I loved this movie. I enjoyed the realism in character, interactions with old experts and new innovators battling heads over how things are done when new technology is introduced. So many people don't realize how real these kinds of conversations were, and still are today. I love cutting edge new innovations, but at the same time the social and political structure of our world today, makes me more like that older engineer, "This aint Railroad'n,,,, this is insanity!!!"
The acting was a little wooden though, but then this was a few years after sound and they were still learning how too act it. But yeah the tech and atmosphere were honest as the diesel Streamliners were advanced and new. The basic plot is still quite relevant today, an epic "errand of mercy" with medical equipment with seconds too spare happens now and then. Thinking of medical gear the Iron Lung was new then too.
21:26 "its like i said, you can't beat steam" 19:34 CB&Q Mikado 4990 speeding down the rails looked amazing, and that 5 chime whistle sounded beautiful
Today 5 of May 2020, I came here to forget about pandemic. @38:04 Now, I’m trying to get away from the word quarantine, and it keeps following me. What gives? I’m going crazy.
That cross-country run had a lot of very close shaves- I counted 3 times when the Silver Streak would have piled up if it had been moving just a little faster-!!!
I heard that this short inspired the Looney Toons cartoon short, Porky’s Railroad. Where Porky and his steam engine, Toots, race against The Silver Fish to prove that they’re still reliable.
WOW!!! Does this film fit in with our current times and pandemic now! Who would have thought. BTW, I think what they refer to in the film as infantile paralysis is what we now call polio, and before the vaccine, it meant, I believe, being put in an iron lung - sometimes ? or often, forever.
Interesting the character “Caldwell”. The 1976 movie. Gene Wilders character was George Caldwell. A coincidence??? Lol. The festive music at 30:00. Is the same music used in King Kong. Another RKO film from 1933.
My favorite scene in this film was when the steam engine passed by the streamliner. I couldn't help but laugh at how the old outran and outpulled the new like that.
Wow, what an exciting story; it seems that so often throughout History, essential progress is achieved through a combination of one-person’s Vision - combined with Miraculous-Circumstances - which together make it possible! (I believe that both those-elements originate from the same Source!!!) Thank-You for this!
At one time I used to cross a similar bridge , a shortcut for work , had to time it just right so I would'nt get caught in the middle , few trains , many boats . 😊
Looks like RKO had stock footage of the Burlington Zephyr, the 1933 Chicago World's Fair, and Hoover Dam under construction, and wrote a movie around it.
The first Rocket train was out ran buy a horse and carriage and everyone thought trains would amount to nothing. The problem with good ideas is they sometimes do not work the first time.
53:31 -- "Don't worry about these curves, Dan. This is a different kind of train." Right. This kind of train is not affected by inconvenient laws of physics such as inertia.
19:22 Interesting the Silver Streak is being paced by a DeSoto Airflow, which had been introduced in 1934, the most streamlined production car at the time.
@@BackSeatHump I'm not so sure about that- "the shortest distance between two points is a straight line"- and when you are flying, you are unaffected by land barriers!!!
13:35 The machanic with glasses & fedora sounds like Dagwood Bumstead . Could that be Arthur Lake under that grime ? 47:00 A man skating on stilt ice skates , how cool is that ? 😊 This movie entertains on different levels , I would recommend this movie to friends . So much better than " Streamline " . People getting motion sickness imagine if they had a modern Bullet Train . 😅
A great shame they didn't make the Pioneer sets double - ended, with a power car at both ends sandwiching articulated trailers. They'd have had a great product for high-speed interurban service, that didn't need overhead wires or third rail. It could even have been built to run on electricity where provided, as it had electric traction motor transmission, for all or part of its journey. Rather like the FL-9's. In the UK I worked on the DEMUs, Diesel Electric Multiple Units. These were long-lived, characterful, reliable machines, and only disappeared when the health and safety Nazis made it impossible to run them on the main line.
While the pioneers were not power cars on both ends, other Interurbans did have them, but they were electric. Interurbans did not survive because of lack of double ended diesel engines but mainly highways.
