The US president has a bulletproof railcar
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- Äas pĆidĂĄn 1. 04. 2018
- US Car Number 1, the Ferdinand Magellan, sits in the Gold Coast Railway Museum in Miami. It's 120 tonnes of bulletproof, armoured railcar: a train carriage designed to move the President of the United States around the country in safety and style. At least, it was, until other transport came along to do a better job.
Thanks to all the team at the Gold Coast Railroad Museum: they're at www.gcrm.org/, or on Facebook at / goldcoastrailroad ! [looks like their main site's down at the moment!]
Edited by Michelle Martin (@mrsmmartin)
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I realise I said "railway" instead of "railroad" at the end. Apparently I haven't picked up too many American dialect words yet...!
Tom Scott hey tom
IMO, thatâs probably for the best. Thereâs something innately off to my ear about hearing people with British accents use Americanisms and vice versa.
Realize* đ
Some places do call themselves ârailwayâ museums, but usually itâs ârailroadâ museum (for example, the B&O Railroad Museum in Baltimore)
The description still says railway (intentionally or otherwise)
that guy looks exactly like what I would imagine someone working in a train museum would look like
he's so american too. I don't even mean that as an insult, but you look at him and you feel "yep he's from the us"
jonas1015119 Hahaha, I had this exact same thought. He's like fig.1.1 beside the dictionary entry for "train enthusiast".
It's the hat that does it.
Apart from that he looks way too small to be an American!
I imagine they took one look at him in the job interview and said "Yep, you've got the job"
Unhealthy Life Decisions I assume he means width/big, not tall.
"still wont give up my phone"
i love that guy. american museum guides are hilarious
No, he was hilarious. There was no need to generalize smh
yo Alex
Typical person to take offense at someones opinion
@@Alex632 Did you just get offended by a compliment
MR ANONYMOUS ok make me laugh
That guy is an anti-Ok boomer
Not only is Mr Waggoner a great guide and presenter, he has the perfect name for working in a railway museum.
4 years
@@RickrollFoot I too had this video recommended to me recently.
@@Liwet. indeedđ€
@@itsmie523 indeed
@@RickrollFoot indeed
Sorry if this has been mentioned before: According to Margaret Truman, the President requested that the train slow down to 80 MPH; it was running about 100MPH at the time (there is a speedometer in the car), and Harry was afraid the super-heavy railcar would cause catastrophic damage if it were to derail at that high a speed.
I prefer the green honestly. I think a train car in red white and blue would be gauche. That glass is impressive!
Yeah. It looks nice in green
Marine One is still green, at least we have that
The whole car is impressive. Considering that this is around 80 years old and still looks good even if dated by the furnishings.
Green is by far the best railway colour. The Flying Scotsman is also green and it looks grest.
British Racing Green FTW!!!
This was great and the gentleman presenting was very pleasant to listen to.
Just the right amount of humour mixed into the presenting talk.
I audibly laughed at the cellphone joke at the end
His voice is also strangely calming
indeed. totally right
also, made me want to listen to some Allman Brothers Band..
That tour guide is really cool. Explained everything clearly and loved the joke at the end haha
Casually gave a tour to as many people as in 10 years of normal tours.
I'm dying at the idea of an American president smoking in the toilet like a high schooler trying to hide it from the teachers.
This museum is awesome but sadly it shares the same entrance as the Zoo and gets less recognition nowadays.
Show everyone this video and that may change!
I Love both places. Miami is a golden egg in a relatively bland batch that is Florida cities (Though we have some the best non western national and state parks too)
Yeah it is really nice, and sucks that the zoo is there now. But now thereâs a military museum opening up there too.
Miami is definitely more interesting than most of Florida combined, but I could never stomach how the glamour and money could sit so close to all the poverty and yet people would act like the poor didn't exist. You could drive two blocks and go straight from Lambos to homeless people sleeping under trees. Too often the place felt like a shallow party town.
Iâve been going to this museum and the zoo since I was a year old and I can say that the museum is way better than the zoo.
Damnit Scott,
This is the third time time you've been in a place just a month after I was there. That's just infuriating.
Come to the Minnesota State Fair. I've tried to convince him to come on his own :)
Look on your calendar and figure out where you will be in a month. Now skip the wait and travel there today. You will see him, it's a fool proof plan
Ham III Wouldn't he have to wait 2 months since he was a month before?
Shhh...
