The coming of the railroad changed the way America ate and drank. Before the iron horse connected every town of any importance to the outside world, most food was grown or produced locally. The arrival of cheap, fast, refrigerated transport - in the form of the woodsided reefer with ice bunkers at each end - enabled local brewers, diaries, meat processors, and other food businesses to become players on a national scale.
This model typifies the all-wood reefer of the last quarter of the 19th century, with metal truss rods running under the car to counteract the wood underframe's tendency to sag in the middle. With a few boards thrown across the rods to make a platform, many a hobo used the truss rods as a traveling bedroom - hence the expression "riding the rods."
