Prior to WWII, the standard way for American government employees to get around the country was by train. The government reimbursed travel expenses to the point of a Pullman Section (day mode on top, night mode below):
Bathrooms would be in the boudoirs at the ends of the car (men at one end, women at the other), with a sink and a place to shave.It should be noted that this was still the times of Officers And Gentlemen, especially when it came to Admirals. This was the time when the section was on its way out. Where ten years earlier even multi-millionaires didn't think twice about using them, in 1941 they were rather falling out of fashion, being replaced with enclosed rooms (a sample of offerings linked below).
http://streamlinermemories.info/Mfrs/OnDressParade.pdf
Each Pullman sleeping car had its very own porter. This man was almost always African-American, or sometimes Filipino. Working for the Pullman Company was one of the highest-paying jobs in the African-American community at the time. On the other hand, they had no chances for promotion, and could be fired very easily (future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall was told to deal with it or leave when he asked for pants that weren't too short since it was "easier to find another negro than a pair of pants"). The more polite passengers would refer to them as "porter", while the less polite would use "boy" or "George"-the latter stemming from the old practice of referring to slaves by their master's name (company founder George M. Pullman in this case).
No matter which (direct) route you took from Seattle to Chicago you would be riding in older Heavyweight rolling stock dating to the 1920s. It would be decorated in the Edwardian style. This 1940 brochure from the Great Northern Railway advertises its flagship train (there were a couple others on the same route) the Empire Builder:
http://streamlinermemories.info/GN/GNACEB.pdf
The Northern Pacific's competitor was the North Coast Limited, and the Milwaukee Road had the Olympian. Each company also operated several secondary trains to complement their flagships and serve local towns.
Despite the brochure's claims, the food in railroad dining cars was often rather expensive. However, you certainly got what you paid for. Prior to the 1960s, American railroad cuisine was considered to be among the best in the world, mobile or stationary. Companies competed and bragged about specialty dishes. Most of the time, the food would be the equivalent of a decidedly upscale restaurant.
Flagship trains in this period often had on-board maids, secretaries and barbers. They also frequently had custom menus, writing pads, and ink blotters (no ballpoints back then). Other amenities included showers, radios, and soda fountains. There were dedicated areas for smoking (including the men's boudoir in each sleeping car), but given the habits of the time I wouldn't count on the rest of the train being smoke-free.
The big new feature on American railroads in the '30s and '40s was air conditioning. Although it had been introduced back in 1931, the sheer size of the national fleet meant that it took until after WWII to equip all intercity rolling stock-the last commuter trains without AC were retired in the early 1980s and the NYC Subway still has some cars without it. Baring a major breakdown, however, the equipment on a flagship like the ones mentioned above would be equipped with AC.
Without using freeways, it is about 90 minutes either way from Puget Sound Naval Shipyard in Bremerton to Tacoma or Seattle. But Seattle is accessed by ferry, which makes for more interesting shenanigans (the first non-warship seen in-story). Incidentally, one of the things that would shock Thomson would be the shipyard's own internal railroad and its fleet of steam locomotives. Its something he probably would have known about academically, but steam engines aren't exactly an ordinary sight for 21st Century admirals, let alone a dozen at once. And steam locomotives aren't exactly subtle, so he would be treated to an impressive (if smoky) show.
An evening departure from Seattle would bring you to Chicago on the third morning. Until the big decline in the early 1960s, there were six different major railroad terminals in Chicago. The Great Northern and the Northern Pacific both forwarded their trains to the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy at the Twin Cities (St. Paul to be precise). The Burlington used Union Station. The somewhat-maverick Milwaukee Road operated under a single corporate structure all the way to Chicago. And it used... Union Station. So all three trains to Seattle used Union Station. Never noticed that before now.
I will cover the stay in Chicago and the trip from there to Washington in the next post. Timetables will follow after that. Thank you.
Also, a naval tidbit-apparently captains and admirals have their own personal boats (captain's is a gig, admiral's is a barge) that they use for getting out to ship and for puttering around harbor for business or leisure.
Here is WeeVee's admiral's barge in 1939:
This was built for COMPACFLT in 1946 and is still used for that office (and presidents when they visit) at Pearl Harbor:
(she apparently also gives tours roughly once a month)
For longer voyages during the war when it wasn't practical to send a naval ship Halsey used this new vessel from New Zealand:
Her name is Manawa Nui and she started the war doing clandestine ops infiltrating Australian coastwatchers into the Solomon Islands. Halsey used her for slightly longer-ranged voyages.
Would any of these vessels be likely to "speak up" at all?