Gaafts - You need to work harder at your Tom Scott stalking! :)
I agree with this guy, the US needs more rail infrastructure
I agree. In reality though it's kind of a non-issue. Our streets are just the easiest and fastest way to transport goods, and Trucks/Cars are already very efficient in the grand scheme of total carbon emissions.
I would want go just sit in train to travel if they go i would want to go and work!
@@WaffleCake You know trains are the main way to transport goods right?
@@thepokemondusknoir In what way and according to who? Seems to me like Semi-Trucks do 90% of it. I've literally only seen a handful of railroads in my entire life.
With all due respect, you might wanna get out more ;) @@WaffleCake
Oh, no special thanks for Cully Waggoner at the end. The guy did a good job showing you, & us, around the train.
Never expected to see you here Sage.
.,
In crediting, special thanks is often for people who aren't explicitly mentioned onscreen - people or organisations you might not otherwise know were involved
shut up
@@claws811 balls
"Bulletproof Railcar" sounds like a great band name.
Sounds kinda hardcore punk-y to me
Dildo Baggins no.
Dildo Baggins just shush
@Dildo Baggins username checks out
Damn now I wanna know what dildo Baggins said
Totally misread the title as "The US President's Bulletproof Racecar" when this popped into my email. I must admit though, the reality is even more interesting!
Is it though?
it took me 3 tries to figure out you didn't just type the video title
Such a refreshingly light topic video. Nothing too serious, but still seriously interesting. Thanks, Tom!
This tour guide steals the show. He's amazing.
Bulletproof railcar sounds rad.
Glady sounds like the name of a metal band
Ariff Ishak normally it's bullet proof up to a certain caliber.
carolyn mmitchell and what caliber is that? An artillery shell?
Considering that no Axis artillery units made it into the US during WWII, the level of protection need only be against an infantry rifle at most. Back then, .30 caliber was the norm.
Bullets would be a waste of metal as well as the artillery shell, explosives would be a LOT easier to take down the car afterall, Trains cant run without rails or wheels
I like how the camera zooms out as you walk towards the lens.
It's so smooth that you probably wouldn't notice it until you wonder why your body isn't getting much bigger after getting closer and closer to the camera.
Fun fact: a similar type of laminated bulletproof glass was used to protect the pilots of WWII fighter planes from the front. If you've ever wondered why, say, a Spitfire has that small window in the very front of the cockpit that seems to have a blueish tint, that's the bulletproof glass. That, plus a steel plate in the pilot's seat back and a thin firewall behind the engine, would often be the only actual armor found on a fighter plane.
The guy explaining is really chill I like it haha
Was there ever a horseforce one?
Ryan - According to Wikipedia, Studebaker built carriages specifically for Grant, Harrison, Lincoln, and McKinley. I don't know if they were reinforced in any way.
More to the point could they get a bulletproof unicorn so the presidents can have an airhorse one?
Phillip Parkinson-shanley that would be a Pegasus, unicorns don't fly.
Phillip Parkinson-shanley unicorns have just a single horn and no wings, Pegasus had wings but no horn. I personally would rather be fly then horny.
Phillip Parkinson-shanley I wonder if it would be possible to get a Pegasus and a unicorn to breed.. then you would have a flying horny horse.
"The railcar is the heaviest US railcar ever built."
Correction: At 285,000 pounds, the presidential modifications made it the heaviest PASSENGER railcar ever used in the US.
Laughs in Schnabel
whats the heaviest
@@phantomaviator1318 Schnabel
4:42 this dude just spoke plain facts
I live about 20 miles from the museum, and itâs one of my favorite places to go! Sadly, it doesnât seem like public interest is high enough to keep it going, but itâs never had any signs of closing for as long as Iâve been alive.
ImATrackMan wonder if it's publically funded due to the artifacts it holds?
You can get a surprising amount of mileage out of volunteer work and simply owning the ground you operate on rather than renting. And don't underestimate the number of railfans in the U.S.
ImATrackMan before it ( the museum) was in its current location... It was in Ft Lauderdale near the airport. When I-595 was constructed they had to move to their current location.
During the week days, several school field trips are run through the museum.
That's so fascinating. I never thought about the previous transportation methods that presidents of the past may have used. Thanks for this video Tom! I'm going to make sure I go see this train in person some day.
Abraham Lincoln "sneaked into" DC for his inauguration as there was an alleged plot by people in Baltimore to kill him (Maryland was a slave-holding state back then). It's a fascinating story how they did some switcheroo and announced him being on a different train than he actually was to keep Lincoln save.
I'd like to see the boats.
