What Were Railroad Marbles Used For

These handy antique marbles have seen lot of use over the years and have a lot of great energy to work with.

What were railroad marbles used for. And so they did. One of my teachers told us that a few years ago a student brought in about two dozen marbles that he claims he found on or near the railroad tracks. These marbles were different common glass colors cobalt clear light olive green and aqua. As the story goes a railroad official wanted a marble that would carry five hundred pounds of weight.

These marbles were first used between 1885 and 1890. Occasionally as at carrara. I discovered some different multicolored glass marbles at a disused railroad siding next to the site of a circa 1912 1980 chemical and fertilizer plant. No dark green or brown glass marbles were found.

The smallest and most common was about 15 mm 5 8 in in diameter the two larger more valuable sizes were referred to as semi bowlers and tom bowlers being about 20 mm 3 4 in and 25 mm 1 in in diameter respectively they were used in much the same way as ordinary marbles although sometimes they would be declared. My teacher is offering extra credit if we bring in marbles for a project we re doing and i d like to know if the railroads use marbles for anything and if anyone would even find anything if they. The change from limestones rich in fossils into true marbles in such metamorphic regions is a common phenomenon. These were used to roll freight on and off trains.

Marbles often occur interbedded with such metamorphic rocks as mica schists phyllites gneisses and granulites and are most common in the older layers of earth s crust that have been deeply buried in regions of extreme folding and igneous intrusion. Shooter marbles clay marbles and opaques. This was the only known business on the site. The beach made a great place for target practice.

I like to rub some money drawing and or better business type oils on them to make handy amulets for business and wealth drawing. Vacation marble games marble racing down the sloping beach sand jax games and sling shots with marbles for ammunition were used. In australia games were played with marbles of different sizes.