Steam era signals

[nachoman]

I've never thought about that. So let's assume the engine is shoving a cut of cars into a spur, and they have to be spotted precisely at a loading dock. I am assuming there has to be a spotter at the end of the cut of cars, and needs to signal to the engineer when to stop. Given things like bad weather, darkness, and curves and view blocks (other buildings and vegetation), you are saying the conductor would ride along the end of the car and open a valve on the brake line to signal the engineer to stop? I suppose in certain situations they could have used multiple visual spotters to relay a signal.

I guess knowing this changes how some of us pre-radio modelers should operate our switching moves. When I back a trailer with a car, I have someone standing in view telling me when to stop. So, when I am switching my layout, I need to think about how the engineer can know where to stop when spotting cars.