Switching from Red to Black

The railroads, which took some of the recession's hardest blows, are fast getting back on their feet. Freight carloadings for the week ending May 9 jumped 26% above the comparable week of 1958, to 677,398, a new peak for the year.

The improvement in loadings was showing up where it counted: in earnings. The Pennsylvania, which lost $4,727,327 in April 1958, made $4,000,000 last month. The Great Northern also switched from $1,665,061 in the red a year earlier to $1,193,081 in the black last month. The Missouri Pacific, which just managed to earn $13,091 in April 1958, cleared $500,000 in April 1959. For the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western, which lost $816,000 in April 1958, there was the limited consolation of losing only $400,000 last month. If things keep on getting better, President Perry M. Shoemaker promised stockholders a modest overall profit for the year.

With the prospect of still higher future earnings, railroads jumped their March orders for new freight cars to 10,795, almost twice the total for the two previous months, and the biggest spurt of such orders since November 1955.

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