A caboose houses the conductor and rear brakeman with their paperwork, tools and a stove, and lets them watch the train from a cupola or bay window. Through freights run with an end-of-train device instead, so cabooses work mainly as shoving platforms on locals and transfer jobs. Crummy, hack, van, cabin and buggy are all regional names for the same car.
They put a crummy on the rear of the transfer job so the conductor has somewhere to ride on those long shoves.
Western crews say crummy or hack, Canadian crews say van, and cabin car is the Pennsylvania term.
Also heard as
- caboose
- hack
- cabin car
- van
- buggy
- way car
Related terms
EOT
End-of-train device: a unit hung on the last car's coupler that reports rear brake pipe pressure and motion to the head end.
Local
A freight train that works the industries along a line, setting out and picking up cars at each customer.
Shove
To push cars with the locomotive behind them, as opposed to pulling them.