO scale and 250 N scale) of these bore the film's Silver Streak nameplate instead of the standard Burlington Route nameplate.
In the face of seriously declining railroad passenger travel, engineer Tom Caldwell presents to the president of the CB&D Railroad, [4] B.J. Dexter, a design for a revolutionary streamlined diesel-electric train that will increase efficiency and lower all costs. Dexter opposes change, however, and the railroad's conservative board of directors agrees with him, rejecting Tom's concept. He quits in frustration. Sure that Tom's theory is sound, Dexter's daughter, Ruth, convinces Ed Tyler, a locomotive manufacturer, to look at Tom's design. Tyler is impressed and initiates immediate construction of the new train. Soon, Tom and his team prepare the newly named Silver Streak for a well-publicized trial run with Dexter and Ruth aboard as passengers.
The new train fails to attain even half of its projected speed of 100 miles per hour (160 km/h), however, and is easily overtaken by a steam-powered freight train hauled by CB&Q Class O-1-a No. 4990, a Class O-1-a 2-8-2 'Mikado' type steam engine. An angry Dexter tells Tyler that all the Silver Streak is good for is an exhibit at the Century of Progress Exposition to help recover his advertising expenses. Tom is baffled by the train's failure since all the engine components worked perfectly during assembly, but Dexter stubbornly insists that the concept will never work. Furious with Dexter's attitude, Tom quarrels with Ruth. Her brother Allen, who supported Tom's idea, tells his father that he is now quitting the railroad to take a job as a civil engineer with the Six Companies, Inc. constructing the Boulder Dam.
Tom and Bronte, the diesel engine's builder, discover that the electrical generator acquired for the Silver Streak has a manufacturing defect. After correcting it, the engine produces even greater power than he had earlier predicted. He tries to telephone Ruth with the good news to reconcile with her, but she has left Chicago to travel by train to California. Ruth discovers en route that infantile paralysis (polio) has broken out among the dam's construction crew and detours to the site only to find that Allen has contracted the disease. When a doctor informs her that Allen will die within 24 hours unless he receives treatment with an iron lung respirator, Ruth telephones her father to have one shipped to the dam by air. Dexter is told that a single iron lung is too heavy for any air transport to carry and cannot be disassembled. Tom and Tyler persuade Dexter to take a gamble on the Silver Streak, as it is now Allen's only hope.
With less than twenty hours to travel 2,000 miles (3,200 km), the Silver Streak is given emergency track clearance all the way after picking up a shipment of seven Drinker Respirators in Chicago. Tom includes Bronte on his crew, unaware that he is now wanted for attempted murder. As radio broadcasts track the progress of the "epic errand of mercy", the Silver Streak breaks records as it races south, against time, through the night. Nearing Boulder City, however, Bronte is revealed to be a wanted fugitive and throws the engine breakers to stop the train so he can escape. Instead, this causes the Silver Streak to run out-of-control at very high speeds. After a struggle, Tom knocks Bronte unconscious and finally regains control of the runaway train just before it arrives (early) at the Boulder City station. After the iron lungs are unloaded on the train platform, Ruth and Tom see each other and reconcile, sealing their relationship with a kiss.
The Pioneer Zephyr was chosen for the film after the California-based Union Pacific Railroad declined to provide its high-speed passenger train, the M-10000. The plot element of the infantile paralysis epidemic took advantage of public fears of the disease rampant in 1934 when more than 1,000 cases were diagnosed in Los Angeles alone. Location filming of the Zephyr was done over a two-day period in September 1934 at the CB&Q yards in Galesburg, Illinois. The train was renamed The Silver Streak for the film, which had been a discarded choice of CB&Q president Ralph Budd, and the local high school adopted it as the nickname for its athletic teams. [5]
The film made a profit of $107,000, [6] approximately $2,196,000 in February 2022 dollars.
