On Wed, Aug 5, 2020 at 02:47 PM, Dave Nelson wrote:

Anyone know when the term ”Block”, describing a set of cars headed to the same location, came into general use?  Or whether that concept is in use outside of North America?  

 

Dave Nelson

If you go back to early in the 20th Century, you will see more talk about "classification" than "blocking", but there really is not much difference.

Also in Droege Freight Terminals & Trains, you will find mention of a gravity yard built in Germany in 1846, so I think the Europeans understood the concept of classification in the mid-19th Century. Droege talks a lot about classification, but scanning the yard section, I did not see mention of "blocking". However my search was far from comprehensive.

My wild ass guess is that in the USA with the emphasis on fast freight in the 1920s,  "blocking" came in use as a term which the shipping public more easily understood. But like I said ....

If anyone can come up with the first usage of the term blocking, I'd like to know myself, but it probably post-dates the concept of "classification"

Jack Wyatt