I heard a story about an Illinois Terminal brakeman who once needed relief. The Illinois Terminal was an electric interurban line for a good share of its life and handled freight as well as passengers. On this particular day, the freight was assigned a transfer caboose (picture a 20ft cabin on a 40ft flatcar). Since transfer cabooses were typically only used to transfer trains between large yards in major cities (like St. Louis) they didn't have toilet facilities. But toilet or not, Nature called - so the brakeman seated himself on the rear railing of the caboose. Just as he started doing his business, the train left the private Right-of-Way and - in typical interurban fashion - shot down the center of Main Street in a small Illinois town.