I find it funny that Tom wears a hoodie in a Miami Florida spring where the temperature rarely gets below 85 F
Very interesting, thanks Tom. Cully seems like a nice relaxed chap and if I ever go to America, I think I should make the trip to Miami and the museum.
Was it resistant to banana peels on the rails too?
Contrary to popular belief, banana peels are not magical slippery things... It'd just squash them like nobody's business.
Yes but what about coins on the track?
They get flattened. I actually once tried that with a cent coin on a streetcar track...
Jesus Gonzalez yeah I tried it when i was a kid with real railroads, the trains are meant to be able to handle way more then a coin on the track.
Jesus Gonzalez Alright, Mr. Literal we get it..
I like how Cully doesn't want to give up his cell phone.
These comments are super strange to me because I have never run into anyone else with the same name
This channel is awesome all around. Kudos, Tom Scott, for bringing us along on your fascinating travels and showing us new and interesting things and places.
I would like to see some longer segments. Episodes in the 20-40 minute ballpark are great for sitting down with a cup of coffee (and, incidentally, so are the Citation Needed episodes!). Though that is a general complaint that goes for just about any CZcams channel.
4:30 I totally agree with this guy
"Air Force One" featured in this week's "West Wing Weekly" podcast. It's actually a call-sign allocated to any USAF plane the president happens to be in; not (necessarily) *that* 747.
And if I remember right, there is a special callsign designated to any civilian aircraft the president flies on, but it was never really used (I think only in one situation it was used, but I don't remember specifics)
Justin Noker Edit: Itâs Executive One.
John George Bauer-Buis ah thanks for that
EDIT: also looked into the history, it was only used during Nixon's presidency when he was setting an example to the world to conserve energy during the energy crisis by flying on a Delta DC-10. And Executive two (the callsign for vice president aboard) was used in the 70's for vice president Rockefeller who owned his own private plane that he preferred to take, and it was almost used in 2000 when Al Gore almost had to fly in to cast a tiebreaking vote, as a U.S. Airways shuttle flight was the fastest way to D.C. at the time, though his vote was not needed
We obviously know that.
Does that mean the plane is NOT "Air Force One" if for some reasons it has to fly without the president onboard?
Really interesting subject and Cully did a great job.
plopfish Yes! He is good on camera.
I was thinking the same thing.
He was incredibly interesting to listen to. Great video as always Tom!
tour videos are awesome Tom,thank You for sharing
Loved the museum as a child and my now kids still love going their. I was lucky enough to tour this train car as a kid. Thank you for sharing this hidden gem in Miami.
aw, the museum guy is a sweet heart. bless him
For a second I read that guy's title as "Doctor of Training", which sounds simply amazing I wish it was a real doctorate you could get.
Isn't that a fancy way of saying teacher/professor?
Such a cool video, the times were so different. Its amazing to see and allows one to imagine how things were in those days im an 80-90s kid so I can remember when things weren't so different, my great grandparents help raise me and it allowed me different perspectives and to see some really old things. Thanks!!!
That guide is so cool. The passion and knowledge coming from him is so infectious. What a fascinating video!
That Nick Offerman / Ron Swanson laugh at the end.
Excellent video, Tom! I'm a sucker for anything rail-related so this video was super cool to see.
These videos are so well edited.Thank you for that.
Fascinating. Glad to have you back exploring fascinating places!!
Absolutely loved this one. Love learning about quirky history.
That's one thicc rail car
But most importantly, it goes on a tracc
Except it isn't, because that isn't even a real word.
Atomic Charme yo boring boi. and yes ist such a thicc rail tracc car - the color for the train is nice too
+KönigsTiger
The letter K called.
It wants to be used more often,
No one really decides what a 'real' word is though. Language is entirely cultural and continually evolve. You think airplane was a word 500 years ago?
Do you think the modern English language was written the same way 1000 years ago? Languages evolve, grammar changes, and what is socially accepted changes.
Considering majority of the English-speaking world have started to recognize 'thicc' it have gained 'word' status. It is certainly not considered formal, but it is a word as much as the thousands of other informal words are.
You travel to the most interesting places. I love it. Thank you Tom for giving us this. :)
We visited this museum (before your video) and it is realy a hidden gem :) Great to see this railway car!
Very interesting that you can stand in the very same place where that picture was taken today! Thank you for showing this, Scott!
Unfortunately the train station where it was taken while still extant as a building is not served by passenger trains any more.