Actually, they did do this. There a train was called the Electroliner that looks almost exactly how you described this and exactly how it works-almost.
@@jamesf791 you zre right. The Chicago, North Shore and Milwaukee actually had a Pioneer Zephyr-like train, the Electroliner, that was double ended with cabs on both ends.
HECK, ALL NEW TECHNOLOGIES HAVE TEETHING PROBLEMS- LOOK UP THE STORIES OF ROBERT FULTON AND THE STREAMBOAT, SAMUEL F.B. MORSE AND THE TELEGRAPH, AND THOMAS EDISON AND THE INCANDESCENT LIGHT BULB!!! REMARKABLY, THE SILVER STREAK MORE THAN REDEEMED ITSELF, AND IT DELIVERED WHEN IT REALLY MATTERED!!!
From what I gather, it was a problem in the generator-an excitation circuit that was just a teeny bit too far apart. I remember one time fixing a portable light plant with a similar issue.
Charles Sterrett before he became the Durango Kid in B Westerns. and "Big Boy Williams before he too becazme a cowboy star. (cant figure out the nail puzzle)
this part is factual. the biggest transport plane in the US was the Fokker F-32. only 7 were built, they cruised at just 120mph, and they were so unreliable they were grounded by the government in 1931.
I got about halfway through the film, but the audio quality is so poor that it all comes out as mumbling. If there were captions, that could be worked around.
The man offered $200, 000. oo to build an experemintal design in 1935 . In todays money that would be $44,286,569.oo . Unbeliveable , don't you wish a dollar still had that much clout . 😢😢
Zephyr was a dog. That Burlington mike looked great pulling ahead of that oil burner. Any modern day super power steam could have and did put the EMD boys in there place. The Burlington "Gopher" had nothing on a Milwaukee Hudson or Atlantic. N&W Northern or Santa Fe Hudson. For that matter a NYC Hudson, Niagara or Mohawk. Diesels starting a train they can't pull. Steam engines pulling a train they can't start.
DOES ANYBODY RECOGNIZE ARTHUR LAKE- WHO IS PLAYING CRAWFORD, THE NERD? ARTHUR LAKE WENT ON TO PLAY DAGWOOD IN THE LATER "BLONDIE" MOVIES!!! ...LOOKING UP ARTHUR LAKE IS WHAT STEERED ME TO THIS MOVIE!!!
I love the way the drivers can is,not partitioned off the generator and diesel engine? The heat and noise would be to say the least unbearable. Very corny but that was films in 1935 in general
That's the way gas/electric & diesel electrics were in the old days particularly with doodlebugs and box cabs.. Yes the noise and heat from the Winton 201a would be almost unbridgeable. This set I believe is in the Museum of Science & Industry in Chicago.
Who are these extra people? I thought there were no passengers..... The audio was off through much of the movie. In some places it was worse than others.
@@trainguy111 The movies always lied to us, at 17:53 a whistle is heard but it is not the sound of the machine, I think it was edited. At 2:00 of the following video you hear the real horn ... I think ... czcams.com/video/k04asHt2Kg0/video.html
Yeah a great ending he gave his all thanks to the help of the other train workers the bad guy did not cause loss of lives,bless the Lord,for His protection,woohoo!!!!!!!😀😁
I love how in “The Players” part of the staff credits, they’ve put the Burlington Zephyr itself as an actor playing “The Silver Streak”
I loved this movie. I enjoyed the realism in character, interactions with old experts and new innovators battling heads over how things are done when new technology is introduced. So many people don't realize how real these kinds of conversations were, and still are today. I love cutting edge new innovations, but at the same time the social and political structure of our world today, makes me more like that older engineer, "This aint Railroad'n,,,, this is insanity!!!"
The acting was a little wooden though, but then this was a few years after sound and they were still learning how too act it. But yeah the tech and atmosphere were honest as the diesel Streamliners were advanced and new. The basic plot is still quite relevant today, an epic "errand of mercy" with medical equipment with seconds too spare happens now and then. Thinking of medical gear the Iron Lung was new then too.