A streamliner is a vehicle incorporating streamlining in a shape providing reduced air resistance. The term is applied to high-speed railway trainsets of the 1930s to 1950s, and to their successor "bullet trains". Less commonly, the term is applied to fully faired upright and recumbent bicycles. As part of the Streamline Moderne trend, the term was applied to passenger cars, trucks, and other types of light-, medium-, or heavy-duty vehicles, but now vehicle streamlining is so prevalent that it is not an outstanding characteristic. In land speed racing, it is a term applied to the long, slender, custom built, high-speed vehicles with enclosed wheels.
The Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad was a railroad that operated in the Midwestern United States. Commonly referred to as the Burlington Route, the Burlington, CB&Q, or as the Q, it operated extensive trackage in the states of Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Wyoming, and also in Texas through subsidiaries Colorado and Southern Railway, Fort Worth and Denver Railway, and Burlington-Rock Island Railroad. Its primary connections included Chicago, Minneapolis–Saint Paul, St. Louis, Kansas City, and Denver. Because of this extensive trackage in the midwest and mountain states, the railroad used the advertising slogans "Everywhere West", "Way of the Zephyrs", and "The Way West".
Silver Streak is a 1976 American thriller comedy film, about a murder on a Los Angeles-to-Chicago train journey. It was directed by Arthur Hiller, written by Colin Higgins, and stars Gene Wilder, Jill Clayburgh, and Richard Pryor, with Patrick McGoohan, Ned Beatty, Clifton James, Ray Walston, Scatman Crothers, and Richard Kiel in supporting roles. The film score is by Henry Mancini. This film marked the first pairing of Wilder and Pryor, who were later paired in three other films.
The EMD E5 is a 2,000-horsepower (1,500 kW), A1A-A1A passenger train-hauling diesel locomotive manufactured by Electro-Motive Corporation, and its corporate successor, General Motors' Electro-Motive Division (EMD) of La Grange, Illinois, and produced exclusively for the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, and its subsidiaries, during 1940 and 1941. The E5 was distinguished from the otherwise very similar E3, E4 and E6 by being clad in polished stainless steel to match the Burlington's Zephyr trains. It also featured unique small grill-like ornamentation on both sides of the upper headlight. Like the other pre-war models in the E-series, the E5 had a sloping “slant nose” and it was equipped with two headlights — a regular stationary headlight above a gyrating Mars signal light. The E5 was the sixth in the EMD E-unit series.
A dome car is a type of railway passenger car that has a glass dome on the top of the car where passengers can ride and see in all directions around the train. It also can include features of a coach, lounge car, dining car, sleeping car or observation. Beginning in 1945, dome cars were primarily used in the United States and Canada, though a small number were constructed in Europe for Trans Europ Express service.
The Budd Company was a 20th-century metal fabricator, a major supplier of body components to the automobile industry, and a manufacturer of stainless steel passenger rail cars, airframes, missile and space vehicles, and various defense products.
The Pioneer Zephyr is a diesel-powered trainset built by the Budd Company in 1934 for the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad (CB&Q), commonly known as the Burlington Route. The trainset was the second internal combustion-powered streamliner built for mainline service in the United States, the first such train powered by a diesel engine, and the first to enter revenue service.
Sally Blane was an American actress who appeared in more than 100 movies.
The Denver Zephyr was a streamlined passenger train operated by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad between Chicago, Illinois, and Denver, Colorado. In peak years it ran to Colorado Springs. It operated from 1936 to 1973. The Denver Zephyr continued operating after the Burlington Northern Railroad merger in 1970. BN conveyed the train to Amtrak in 1971; Amtrak merged it with the Denver–Oakland City of San Francisco to form the San Francisco Zephyr and dropped the "Denver" name in 1973.
