Larry Jackman wrote:

When I was a clerk on the Un Pac At Topeka and Salina Ks we never followed the rules. If a box car was not marked return to XXX when empty we used the empty cars as we wanted. The lead engine would put the empties in to a track. Then if 40 cars were needed for loading at various industries the house engine would pull the first 40 cars from which ever end of the track an spot them where ever they were ordered. Nobody cared who owned the car. To us it was an out bound load. Once in a while there was a note about a car going the wrong direction. We would read the note and continue as we wanted. Nobody were ever singled out or reprimanded for it.

Dan Holbrook, care to comment on a comparison to more recent times?

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