Every so often I’ll still see a Chessie System rolling stock. Even faded and neglected, it’s a nicer livery than CSX.

Chessie stays very popular with the railroad. She's used for a lot of csx posters inside their yard offices.

If you want more people to love your RR: Make a cat your logo.

Now I understand why everybody says "CSX bad". Completely understandable. #BringBackChessie

Not only was the kitten on railroad equipment. She was on the C&O's railroad ferries, and tugboat smokestacks.

I named my first cat Chessie after the railroad. If I'd adopted his sister instead of him, she would have been named after the kitten in the advertising. Not only was he named after the railroad, he was also a "railfan". When I first adopted him, I had my Lionel train going around the perimeter of my living room. He never attacked it but would follow it around the living room. When it went behind the couch, he would even run around the couch to wait for it and follow it around again. In the basement, he loved to curl up on the stairs to watch me and the trains on my layout.

We love chessie the cat bc she was given a great railroad and a cute little symbol of her

Never thought a kitten would have such an impact on a railroad

I have a dog named Chessie. She is a railfan dog and I take her to see local trains. I lived next to the Chessie System in the early 80s to mid 80s. I could watch the trains from my bedroom. I also rode the Chessie Steam Special that you show in this video. This video is awesome!

That’s great! It’s kinda sad to see that sleeping kitten losing popularity for some reason, but made me feeling better knowing there still are pictures, locomotives, and rolling stock with the logo of the kitten on it.

Chessie was a icon for the C & O and Chessie System of 67 years. Chessie did her job and she deserves a good retirement. Don't forget Chessie!

if you look up the song “Driver-8” by R.E.M, they feature many clips from the Chessie System in the 80’s. Great song with great clips of the Chessie.

CSX should consider changing their normal C into the Chessie C

When I was a 8yo kid in 2003 my dad got me a electric train set from Mehano, the locomotive was a Chessie System EMD SD40-2, I liked that paint scheme. As a kid I didn't know anything about trains but as I grew up I discovered EMD and I was amazed by the 2-stroke diesel rumble. As a kid I just loved trains and cats are my favorite animals. Today I'm a train engineer! Thank you little kitten! ❤️ Greetings from Croatia!

"Sleep like a kitten. Arrive fresh as a daisy.". What a cute slogan. I sure wish one could do that on a Greyhound! Only once did i get to sleep on a train, it was the early 80s, i slept like Chessie in an AmTrak sleeping compartment and did wake up fresh as a daisy. In the late 80s, touring the southwest including the Grand Canyon, i also slept like a kitten on a "Green Tortoise" bus that provided very comfy mattresses for all-night traveling.

Lots of people mention missing the Chessie System paint on locomotives and rolling stock. It was one of the finest contemporary paint schemes in railroading. Others would be Conrail, new Florida East Coast, and Kansas City Southern, IMHO. It was a fine railroad, at that - efficiently run, not burdened with passenger service, and its trains ran on a pristine roadbed.

Can we just take a moment to appreciate how GOOD this is?? Like, everything about it is just amazing. The audio, pictures, videos, editing, it all goes so well together and makes a really incredible video. I can’t wait to see more of these! Keep up the great work my guy.

This was so cool to watch!

Isn’t it appropriate that I watched this with an orphaned kitten sleeping on my chest. He and his 3 other litter mates have been with us for 3 weeks after his mother, a wild barn cat, was killed on the road.

I’m wearing a chessie shirt while watching this. *yes I like chessie*

So here’s an idea, get rid of the most loved logo in the United States.

The kitten seemed to do more than boost morale: it helped the system remain profitable through its fame, and its part of the reason why Chessie was pretty much the only East Coast system during the 70s next to Norfolk and Western that could keep their tracks in shape. That alone meant many companies would be repeat customers for their service compared to many of the larger ailing systems during that era (ESPECIALLY compared to Penn Central.) so I gotta give that adorable feline a lot of respect for that.

If the C&O or Chessie System were still around, they'd be Titans of internet advertising.

Everyone knows the Chessie System is a legend of the railroad market!

A couple of years ago I adopted 2 cats who were looking for a home together. They had been given the most God awful names by their previous owner (Capri and Sparkles, Sparkles being the male) so guess what names they have now? Yup, Chessie and Peake.

We have our own version of Chessie the Cat at the Virginia Museum of Transportation We don't have a name for her but she loves to hide out in the Virginian #4 So I just call her Virginia

Chessie has a wicked paint, change my mind.

My mom actually has a Chesapeake and Ohio mug with that kitten on it!!

