What keeps the wheels of America's industrial progress turning night and day, constantly revolving in a frenzy of centrifugal capitalistic rotation? Well, some might say it's the blessings of a benevolent deity, or maybe the sinister plans of a secretive ultra-wealthy cabal, or perhaps simply the invisible hand of the marketplace satisfying our natural desires for new cars or washing machines or TVs. But we know the real story, because we read it in an unimpeachable source - a comic book.


Railroads! Railroads keep those wheels turning. And sure, that answer merely kicks the can down the railroad tracks, because now we're wondering what keeps the wheels (or "drivers", that's the railroad term) of the railroads turning? Maybe it's wheels all the way down. Let's find out!


Well, you kids have heard all about banking and mining and construction and manufacturing. Now you're going to learn about the industry that makes all those other industries possible, without which those other industries would be unable to function at all! And that industry is coffee. Coffee and donuts. That's the secret. Hey, you try handling a locomotive for a 12 hour shift without some sinkers and java!


Right now thousands of train cars are coming and going, being sorted and distributed, carrying all kinds of freight, under the constant observation of the armed guards in the machine-gun tower. None of you trains are escaping today, ya hear?


Back in the old days, train-spotters had to stand on cold windy platforms and jot details of passing trains down in little notebooks. But now, these futuristic pioneer hobbyists can record it all on audiotape! Train-spotters can spot vastly more numbers of trains in comfort and in a fraction of the time, giving them ample opportunity for other pursuits, like for example, asking themselves hard questions about why exactly they are spotting trains in the first place.


The railroad industry would like to remind readers that very seldom do switchyard operators lose their minds and start throwing switches at random resulting in widespread destruction and chaos. That's not to say it doesn't happen! It's just really rare.


We'll pause as you all get your giggles out of the way because of the use of the word "reefer." Yes, yes, very funny. Now can we get back to showing you how thousands of cases of marijuana are smuggled using the railroads? Please? Class? This is important.


Remember kids, without trains you might have to go an entire season without ever seeing spinach or broccoli or brussels sprouts. Think what a tragedy that would be!

(sound of children booing)


Your family car begins as raw materials transported by railroad to various plants where those materials become steel, rubber, coils, wires, springs, glass, and empty soda cans and fast food wrappers thrown into the back seat. Then, after that car is inevitably smashed in a high speed collision, the wreckage will be hauled - by train - to be melted down again, completing the circle of automotive life.


America's chemical and railroading industries work hand in hand day and night across our vast nation, spending millions of dollars, to remediate the structural and environmental damage caused by these chemicals when the trains derail.


Here's some of the chemicals that might be making an unplanned visit to your neighborhood soon! That Hydrogen Peroxide will come in handy to disinfect any derailment-derived injuries.


Coal! America's secret weapon in the war against human lungs. It might be silicosis suffered in mining coal, or lung cancer from coal-burning power plant air pollution, or getting lumps of coal lodged in your chest cavity following a hopper disaster in the rail yards - coal is out to get you! It's a shame the stuff is so darn useful.


FINALLY a way to use the phrase "coal dumper" in polite conversation. Thank you, railroad industry!


Railroads have more than 160 uses for concrete, whether in constructing the gigantic Association Of American Railroads building in Washington DC, or in building the kinds of huge trestle bridges that you see terrified children crossing ahead of speeding trains on their way through rural Maine to look at dead bodies in heartwarming 80s films.


America has more than four hundred and eighty-eight million acres of commercial forest land, majestic vistas of nature's unspoiled beauty stretching as far as the eye can see, towering forest giants just waiting to be whacked down and thrown onto railroad cars to be turned into matches and toothpicks. All for you!


Towering over humanity, the killer robots stand fifteen meters high and are equipped with powerful engines and razor-sharp blades used to carry out their pre-programmed commands to eliminate all mankin-- sorry, these are combines. Just regular farm combines.


Huge quantities of grain are shipped for export to foreign countries as America flexes her industrial might in the kind of postwar "soft-power" diplomacy that leaves both the non-aligned nations and the Warsaw Pact green with envy! And railroads make it all possible. Is there anything railroads can't do?


Here's how it works. We dig the iron ore, coal, and limestone out of the ground, railroad it to the blast furnace, turn it into steel, and use the steel to make... more railroads and locomotives, so we can railroad more iron ore, coal, and limestone to the furnaces for steel for railroads for iron for steel for railroads and so on and so on, until the whole thing is just one enormous whizzing ring of chugging locomotives and molten steel forever and ever. And that's what Daddy does all day. Every day. Could you get Daddy a beer?


When you think of scrap iron you think of some genial redneck in his wrecker hauling a demolished DeSoto down the road. But there simply aren't enough genial rednecks to handle all of America's scrap metal needs! Thank goodness for railroads.


"Just think guys, we're going to go on a trip! A TRAIN trip! It'll be great, won't it Sheepy and Oinky? We'll get plenty of care and service, and get rested, and we'll travel on fast schedules - unlike the PEOPLE that travel on trains. Their experience is vastly different."


Here we see AMTRAK's new passenger loading system, which is... sorry. Wrong slide.


Reefer trains assure us of an abundant variety of fresh meat and dairy products, poultry, eggs, butter, cheese, all incredibly delicious foods that we are now really craving for some weird inexplicable reason. Maybe it's the reefer. The reefer... madness, if you will.

What, you think I'm going to pass up any chance to make fun of the word 'reefer'?! I'm only human!


Across America, trains transport pulpwood to countless mills, except when certain railroad employees who shall remain nameless accidentally throw a switch at the wrong time and dump entire carloads of lumber into the river, way to go Bob.


The petroleum industry's raw materials and products are shipped across the nation in our fleets of various kinds of tank cars. Certainly there's no better way to transport millions and millions of gallons of liquid petroleum! Unless some foolish visionary manages to invent and perfect some sort of "line" of "pipe" that could provide a continuous flow of... nah. Never happen.


"As I begin hour three of my brief lecture I'd like to remind everyone of how these railroads perform continent-wide services on railways built and maintained at their own expense, purely out of the goodness of their hearts, and if the land these railroads are on happened to be given away by the government for pretty much nothing in a series of sweetheart deals and handouts, well, there's nothing you can do about it now."


All that you touch, everything you use, everything that keeps you warm and clothed and housed and fed and safe every day, it all comes from the bountiful goodness (inspiring music begins) of railroads, railroads that (inspiring music swells dramatically) move the wheels of industry, moving wheeling freight cars that move and wheel around moving the wheels of a wheeling great America. Wheels! Enjoy some today (offer void in Wheeling West Virginia).

This has been brought to you by the Association Of American Railroads, filling America's classrooms with educational comics while filling America's capital with expense account lunches and campaign contributions. Keep on chuggin, AOAR!

Become a Patron! Hey gang, thanks for reading Mister Kitty's Stupid Comics! If you enjoyed it and want to show your appreciation, you can now become a patron by hitting that Patreon button above! Or, you can hit that PayPal button on our home page, or turn off your ad blocker so's our advertisers know you're out there! And remember to visit our YouTube channel, our Facebook group and our Instagram? Why don't you.

PREVIOUS STUPID COMICS

NEXT STUPID COMICS

BACK TO STUPID COMICS INDEX



BACK TO MAIN INDEX