The Ak-Sar-Ben Zephyr was a streamlined passenger train operated by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad (CB&Q) between Lincoln, Nebraska and Chicago, Illinois, United States. The first version operated from 1940 to 1947; a revived service operated from 1953 to 1970. The "Ak-Sar-Ben" portion of name was created by spelling Nebraska (Neb-ras-ka) backwards and taken from a fraternal organization of the same name. "Zephyr" was a name applied by the CB&Q to many of its trains, beginning with the Pioneer Zephyr in 1934. The name derived from "Zephyrus", the Greek god of the west wind.
The Mark Twain Zephyr was an early diesel four-unit articulated zephyr train that was similar to the Pioneer Zephyr in style. The train was built by the Budd Company and was powered by a diesel engine produced by the Winton Engine Company. The train was named after the renowned author Mark Twain because it was scheduled to provide service from St. Louis, Missouri to Burlington, Iowa via his hometown Hannibal, Missouri. The train's exterior structure used stainless steel, and had a "shovel nose" front.
The 400 was a named passenger train operated by the Chicago and North Western Railway between Chicago and Saint Paul, with a final stop in Minneapolis. The train took its name from the schedule of 400 miles between the cities in 400 minutes, and was also a nod to "The Four Hundred Club", a term coined by Ward McAllister to refer to the social elite of New York City in the late 19th century. It was an express train with limited stops between Chicago and the Twin Cities. The "400" ran from 1935 to 1963 on the Chicago to Twin Cities route. The C&NW later named their other passenger trains using the number "400".
The Slumbercoach is an 85-foot-long, 24 single room, eight double room streamlined sleeping car. Built in 1956 by the Budd Company for the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad for service on the Denver Zephyr, subsequent orders were placed in 1958 and 1959 by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and Missouri Pacific Railroad for the Texas Eagle/National Limited, then in 1959 by the Northern Pacific Railway for its North Coast Limited and also the New York Central Railroad for use on the 20th Century Limited.
William Farnum was an American actor. He was a star of American silent cinema, and he became one of the highest-paid actors during this time.
The Branson Scenic Railway is a heritage railroad in Branson, Missouri. The Ozark Zephyr, Branson Scenic Railway's historic zephyr train, departs from an old depot in downtown Branson and operates in the scenic Ozark Mountains for an approximate 40-mile (64 km) round trip.
The Silver Streak Zephyr was a train service of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad in the American midwest. It ran from 1940 through 1959.
The Wisconsin Great Northern Railroad operates a historic train line centered in Trego, Wisconsin on 26 miles of track, between Spooner, Wisconsin and Springbrook, Wisconsin. It was founded on April 1, 1997. The line runs dinner trains, bed and breakfast trains, and scenic sight seeing tours.
The Silver Star Cafe is a restaurant in the west end of Port Hedland, Western Australia. Its kitchen and lounge area are housed within a historic preserved railway carriage, and it has an alfresco deck alongside. A project of BHP Billiton Iron Ore, with support from Town of Port Hedland, Boom Logistics and Laing O'Rourke, the cafe was officially opened by the Premier of Western Australia, Colin Barnett, on 26 October 2010.
The 7131 was an Argentine diesel multiple unit class, first produced in Italy by Fiat Ferroviaria, then licensed to Argentine company Materfer to continue the manufacturing. Those railcars were introduced in the 1960s to replace the existing rolling stock of most of the urban services of Argentina, such as Roca, Urquiza, Mitre and Sarmiento lines.
Chicago, Burlington and Quincy No. 4000, also known as Aeolus, is a preserved S-4a class 4-6-4 "Hudson" steam locomotive that was originally built by Baldwin in 1930 as S-4 locomotive No. 3002. It was primarily used to pull fast passenger trains before it was rebuilt by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad in 1937 to be re-classified as an S-4a with Streamlining, and it was renumbered 4000 in the process. The streamlining was removed during World War II, and the locomotive was later downgraded to secondary passenger and mail service. In 1956, No. 4000 pulled two excursion trains out of Chicago, Illinois before it was retired. The locomotive was donated to the city of La Crosse, Wisconsin in 1963, and it remains on static display in Copeland Park, as of 2024.