RAILROADS: Shirt Story

The Long Island Railroad, owned by the Pennsylvania, carries more passengers per year than any railroad in the U. S. But more than half of them are commuters, and the Long Island, competing with 5¢ subways, must haul them cheaply. To the commuters’ chronic irritation, it does. Favorite Long Island commuter’s sport is thinking up ways to pique, gyp and otherwise get back at the Long Island Railroad.

Fortnight ago beefy (collar size: 17) Queens County Court Deputy Clerk Thomas J. Smyth boarded a Long Island train (non-air-conditioned) to ride to his job. It was a hot morning; he sweated, squirmed, took off his coat, exposed a clean white shirt to the cinder-covered seats. At his office he changed shirts, sent the dirty one to the Long Island’s claims agent, requested that it be laundered. “If this cannot be done,” wrote he, “I donate the shirt for use as an oil rag in one of your repair shops.”

The agent sent the shirt to a Y. M. C. A. for laundering, charged off 15¢ to claims. Last week Needier Smyth’s shirt, returned without comment, was back on his back. Said he: “A businessman is entitled to arrive at his destination reasonably clean.”