It’s cool that a Kitten was a mascot for a railroad

this has allowed for a single piece of dopamine to be produced by my brain because kitty

I had an old ho scale f7 diesel that i got from an old lady, and it had chessie system on the side. Glad to finally know the heartwarming story.

This was the most wholesome thing I've seen all day. I'm not crying, you are!

I love these "history of thr logo" videos (that is, assuming that this was one of those videos) and I cannot wait for the next one. As for Chessie herself, she'll always hold the place as being on my first model train (an old bachmann boxcar)

Growing up along the steel mills in Youngstown my mom and I would always count all the Chessie cars that would pass us by! Great vid!

This cat will be missed

I liked all the parts showing who merged when to form what. I was always a bit confused with exactly what railroads csx came to be. Chessie is like the queen of England. She is immortal, and will never die In our hearts. :`)

Oh wow.. it really was a cat all along? No wonder I absolutely loved the Chessie liveries! Edit: I learned way more then I should've in under 7mins, Thanks for this video bud!

2 of the things I love: trains and cats!

I love Chessie! One of my first Model trains was a Chessie system and I've been loving it ever since!

I can't help but wonder if the person who came up with the "sleep like a kitten" bit ever watched very many of them sleep. They twitch, move around, make faces, etc. just like human babies. They're hilarious.

Grew up near Youngstown, Ohio. Remember all the Chessie locos going through Struthers, Ohio to the mills(well, what was left of them at the time, *sniff*) Great, fond memories. Thanks for upload.👍😊

I grew up near Corbin, KY. I can remember seeing CSX locomotives still in the sleeping cat scheme. So grateful for that.

Also still used by the Chessie credit union in Cumberland, MD

Ah yes, the station master's cat, something iconic of the railways of the past.

I rescued a kitten 14 years ago on the railway across the road where I live and named her Chessie after the famed Chessie. I did not know what the famed Chessie looked like so I checked and they looked almost identical! I still have her she is my life! Thank you so much stay safe and God bless.

We will never forget chessie

I love chessie so much I even named my pet cat after Chessie. I found him stuck in my pool as a month old kitten after getting home from a vacation and after I recused him we couldn't find his family so we adopted him. He even looks exactly like the Chessie in the advertisements.

The most classic image of CSX to date, and will remain like that for years to come!

Never knew about this adorable kitty. I'd seen the logo but never knew the origin. I paint oil paintings and use my kitty Moonbeam for the logo on all my paintings. Moonbeam is a black cat!

I’ve been a fan of Chessie since I was a kid! When we were railfanning by my maternal grandmother’s apartment in Kingstree, South Carolina (the train tracks running from DC to Miami ran by at the corner of her block), we used to count the Chessie silhouettes on the freight cars, and we mourned the loss of her logo when CSX bought out Chessie System. I have the book telling her history, model railroad cars with the Chessie logo, and several T-shirts featuring her. It’s great fun when people recognize Chessie on my shirt, and even more fun telling her history to people who don’t recognize her. But we also have a real-life Chessie-one of our three cats, a gray marble tabby, is named Chessie in honor of the great railroad mascot. She’s featured in videos on my channel along with her adopted brothers Raven and Eragon.

Great video. I can remember from when I was a little kid, there was an old boxcar with the Chessie System railroad logo sitting in an abandon siding at the railroad yard in Zanesville, Ohio. I think it was scrapped when the railroad was sold in 2008.

I agree with one comment bring back Chessie The 🐈 Cat! How I remember when the Penn Central was pulling equipment from C&O and I still remember " For Progress" & all the liveries in their originals during the 1960's & 1970's into the 1980's. Thanks for the making of this video! I love it!👍🙂

I swear to god there are like no good train documentaries I’ve watched like all of your videos atleast 3 times each

One other item of interest: under C&O control, the B&O also had a cat named "Bessie", but apparently she was not as popular as mama Chessie.

Animals Can Be Memorable In Every Way, Including Railroads Back In The Day

Chessie System colors were so wild and fun looking i loved it.

We all miss Chessie and her family.

Very good documentary of a great era!

Ah! I see her all the time on rail cars! We have a rail yard in our town and Chessie is there every month!

Great video and some awesome history! Wish Chessie was still around today!

CHESSIE IS BACK ON CSX as a heritage unit

I remember seeing the Chessie symbol on freight cars as a kid. I always thought the Chessie was short for Cheshire Cat. Know I know! Thanks for posting this!

