Spent some time looking at old B&W trains footage from the 1940's and noticed that in daylight most trains did not have their headlight on. What year/era did it become the norm to leave it on ?
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I believe it was the early 1950's.
1952 on the PRR.
I've become so accustomed to seeing trains running with their headlights on that when I do see some old photos of these engines running dark, it looks like something might be wrong with the engine, or maybe it's just stopped!
Paul Fischer
It could be a Rule 17 situation where the engineer doused the headlight for an oncoming train on an adjacent track, in many cases.