WHY IS THE SYNCHRONIZATION SO LOUSY???
@@artshifrin3053 The original file is synchronized, but when i uploaded it to youtube the compression algorithm achieved this.
@@artshifrin3053 just concentrate on the story.
@@TVPaci your work is appreciated, tho' there may be tech issues. Not your fault. I'd rather have the story than not, so thanks for the upload.
The Burlington Zephyr. Art Deco of the rails. Fun flick. Thanks.
I really liked this film! Thanks
WOW just WOW!!!! this is a real GEM 💎, loved it!!!!, thanks for the upload, and the action sequence near the end YEEHAW!!!!!, pure awesomeness!!!!
Saw this movie broadcast on TV in the late 1950s. Thought it was great back then; I still do today.
Something about this movie makes it far more fun to watch than newer movies.
Absolutely agree
very entertaining, even today - great express train camera work, very exciting ride along!
The train (the Pioneer Zephyr) is now a permanent exhibit at Chicago's Museum of science and industry.
You mean the Chicago Museum of science and appropriate technology...
("Fallen Angels" reference.)
yeah & I think Con-Cor made the Silver Streak in HO scale once
do want one!
Thanks for posting. Someone gave me this DVD since I liked the 1976 movie so much, but it was defective so I never got to see it until now.
21:26 "its like i said, you can't beat steam"
19:34 CB&Q Mikado 4990 speeding down the rails looked amazing, and that 5 chime whistle sounded beautiful
Well, despite some silliness--typical of the era--this was pretty fun. Thank you to TVPaci!
Beautiful Art Deco trains and cars.
Thanks for sharing! Enjoyed!
I love this movie! thanks for sharing.
Today 5 of May 2020, I came here to forget about pandemic. @38:04 Now, I’m trying to get away from the word quarantine, and it keeps following me. What gives? I’m going crazy.
20:31 it the brave engineer origin whistle
This movie is so hokey but I still enjoy it. This technology was the ultimate and I really get a kick out of them showing it off
❤️! Just watched it right now for the first time!!
Absolutely incredible flick.
Perhaps a new all time favorite for me.
That cross-country run had a lot of very close shaves- I counted 3 times when the Silver Streak would have piled up if it had been moving just a little faster-!!!
51:39 brave engineer whistle
What a great flick! It was truly exciting at the end. And what a great closing line. I gotta remember that one! LOL
54:04...IT'S INCREDIBLE THAT ANY TRAIN WOULD EVEN ATTEMPT TO GO AROUND A CURVE LIKE THAT AT 80MPH!!!
i vomited in sympatico!
20:30 you hear brave engineer whistle
I heard that this short inspired the Looney Toons cartoon short, Porky’s Railroad. Where Porky and his steam engine, Toots, race against The Silver Fish to prove that they’re still reliable.
WOW!!! Does this film fit in with our current times and pandemic now! Who would have thought. BTW, I think what they refer to in the film as infantile paralysis is what we now call polio, and before the vaccine, it meant, I believe, being put in an iron lung - sometimes ? or often, forever.
Was thinking the same. Science of the day said to spray down children with DDT to keep them safe
The ice skater on the stilts!
Yes I thought how it would be doing that
I thought ouch that'll hurt
If only AMTRAK was this fast.
Interesting the character “Caldwell”. The 1976 movie. Gene Wilders character was George Caldwell. A coincidence??? Lol. The festive music at 30:00. Is the same music used in King Kong. Another RKO film from 1933.
19:52 what type of whistle is that?
The Burlington Zephyr used an air horn to sound, but a steam locomotive whistle was used.
I wants this on DVD! Amazon sez N/A!
Saw the version of 1976 in the 80's when I was a kid, I have already know that it was a remake of this one of 1934...
Actually the 1976 Silver Streak is a completely different movie. The only thing it has in common with this film is the title.
My favorite scene in this film was when the steam engine passed by the streamliner. I couldn't help but laugh at how the old outran and outpulled the new like that.
