Detective Police Badge San Francisco California (04/10/2011)

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Detective Police Badge San Francisco California

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Detective Police Badge San Francisco California

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Sold Date: 04/10/2011
Channel: Online Auction
Source: eBay
Category: Fraternal, Political, Organizations

Extremely Rare Detective Amtrak Police San Francisco California Police Badge with Hard Blue Enamel.

Pin and Catch Intact, Full Size. Was told this was the 1st issue for the San Francisco region.

Hallmarked Irvine & Jachens, the San Francisco Badge Manufacturer currently making all SFPD Badges.
Badge is very difficult to photograph

Gold in Color (appears gold filled, but not so marked, so not being sold as such), Hand Engraved,

Exact Same Style as a SF Detective Sergeant or Higher Rank Badge

Badge Number Obscured via Photoshop, for Pictures

From the middle 19th century until approximately 1920, nearly all intercity travelers in the United States moved by rail. By 1910, close to all of intercity passenger trips were by railroad. The rails and the trains were owned and operated by private, for-profit organizations. Approximately 65,000 railroad passenger cars operated in 1929.

For a long time after 1920, passenger rail's popularity diminished and there were a series of pullbacks and tentative recoveries. Rail passenger revenues declined dramatically between 1920 and 1934 because of the rise of the automobile, but in the mid-1930s, railroads reignited popular imagination with service improvements and new, diesel-powered streamliners , such as the gleaming silver Pioneer Zephyr and Flying Yankee . Even with the improvements, on a relative basis, traffic continued to decline, and by 1940 railroads held 67% of passenger-miles in the United States. World War II broke the malaise. During the war, troop movements and restrictions on automobile fuel generated a sixfold increase in passenger traffic from the low point of the Depression. After the war, railroads rejuvenated overworked and neglected fleets with fast and often luxurious streamliners — epitomized by the Super Chief and California Zephyr — which inspired the last major resurgence in passenger rail travel.

The postwar resurgence was short-lived. In 1946, there remained 45% fewer passenger trains than in 1929, and the decline quickened despite railroad optimism. Passengers disappeared and so did trains. Few trains generated profits; most produced losses. Broad-based passenger rail deficits appeared as early as 1948 and by the mid-1950s railroads claimed aggregate annual losses on passenger services of more than $700 million (almost $5 billion in 2005 dollars using CPI). By 1965, only 10,000 rail passenger cars were in operation, 85% fewer than in 1929. Passenger service was provided on only 75,000 miles (120,000 km) of track, a stark decline. Passenger rail service in the United States showed the signs of underinvestment. Rail facilities suffered from decrepit equipment, cavernous and nearly empty stations in declining urban centers, and management that seemed intent on driving away the few remaining customers. The 1960s also saw the end of railway post office revenues, which had helped some of the remaining trains break even.

In the late 1960s, the end of passenger rail in the United States seemed near. First had come the requests for termination of services; then came the bankruptcy filings. The legendary Pullman Company became insolvent in 1969, followed, in 1970, by the dominant railroad in the Northeastern United States , the Penn Central . It now seemed that passenger rail's financial problems might bring down the railroad industry as a whole, yet few in government wanted to be held responsible for the extinction of the passenger train.

In 1970, Congress passed and President Richard Nixon signed into law, the Rail Passenger Service Act . Proponents of the bill, led by the National Association of Railroad Passengers (NARP), sought government funding to assure the continuation of passenger trains. They conceived the National Railroad Passenger Corporation ( NRPC ), a hybrid public-private entity that would receive taxpayer funding and assume operation of intercity passenger trains. The original working brand name for NRPC was Railpax , but shortly before the company started op...