The 20th Century Limited was an express passenger train operated by the New York Central Railroad from 1902 to 1967, during which time it would become known as a "National Institution" and the "Most Famous Train in the World". In the year of its last run, The New York Times said that it "...was known to railroad buffs for 65 years as the world's greatest train".[1] The train traveled between Grand Central Terminal in New York City and LaSalle Street Station in Chicago, Illinois along the railroad's famed "Water Level Route". The NYC inaugurated this train as direct competition to the Pennsylvania Railroad, aimed at upper class as well as business travelers between the two cities. It made few station stops along the way and used track pans enroute to take water at speed. Beginning on June 15, 1938, when it got streamlined equipment, it made the 960-mile journey in 16 hours, departing New York City westbound at 6:00 P.M. Eastern Time and arriving at Chicago's LaSalle St. Station the following morning at 9:00 A.M. Central Time, averaging 60 miles per hour (97 km/h).[2] For a brief period after World War II, the eastward schedule was shortened to 15½ hours.
The 20th Century was known for its style, which has been described as "spectacularly understated ... suggesting exclusivity and sophistication",[3] as well as for its speed; passengers walked to and from the train on a plush, crimson carpet which was rolled out in New York and Chicago and was specially designed for the 20th Century Limited. "Getting the red carpet treatment" passed into the language from this memorable practice.[4] "Transportation historians", said the writers of The Art of the Streamliner, "consistently rate the 1938 edition of the Century to be the world's ultimate passenger conveyance—at least on the ground".[5]
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Inaugurated on June 17, 1902 by patent medicine salesman turned passenger agent George Henry Daniels, the train offered a barbershop and secretarial services.[6] The train arrived in Chicago at Union Station three minutes ahead of schedule. At that time, the trip took twenty hours, cutting four hours off the time previously required. The New York Times report laid great stress on the routine nature of the trip, with no special procedures being followed and no special efforts being made to break records. It stated that there "...was no excitement along the way," and quoted a railroad official as saying "...it is a perfectly practical run and will be continued," and the engineer (William Gates) as saying "This schedule can be made without any difficulty. I can do it every time, barring accidents."
The schedule dropped to 18 hours in June 1905, the same month that the trained wrecked (June 21, 1905) on the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern R.R. line at Mentor, Ohio. After more changes it reverted to 20 hours in 1912 and was unchanged until 1932. In 1935 it dropped to 16 hours 30 min each way, and to 16 hours flat on June 15, 1938, when lightweight cars took over.
In its heyday, regular passengers included Theodore Roosevelt, William Jennings Bryan, Lillian Russell, "Diamond Jim" Brady, the elder J. P. Morgan, Enrico Caruso, and Nellie Melba.
In the 1920s the New York to Chicago fare was $32.70 plus the extra fare of $9.60, plus the Pullman charge (e.g. $9 for a lower berth), for a total charge of $51.30, equal to $643 today. For that one received a bed closed off from the aisle by curtains; a compartment to oneself would have cost much more. In 1928, the peak year, the train earned revenue of $10 million and was believed to be the most profitable train in the world. Also in 1928, Erwin "Cannon Ball" Baker, who eventually became the first commissioner of NASCAR, raced the 20th Century Limited from New York to Chicago in an automobile, beating the train.
In 1938 industrial designer Henry Dreyfuss was commissioned by the New York Central to design streamlined train sets in Art Deco style, with the locomotive and passenger cars rendered in blues and grays (the colors of the New York Central). The streamlined sets were inaugurated on June 15, 1938. His design was probably the most famous American passenger train of all time.[6] As were many similar long haul express passenger trains through the mid 1960s, the "20th Century Ltd" carried an East Divsion (E.D.) Railway Post Office (R.P.O.) car operated by the Railway Mail Service (RMS) of the United States Post Office Department which was staffed by USPOD clerks as a "fast mail" on each of its daily runs.[7] The mails received by, postmarked, processed, sorted, and dispatched from the "20th Cemtury Ltd's" RPOs were either canceled or backstamped (as appropriate) during the trip by hand applied circular date stamps (CDS) reading "N.Y. & CHI. R.P.O. E.D. 20TH CEN.LTD." and the train's number: "25" (NY-CHI) or "26" (CH-NY).
After the Second World War a new trainset was commissioned, pulled by diesel-electric locomotives. The new set was ceremonially inaugurated by General Dwight D. Eisenhower in September, 1948. It was this set that was featured in postwar films such as North by Northwest and The Band Wagon.
For much of its history before 1957 the all-Pullman train made station stops only at Grand Central Terminal and Croton-Harmon for New York–area passengers and LaSalle Street Station and Englewood for Chicago-area passengers. These traveled in as many as seven sections, of which the first was named The Advance 20th Century Limited.[6][8] If trains ran on schedule they would pass halfway not far west of Buffalo Central Terminal. The tracks of the New York and Harlem Railroad were used from Grand Central to the Spuyten Duyvil and Port Morris Railroad, which it used to reach the New York Central's main line along the Water Level Route, north along the Hudson River and west to Buffalo, then southwest and west on the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway along the south shore of Lake Erie, and north into Chicago, merging with the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad at Englewood. In case of track closures, alternate routes such as the New York and Harlem Railroad from New York to Chatham, NY and Boston & Albany Railroad from there to Albany, NY, or New York, West Shore and Buffalo Railroad between Schenectady and Buffalo could be used. On one occasion, about 1961, the train detoured over the "Auburn Road" between Syracuse and Rochester, NY, due to a freight derailment blocking the main line west of Syracuse.
The 20th Century Limited (and specifically, car #10006) was used in the filming of Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest. The interior of the car as seen in the film was actually a set built by MGM Studios.
By the late 1950s the train was in decline. On December 2, 1967, at 6:00 P.M., the half-full train left Grand Central Terminal track 34 for the last time.[1] As always, carnations were given to men boarding the train, and perfume and flowers to the women.[1] The next day, it straggled into LaSalle Street Station in Chicago 9 hours 50 minutes late, due to a freight derailment near Conneaut, Ohio, necessitating a detour over the Nickel Plate (New York, Chicago and St. Louis) Railroad.
Today Amtrak operates a New York–Chicago train named the Lake Shore Limited. The only routing differences are as follows: at the New York terminus, it runs to Penn Station. At Whiting, Indiana (near Chicago) it switches to the former Pennsylvania Railroad's Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway, terminating at Union Station.
Westbound train #25- 20th Century Limited, on March 17, 1938; Sampled at New York, New York[9]
Westbound train #25- 20th Century Limited, on March 30, 1965, sampled at Cleveland, Ohio[10]
Eastbound train #26-20th Century Limited, on September 6, 1943; Sampled at Chicago, Illinois.[11]
Eastbound train #38- Advance 20th Century Limited, on February 7, 1930; Sampled at Chicago, Illinois.[12]
The 20th Century Limited was the setting for a Broadway musical composed by Cy Coleman and written by Betty Comden and Adolph Green entitled On the Twentieth Century, about the romantic complications of a beautiful actress and an egocentric producer/director. Madeline Kahn and John Cullum starred in the short-running production, whose spectacular production design featured both the lavish Art Deco details of the time period as well innovative staging to open up what could be cramped quarters inside a train car. The musical was based on the 1932 Ben Hecht-Charles MacArthur stage play of the same subject, which in 1934 they adapted as a film entitled Twentieth Century, directed by Howard Hawks, with Carole Lombard and John Barrymore in the lead roles. The train also figured prominently as a setting for major scenes in both Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest and George Roy Hill's The Sting.