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OT. Railroad Tie Nails

6

60 acre hillside

Member
I found some nails with a date on them in some well rotted railroad ties. The dates are 22, 24, 25. I assume these nimbers indicate the year the ties were put into place. I cleaned the rust away with a wire brush and oiled and put into a sandwich bag and will give to a local museum. Anybody ever see them?
 
They are called date nails and they do indicate the year of tie installation. They were also used on utility poles.
 
Started collecting those back in the early 1970's. There were lots of them in this part of the country because there were Santa Fe tracks and they seemed to use more of the date nails than other lines, although the Frisco used quite a few. Some of the very early single digit nails were square nails and were the most difficult to find. Date nail and barbed wire collecting were quite popular in the 1970's and 1980's in this area. You can still find both offered on ebay.
 
Those were installed new in 1922, 1924, 1925. If those nails could talk, the stories they could tell! The only ones I have seen are either copper or galvanized steel of different lengths. Different RRs had different types of nails.
Brian
 
I've got a few too. It's a pleasant surprise to find one in an old railroad tie corner post.

Paul
 
For anyone that has not seen them if you go to Google "images" you can use the search term "date nails" and see photos of them.

The ones used on the Missouri Pacific had heavy shanks and were heavily galvanized. Don't recall ever seeing any that were rusty. Expect with our low rainfall they lasted longer.

Sad to say the old MOP turned Santa Fe turned Burlington Northern/Santa Fe came in and abandoned the line in my home area.
 
As kids, we used to trade around until we had them for our birth-years. wgm mentioned use on utility poles; while running a new underground connection last year the power company decided that one of the existing poles would be replaced since it was showing some age. They asked if I wanted it and of course said 'yes'. After looking at it I identified a date stamp for September 1941. Pretty impressive that that pole was placed before this country went to war.
 
Thank you. I did not know they were collectible items. Theese came from the Belmont Branch of St. Louis Iron Mountain Lter called Mo. Pac. Same road Jesse James robbed the train at Gad's Hill.

Other items I have gathered is cast iron plow shares

Also found an ox shoe along the Chester (Illinois) Greenville (Missouri) trail.
 
Interesting.

So.... How do you drive a date nail into the lumber? Without smashing the date off the head? Can't see adding the date afeter, and keeping it centered? Special sleeved punch dealie to drive the nail the whole way? or?

--->Paul
 
(quoted from post at 22:11:17 01/13/11) Sad to say the old MOP turned Santa Fe turned Burlington Northern/Santa Fe came in and abandoned the line in my home area.
Click to expand...

Actually, the old Missouri Pacific (MP) was absorbed by the Union Pacific (UP). not BNSF.
 
(quoted from post at 11:29:11 01/14/11) Interesting.

So.... How do you drive a date nail into the lumber? Without smashing the date off the head? Can't see adding the date afeter, and keeping it centered? Special sleeved punch dealie to drive the nail the whole way? or?

--->Paul
Click to expand...

It's been a long time since I looked a date nail over closely.
I know the nails are pretty tough and best I remember the raised numbers are kind of pyramid shaped, so I don't think they would be easily smashed.

The Santa Fe had their own tie plant at Somerville, TX and maybe the nails were hammered/pressed into the ties there.
The other railroads may have had the same set-up, but I don't know about them.
 
I have been collecting Date Nails since the early 70's and have a web site up. You can check it out at nailhunter.com lots of information on Date Nails.
 
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