Tie Plate Canting and General History - Model Railroader Magazine

This is a question I hadn't ever considered, and since I'm in Australia, I can't neccessarily help much. One approach would be to look at early photos of trains on main lines and look for tie plates. Photos exist of the "Empire Stare Express" at speed when it made its speed record (about 1897?). If the NYC didn't have tie plates then, I'd guess nobody did.

I've seen ties cut at an angle to provide the cant (generally 1 in 20 or 1 in 40, I think) in the absence of canted plates.

There are old copies of AREA manuals and Simmons Boardman published a "Track and Structures Cyclopedia" (like the better known Locomotive Cyclopedia). I have one of each, and I'll see what they say, if anything.

My guess would be that plates have been around for a bit over 100 years. It might be worth recalling that in Britain, "double headed rail" supported in cast iron chairs was used from the early 1830s until the 1970s, and these "chairs" could be considered a predecessor of the tie plate. There is a stretch of very early chaired track remaining in a city in Australia, unused for many decades!

Peter