I still have my new napkins and match books from Chessie along with a free pass on the C&O Ferry on Lake Michigan. worked as Switchman for the C&O 1973

I love cats and I always loved the Chessie System locomotive paint scheme. Thank you for this look at the history of their logo.

I'm a rail fan because of Chessie! My first model train was a Chessie.

My ex once expressed intressed in Chessie Cat cuz she remembers the trading cards and memoribilia from the 70s and 80s growing up in Findley, OH in the heart of C&O Land. So at a train show, I got her a Pink Chessie Cat shirt. She was trilled and still wears it often. Even though we don't date anymore, she's still grateful for it.

I remember going to a train convention, I got a Chessie Railroad Christmas ornament. It said the story on the back of the box.

I grew up with Chessie System. It will always be my favorite. I am also a cat guy and I actually named my first cat "Chessie." Great video! Thanks for sharing!

The same marketing guy who came up with "New Coke" got a job at CSX and decided to drop Chessie

Chesapeake and Ohio 614 was part of the chessie steam trips. She didn’t have a fancy paint scheme but did have the chessie logo on her tender during the 614-T test Trips

It’s so interesting, Cats guard the grain, and they travel in style in sleeper cars. Thanks for the note on Tama, she has a whole line of stationmaster successors too!

Weird. Yesterday, I read an article about Chessie and then the next day this shows up in my reccomended nice

Csx just recently bought back the sleeping kitty in their Heratage Locomotive 1973 in the modern era. It started with B & O Heratage Locomotive.

As a kid who grew up in Worthington next to the now CSX line,I vividly remember all of the beautifully painted Chessie System trains. We even had the Chessie system safty films shown to us in elementary school due to the rail line bordering the east side of Brookside elementary where I attended. CSX is a cold unappealing emblem. BRING Back the Cat!

I grew up in the coal fields of southern West Virginia. I rode behind 614 Chessie Steam Special from Saint Albans, WV to Hinton, WV as a teenager in 1977. I modeled my HO Scale layout off the southern West Virginia Coal Fields and its was called the Coal River and Horse Creek RR. Based on areas from Kanawha County, WV to Logan County, WV. Still support the C&O, B&O, WM and Chessie System Historical Societies.

Great video!!!! Me and my dad always wondered what was with the cat everytime we were at a railroad crossing.

2:23 I have that on a stamped tin picture.

Story story, I have always wondered about chessie system pics

They really missed a chance to keep the Chessie C in the CSX logo

Fascinating! I know putting this video together was a lot of work. Thanks so much for doing it! I’d seen the logo for decades and had no knowledge about what was behind it.

What a beautiful vid bud much respect

Cheesie was one of my favorite railroads in the eastern half of the U.S.

While I've lived in TN for the past 35 years, I was raised just north of Baltimore and remember seeing the Chessie symbol all during my youth.

Adorable!

4:11 I know the exact spot where that photo was taken! It’s just over five minutes from where I live.

My 2nd all-time favorite paint scheme, behind Seaboard Airline's Citrus scheme. I'm also a cat guy. Very well-done video, 6 stars on a scale of 1 to 5.

Will always love to see that kitten. Great job. 10-19-21 St. Joseph, MO (Age. 77)

very cool i grew up with Chessie System back in the 80's. i'm 37 now and remember alot of it

I’m liking your videos covering railroads & marketing! I’ve always been fascinated with logos and advertising and I’m happy to see videos about these fields in the railroad industry! Keep up the great work!

Thank you. I always wanted to know about the cat

Thank you for sharing that Every time I watch a train I always look to see if I can find any remaining chessie logo

Rip and love the video man thumbs up

Not sure why I started crying at the end

As a boy in the 60s, ℹ loved Trains ~ ℹ didn't know much , but ℹ knew THE CAT 🐈 You'd better Know you'll find that kitten mixed in with My model layout !

How adorable! I love Chessie and her family. Thank you so much for teaching me something new!

Oh my goodness... I had no it was a train thing... when I was a kid I had the playing cards, bedside lamp (actually just got rid of that a few months ago!), couple through pillows, and a bed comforter/blanket!

It was tough to watch the vibrant colors of the Chessie System get replaced by the drabness of CSX gray but I did like the Bright Future scheme.....especially when they were clean. The current blue and yellow is not bad.......but it ain't Chessie.

Am I the only one who didn't know the back story of Chessie because I never knew (or could figure out) what that logo image was? It drove me crazy and now, thanks to this video I know.

I still see chessie rail cars (mainly hoppers) a lot. It’s nice.

Always my favorite train cars and engine cars