Nice piece of history. I saw some other documentary about it a while ago, but they didn't show as much as you did. People forget that it was a time before modern media, the Interstate system, etc. and getting around on trains was the way to reach out to the American people.
reimann4 yeah, in fact didn't the interstate pop up around when this fell out of use?
Trains are still a good way to see the "real America". Nobody gives a second thought which "face" they are presenting to train tracks. And Amtrak seats you with strangers in the dining car. Better opportunities to get to talk with Americans and visitors of all stripes barely exist.
Yes - that came later.
Actually the Interstate Highway Act as well as the gargantuan subsidies for aviation are among the main reasons for the decline of America's railroads...
Happy to see that the other Cully is up to some super cool stuff! Great video and excellent tour!
This is so cool. Iâm happy this showed up on my feed
What a nice tour, congratulations to the guy, the video was great! :D
I wonder if you could wangle a tour of the Royal Train in the UK...
Leave the UK train stuff to Geoff and Vicki. ;-)
Good point!
Antony Mitchell National Railway Museum in York has Queen Victoria's royal railway coach if I remember correctly.
who?
It has a few carriages belonging to different monarchs, I believe it has the Queen Mother's bulletproof carriage from World War 2, the Severn Valley Railway has George VI's armored carriage.
Tom Scott you have a brilliant voice for presenting. Well done on how you conduct your presentations.
I will be going there on Saturday to be able to ride a piece of History can't wait to go.
_Becomes President_
"I said I want to travel on the fancy train so we WILL travel on the fancy train"
Such a great piece of preserved American history. Thanks Tom!
Absolutely love your channel. Keep up the great content!!!!
Very cool, thank you Mr. Scott.
They should campaign like this again
I scored almost the same place on the compass haha
Reagan actually used it for a one-day trip during which he campaigned at several whistle stops, much like Truman did.
Agreed. the Presidential race would be FAR more interesting if they all had a limited budget (no donations) and had to travel by train. Bring the candidates back down to earth.. literally.
They could even do the debates from the back of their respective railcars.. or is that too much wishful thinking?
That would require a significant upgrade and expansion of the US rail network. And that would be great but that's also never gonna happen. It's a way too practical thing to spend money on.
Actually the German social democrats used a train in 1998 (That's the latest I found it attested in not at all thorough searchs; they may have used it later still) and Merkel used Adenauer's old train in 2009 or 2013 to suggest/show (depending on your partisan leanings) continuity from Adenauer to Merkel.
But then again, the biggest city in Germany without passenger rail service has some 60 000 people. The biggest city in the US without intercity passenger rail service is Phoenix, Arizona.
Why does cully Waggoner seem like such an appropriate name for the tour guideđ
That was a fantastic tour! Thanks!
Such a cool glimpse into a museum I will probably never get to visit, thanks!!!
That guy made a good point. Railways are a great way to relax and slow down a little. Flying is far too stressful.
I dont see flying as stressfull, You get what you pay for, paying for a decent flight and having to relax is easy as hell.
I want to put this into practice, but in the entirety of the southeast USA there is almost no passenger rail travel available at all.
I like trains!
Michele Pittoni If you do, I have a ton of train videos :D
ASDF reference? đ
Well you had a good life RIP
That takes me back.
Hello!
You are doing a great job! Thanks for sharing history with us.
Thanks for sharing this video! This car is on my bucket list! According to David McCullough's biography of Truman, for security, the route ahead of the President's train had all of the switches spiked to prevent sabotage. Talk about "right of way"!
I love how they knew enough to make an armoured rail car for the president..... then put JFK in a convertible.
Although it did have a bullet proof top. JFK wanted to take it down for a bit when some supporters were nearbyâŠoops. My favorite president (being a space nerd) made a big mistake.
Tom Scott you're the best! Love your videos!
What a wonderful look at a very special train. Great to see that it's been preserved.
Im glad I stayed up for this this is a treat
Imagine if the president held an intercontinental horse race and watching that said race in this train
Imagine if the president had back scars that form the american flag.
Would love to see a next President advocate for rail travel as a means of modernising America's railways to high speed, and also encouraging the environmental benefits. And advocate for this by re-introducing a 'RailForce One' as their primary mode of transportation across the country. I think that would be fantastic to see.
It would be nice. High-speed trains for intercontinental travel, and airplanes for everywhere else. Of course, they'd have to make a new modern train, one that had references and similarities to the old train, but of course more modern and even better, maybe even futuristic.
Itâs very exciting that the newly passed infrastructure bill includes funds for railroads. But a president definitely should not travel by rail in todayâs day and age. Recipe for disaster
Yes, convince the elites to lead by example and personally adopt the "green goals" they want to force on everyone else. Let me know how that goes.
