Re: NNG - Railway Passes: Commercial Agent

Dennis Tebo Wrote:
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> In many of them he's listed as
> a Commercial Agent or General Agent. What does a
> Commercial Agent do?


I believe the modern equivalent title would be "Sales Manager". For instance, look at this Clinchfield Timetable listing Company Officers, and under the "Freight and Passenger Agencies" the apparent managers of the Agencies are all "Commercial Agents":



None of the Agency cities listed (except Johnson City TN) were "on-line" on the Clinchfield Railroad, so presumably the Commercial Agents' job was to drum up business for the Clinchfield by getting 'through' traffic routed over the Clinchfield . One could expect that other railroads had similar arrangements.


The full PDF of that Clinchfield Timetable can be seen here:
[www.historyarchives.org]

.

- Graham



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 06/11/2022 05:24PM by Rader Sidetrack.