Ah, the Budd Pioneer Zephyr
Awesome movie!!!FUTURISTIC!!!
the last part of the movie, WOW, what a ride
Wow, what an exciting story; it seems that so often throughout History, essential progress is achieved through a combination of one-person’s Vision - combined with Miraculous-Circumstances - which together make it possible!
(I believe that both those-elements originate from the same Source!!!)
Thank-You for this!
20:15 The brave engineer!
At one time I used to cross a similar bridge , a shortcut for work , had to time it just right so I would'nt get caught in the middle , few trains , many boats . 😊
29:31 Seen is the Nash Motors Tower of Value at the Chicago World's Fair. The cars moved up, over and down the conveyer in constant motion.
Thx for the movie
Looks like RKO had stock footage of the Burlington Zephyr, the 1933 Chicago World's Fair, and Hoover Dam under construction, and wrote a movie around it.
The first Rocket train was out ran buy a horse and carriage and everyone thought trains would amount to nothing. The problem with good ideas is they sometimes do not work the first time.
53:31 -- "Don't worry about these curves, Dan. This is a different kind of train."
Right. This kind of train is not affected by inconvenient laws of physics such as inertia.
ssppeellll Too bad Amtrak 501 didn’t realize that.
@@Bigbuddyandblue Same with amtrak 601
...I'M PRETTY SURE THAT THE ENGINEER WAS AWARE OF ALL THAT- AND HE KNEW WHAT HE WAS DOING(!)
@Mark Martin This particular train was a lot less top heavy- and it was designed to "hug the rails"- that made a HECK of a difference!!!
Private i AS I SEE IT, THE BIGGEST PROBLEM WASN'T "INERTIA"- IT WAS "CENTRIFUGAL FORCE"!!
19:22 Interesting the Silver Streak is being paced by a DeSoto Airflow, which had been introduced in 1934, the most streamlined production car at the time.
A good idea for this good 🎥😉
btw, that dark liquid they're drinking out of great big tumblers in the beach scene is likely iced coffee, black. it was quite popular in the '30s.
@38:04 Now, I’m trying to get away from the word quarantine, and it keeps following me. What gives?
It would have been faster by air but railroad movies are great and this was a good one.
I don't really think it would have been faster by air in those days.
@@BackSeatHump I'm not so sure about that- "the shortest distance between two points is a straight line"- and when you are flying, you are unaffected by land barriers!!!
@@daleburrell6273 It's not a question of "distance". It's a matter of speed and when you are travelling by rail you are unaffected by wind and storm.
@@BackSeatHump When you're flying- if there's a bad enough head wind- you could end up moving BACKWARDS!!!
@@daleburrell6273 Possibly, but certainly be forced to "tack" against the wind which isn't much better.
Does anyone but me notice during the World's fair sequence that the New York theater music from the original King Kong is playing?
I thought the original King Kong music had copied the original "Silver Streak" film.
It was an RKO picture, so they recycled Max Steiner's King Kong music. The King Kong score was also used in RKO's 1935 "The Last Days of Pompeii."
If I’m correct, the steam engines whistle near the beginning was used for disneys The Brave Locomotive, right?
Thank you
13:35 The machanic with glasses & fedora sounds like Dagwood Bumstead . Could that be Arthur Lake under that grime ? 47:00 A man skating on stilt ice skates , how cool is that ? 😊 This movie entertains on different levels , I would recommend this movie to friends . So much better than " Streamline " . People getting motion sickness imagine if they had a modern Bullet Train . 😅
A great shame they didn't make the Pioneer sets double - ended, with a power car at both ends sandwiching articulated trailers. They'd have had a great product for high-speed interurban service, that didn't need overhead wires or third rail. It could even have been built to run on electricity where provided, as it had electric traction motor transmission, for all or part of its journey. Rather like the FL-9's. In the UK I worked on the DEMUs, Diesel Electric Multiple Units. These were long-lived, characterful, reliable machines, and only disappeared when the health and safety Nazis made it impossible to run them on the main line.