Love the quality of the video Tom
Seeing old relics like this preserved is like a time capsule to the past but only being able to see a glimpse of it
Seems like some kind of DLC for Red Dead Online...
Rockstar let everyone down with that online hahaha
It seems to me that you have better ideas than the entire team behind Red Dead Online.
That's the train you wanna be on when the zombies come ^^'
Iamtop yeah just hook it up behind a Genesis unit and you're sailing through the apocalypse perfectly safe at 100 miles an hour... Until you run outta diesel.
Or a group of psychopaths build a massive steal barrier to derail the train and kill everyone Inside
The guy that was giving the tour is the kind of person ppl from the past would imagine. Love it!
Fantastic museum... Like entering a time machine. Definitely worth the trip if you're going to be in the area. I would certainly return.
Bulletproof Railcar is a good band name.
Mister Apple Oh HELL yes.
Yes!
Honestly, bulletproof _anything_ is a good band name.
+rosemary I was trying to think of a counter-example to that, and I couldn't.
I agree
I'm curious about the train engine that pulled the cars, was it steam? Was it a civilian train, or a military one? Did it have armor?
That depended on whose tracks they were running. If going to and from Warm Springs, Georgia, then a Southern Railway steam locomotive would pull it. If going to and from New York then a Pennsylvania RR loco - an electric GG1, to be exact - would pull it. If going from New York to his home in Hyde Park then a New York Central steam locomotive would pull it.
But the US had no armored locomotives.
Nice info.
I understand some locomotives had been reinforced during the American Civil War
I had no idea this existed. I truly love your channel. Please, never quit your brilliance.
Thanks Tom, awesome information. I would love to see it in person. Just subscribed. đđ»
During the introduction, I honestly expected Tom to go off on a bit of a tangent about the history of the site on which the museum sits (it was the site of three hangers for US Navy blimps back in WW2... can you imagine if Presidential blimp tours were a thing?).
Anyhow, the Gold Coast Railroad Museum was always fun to visit (they even do a haunted train during the Halloween season).
Be kind of fun (but sadly never going to happen) if Biden brought this back given his love of trains and Amtrak
His election tour was literally on a train because of COVID
@@adamajluni7781 Mr. Potato Head was in his basement due to dementia.
@@adamajluni7781 Before he had access to Air Force One.
i hope you enjoy south florida weather. great video
Great video - FDR stopped his train at Allamuchy NJ to visit Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd at her home nearby - photos of the train car at the depot are fantastic to see.
Hey Tom , Great video - the link in the vid description leads to an unregistered domain though
Actually the domain is registered to a Thomas Flanary of the Gold Coast Railroad Museum. However it's not properly configured somehow, either the DNS doesn't point to a webserver or the webserver itself is misconfigured. Not something Tom can do anything about though.
I'm surprised this isn't in the Smithsonian or something. Instead of just some random train museum in Miami....
IIRC, the Smithsonian was very much interested in it, but the acquisition process was quite complicated and time-consuming, with committees and board meetings and all manner of approvals going up various chains of command. The Miami Railroad Historical Society (as it was know at the time) simply had to meet once, approve it, and write a check to acquire this bit of government surplus.
The attention to detail is amazing
Time was slowâŠcompared to now. Nostalgia overcomes my modern mind. Thank you for sharing!
In Australia, itâs a âtrainâ made of âcarriagesâ
Isn't "car" a short way of saying "carriage"?
many European languages use a word similar to wagon which I believe is also a proper English word
Norwegian king family have a armored Railcar that they sometimes still use today :)
F. H. The same for the Dutch royal family. They even have 3 of them.
Thank you for the video!
I used to give tours of the Ferdinand Magellan back in the 2010âs at the Gold Coast Railroad Museum. What memories.
We should bring back leaders traveling by rail. If nothing else, it gives people a ground level view of "flyover country"
And before anyone brings it up, NO, that rail car parked under Grand Central Terminal has nothing to do with Roosevelt.
metropod yeah, I remember seeing a video of some people actually going down there and getting a serial number to confirm it was BS
Justin Noker I could tell you it was BS just by looking at it. You could barely get a Smart Fourtwo in that baggage car, let alone a Pierce Arrow
@@metropod what ?
Always interesting to see pieces of history like this
Simple=easily understood.Presenting no difficulty. To see how the president traveled in those days seems so much more logical, connected to the people of the country. Wonderful vid, short and sweet. Cheers...