OED Appeals List: Nonblocking

JAMES A. LANDAU Netscape. Just the Net You Need. JJJRLandau at NETSCAPE.COM
Wed Sep 17 20:57:45 UTC 2008


on Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:55:21 Zulu minus 0400 "Baker, John" <JMB at STRADLEY.COM>
wrote:

<quote>

        The appeals list asks for any written evidence of "nonblocking"
in non-computing senses, especially in pre-1972 uses. <snip>

        Missouri Pac. Ry. Co. v. Baxter, 42 Neb. 793, 60 N.W. 1044, 1045
(Neb. 1894):  A railroad brakeman, a part of whose duty it was to couple
cars upon tracks known by him to be unblocked and dangerous, while so
engaged, caught his foot in a frog, and was injured. Held, that he took
upon himself the risk involved in the nonblocking of the frogs, and
could not maintain an action against his employer for the injury
sustained. Wood v. Locke, 147 Mass. 604, 18 N. E. 578.


        In the 1894 example from Nebraska, the court is summarizing the
holding of the earlier Massachusetts case.  The Nebraska court must have
had additional information about this case, because the report it cites
doesn't mention blocking.
</quote>

Mainline railroad tracks are divided into "blocks", and only one train is allowed in each "block."  (The recent commuter train wreck in California seems to have been due to the engineer going past a signal telling him not to enter the next block.  Unfortunately there was a moving freight train in that next block).

As far as I know, "block" in this sense was standard railroad terminology back in 1894.

There is some railroad tracks, such as in switchyards and customer premises, where blocks are not used because trains move so slowly and can see each other and switching, so block protection is not needed.

"tracks unblocked and dangerous" means tracks on which more than one train can be moving.  The brakeman therefore was in danger because, while he knew where his own train was, had no way of knowing in advance whether another train would show up and put him in danger of being run over.

A frog is part of a switch.  The ruling says that he "caught his foot in a frog", not that he was hit by a train.  If catching his foot (and perhaps falling down or breaking a bone or something) was all he did, it is not clear to me why it was relevant that the trackage was not "blocked".

If I be correct about the meaning of "block" in this instance, then "nonblocking of the frogs" is gibberish, the result of the court apparently having misunderstood railroad jargon.  Hence "nonblocking" in this citation is an accidental and incorrect nonce word.

     James A. Landau
     Test Engineer
     Northrop-Grumman Information Technology
     8025 Black Horse Pike, Suite 300
     West Atlantic City  NJ  08232  USA

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