...well, ya can't please EVERYBODY!!!
While the pioneers were not power cars on both ends, other Interurbans did have them, but they were electric. Interurbans did not survive because of lack of double ended diesel engines but mainly highways.
Actually, they did do this.
There a train was called the Electroliner that looks almost exactly how you described this and exactly how it works-almost.
@@jamesf791 you zre right. The Chicago, North Shore and Milwaukee actually had a Pioneer Zephyr-like train, the Electroliner, that was double ended with cabs on both ends.
21:04 How embarrassing trying to prove that a streamlined train is the way of the future and losing a race with a steam train.
HECK, ALL NEW TECHNOLOGIES HAVE TEETHING PROBLEMS- LOOK UP THE STORIES OF ROBERT FULTON AND THE STREAMBOAT, SAMUEL F.B. MORSE AND THE TELEGRAPH, AND THOMAS EDISON AND THE INCANDESCENT LIGHT BULB!!!
REMARKABLY, THE SILVER STREAK MORE THAN REDEEMED ITSELF, AND IT DELIVERED WHEN IT REALLY MATTERED!!!
From what I gather, it was a problem in the generator-an excitation circuit that was just a teeny bit too far apart. I remember one time fixing a portable light plant with a similar issue.
there are some steam locomotives that are actually faster than the zephyr
@@WesternOhioInterurbanHistory ...THAT'S TRUE- BUT A STEAM LOCOMOTIVE CAN'T MATCH A DIESEL LOCOMOTIVE FOR LONG DISTANCE ENDURANCE-!
Wow look at all those news media vehicles following on the side roads!!!!
53:00...DIDN'T ANYBODY TELL HER THE REASON FOR THE TRIP?!!
A little silly in execution but an interesting film for showing all of the railroad infrastructure that no longer exists.
Charles Sterrett before he became the Durango Kid in B Westerns. and "Big Boy Williams before he too becazme a cowboy star. (cant figure out the nail puzzle)
he's kind of a stiff but Sally Blane is great in those figure enhancing outfits. She was Loretta Young's big sister.
Everything is very well done. Wonderful! But there is a question: was it not possible to deliver this urgent cargo by aviation?
I don't think you saw the planes from that time. 1935
...they tried that- but the iron lungs were too big and bulky to fit on the cargo airplanes that were available then.
this part is factual. the biggest transport plane in the US was the Fokker F-32. only 7 were built, they cruised at just 120mph, and they were so unreliable they were grounded by the government in 1931.
Ah! Back in a time when at least a few Americans could speak English.
47:00 to 47:04 -- I'd never heard of, much less seen, this stunt!
...me either-!!!
29:02 The first Carvana veding machine.
I got about halfway through the film, but the audio quality is so poor that it all comes out as mumbling. If there were captions, that could be worked around.
Crazy college kid with his zany ideas.
The man offered $200, 000. oo to build an experemintal design in 1935 . In todays money that would be $44,286,569.oo . Unbeliveable , don't you wish a dollar still had that much clout . 😢😢
1:02:06...THE TIME ISN'T UP YET-!!!
2 thousandths of an inch (.002) is undetectable without precision instruments!!
Why does it have to travel so fast?What's the point?Suppose something has fallen on the track?
💛
Zephyr was a dog. That Burlington mike looked great pulling ahead of that oil burner.
Any modern day super power steam could have and did put the EMD boys in there place.
The Burlington "Gopher" had nothing on a Milwaukee Hudson or Atlantic. N&W Northern or Santa Fe Hudson. For that matter a NYC Hudson, Niagara or Mohawk.
Diesels starting a train they can't pull. Steam engines pulling a train they can't start.
...was the Burlington Zephyr really able to travel 2,000 miles non-stop?
The dialog sound is very out of sync. Too bad looks like an interesting movie.
DOES ANYBODY RECOGNIZE ARTHUR LAKE- WHO IS PLAYING CRAWFORD, THE NERD? ARTHUR LAKE WENT ON TO PLAY DAGWOOD IN THE LATER "BLONDIE" MOVIES!!!
