Funeral Trains

During the early 1900’s, when motorized funeral transportation was becoming more trendy, steam locomotives were also reaching their peak, and the train industry began its steady booming era. Thus, the funeral train; an innovative way to transport the dead, whether it was for romantic reasons, or purely for reasons of carting the dead from one location to another. Whether the coffin was just another boxcar full of cargo, or part of a significant funeral event, there were some very mixed opinions on the new trend for getting a dead loved one from one place to another.

Some considered the funeral train to be romantic; the technological innovation of the future, ornately designed specifically to bring the dead to a funeral, –in steam-driven style. Others took a more objective view; if the dead were instead part of a larger cargo, it might have been shocking to the friends and family of a religious man, to find out he was being transported with a criminal, or a notorious Atheist. Others disliked the noise, and excitement; steam trains are noisy, and several people were usually involved in their operation, so at times it was likely that many people who were unrelated to the dead, may have taken an unwelcome part of a close knit family funeral.

The first trains were being used for funerals over a hundred and fifty years ago. The trains were also popular for state funerals, –those who held high military officer position, or held high government jobs. Abraham Lincoln, for example, was transported by a steam train to his own funeral, after he was assassinated. And though they are not as popular today as they once were, occasionally someone dusts off the old traditional funeral train, and brings it back into rotation.