Re: "Coupler Cars" all "Idlers" now ...

hank Wrote:
===================================
> That's an, errhm, interesting position.
> Again, AFAIK they have always been called
> idler cars, both the with different couplers
> at each end and the ones used for spacing.
> I wouldn't expect your revision to customary
> usage to catch on.  Unless you can get usage
> of the word "idler" banned as being pejorative
> to us long-term unemployed folks, that is.  


Right, Hank -

Sorta like some egomaniac yo-yo a while back - several years after the death of mainline steam operations (R.I.P.) - pushing for changes to the histöric White (or Whyte?) classification system by using the plus sign ("+") to designate articulated locomotives, such as Challengers (4-6+6-4!), Cab-Forwards (4-8+8-2!) and Big-Boys (4-8+8-4!) - usage long reserved for Beyer-Garrets.
I cancelled my subscription to Trains Magazine in protest of this revisionist B.S.

It also reminds me of the p-c related argument here a few years ago regarding historian Jim Maxwell's brief attempt to use the (pejorative?) term "Swish" for "Draw" when naming a pointless trackage arrangement for shifting the center third rail of dual gauge track from one side to the other, or from three-rail to symmetric four-rail dual gauge when approaching a turntable.  (See [ngdiscussion.net], and [ngdiscussion.net] et seq.)

- Sincerely, Willie  (Wm. Claude Johnson-Barr III, Esq.)  
         "Not All Who Have Cell-Phones Do Twitter
         "Not All Those Who Ponder Can Think ... "

p.s.  Like most of us grumpy old Curmudgeons, the Coupler cars are all Idlers now - so what difference does it make?    



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/21/2015 07:43PM by Johnson Barr.