...LOOKING UP ARTHUR LAKE IS WHAT STEERED ME TO THIS MOVIE!!!
Arthur was unknown in UK.He was hilarious in The Ghost that walks alone.
I love the way the drivers can is,not partitioned off the generator and diesel engine?
The heat and noise would be to say the least unbearable.
Very corny but that was films in 1935 in general
That's the way gas/electric & diesel electrics were in the old days particularly with doodlebugs and box cabs.. Yes the noise and heat from the Winton 201a would be almost unbridgeable. This set I believe is in the Museum of Science & Industry in Chicago.
@@strobx1 yes one is in Chicago
Would like to see it
...and you can bet that the inside of the cab of a steam engine wasn't very pleasant EITHER-!!!
The train doesn't look at all like the drawing?
55:59...THAT GUY HAS BALLS THAT HE HAS TO CARRY AROUND ON A FLATCAR!!!
Who are these extra people? I thought there were no passengers..... The audio was off through much of the movie. In some places it was worse than others.
RAGE OF PARIS (1938) BEST MOVIE EVER, CHECK IT OUT.
What kind of whistle does the Silver Streak have?
Wabco E2. I think.
@@TVPaci It sounds a bit high pitched to be a Wabco E2.
@@trainguy111 The movies always lied to us, at 17:53 a whistle is heard but it is not the sound of the machine, I think it was edited.
At 2:00 of the following video you hear the real horn ... I think ...
czcams.com/video/k04asHt2Kg0/video.html
World fastest train.!
...at that time, yes.
20:30
19:24
Random steam engine in the background- HII, SORRY IM LATE LEMME ON
1:10:35...WHAT HAPPENED TO THE WOMAN WHO WAS SUFFERING FROM "MOTION SICKNESS"?!
...DID THEY THROW HER OFF THE TRAIN(?)
I would have.
Is that a vaping at 30:00 ?
I think he is holding a cigarette with a nut pliers, something common among mechanics, they do it so as not to dirty the filter with oily hands.
29:03..................A 1930s Carvana!
The US had the best railroads in the world! (Another thing lost...)
NEVER jump-ahead bypassing comprehensive scientific primary testing of New Technology in favor of emotion-based hopeful enthusiasm. 🤔
1:04:21 19:57 19:58 19:59 20:00
Yeah a great ending he gave his all thanks to the help of the other train workers the bad guy did not cause loss of lives,bless the Lord,for His protection,woohoo!!!!!!!😀😁
How do we compare this to 1976‘s version ? It’s an orange and apple due to years in between ?
I think they are both cherries.
@@TVPaci great answer !
Very Ayn Rand Atlas Shrugged. (way more than I ever expected when I started watching this film)
Novel came 20+ years later.
Train sounds like a 1955 Packard
And the brakes do too!
Naw. A 1953 Hudson Hornet.
@@IndependentBear ...sounds like a real drag(?)
(get it? get it? get it? snucker- snucker-snucker-snucker-snucker snucker-snucker-snucker-snucker!!!)
...actually, it sounds like a throbbing Diesel engine, to ME(!)
You mean it's NOT a 1955 Packard???!!!
Can you put on the 1970s version ?
The 70s Silver Streak wasn't a remake.
This is not the Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor version....
...OBVIOUSLY-!!!
Yeah. I was about halfway through the movie when I realized that.
@@hortondlfn1994 THIS MOVIE IS IN BLACK AND WHITE- DIDN'T THAT GIVE YOU A CLUE?!!
@@daleburrell6273 Well, Richard Pryor is black and Gene Wilder is white...there's a clue for you.
@@hortondlfn1994 WELL, THE STEWARD ON THE SILVER STREAK WAS BLACK TOO-!!!
Is this at all linked to the Wilder/Pryor comedy thriller Silver Streak?
in name only
It's a shame audio is out of sync with the picture. Better luck next time.
Shame about the lip sync
Great movie......and great story, but....a diesel engine should not produce that much smoke.