A collection of Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) public timetables amassed by William L. Staiger, formerly employed by the PRR at Harrisburg, Pa. They were acquired as issued through the company's local ticket office, supplemented by the purchase of older timetables on the collectibles market. None of the runs of forms is entirely complete, but those for the 1960s and for those routes passing through or easily reached from Harrisburg are more complete than others.

The oldest timetable is dated 1919, and the latest were those in force at the time the Pennsylvania Railroad Company and the New York Central Railroad Company merged to form the Penn Central Transportation Company. By that time, PRR passenger service had shrunk to a few long distance trains between New York, Chicago and St. Louis, the busy New York-Washington line, heavy suburban service at New York and Philadelphia, and vestigial corridor service between Baltimore and Buffalo, Chicago-Louisville, Chicago-Columbus, and Chicago-Cincinnati.

The timetables can be used to track the decline of passenger service, in particular the very steep dropoff that occurred after World War II. Suburban timetables, particularly from the Philadelphia area, show the beginnings of public funding that began in the 1960s. The main line timetables show the accelerating reduction in first class services, such as sleeping cars and full dining cars, and the discontinuance of local trains serving smaller on-line communities. The main line system timetables (Form 1) and the East-West timetables (Form 4) feature color cover artwork, city maps, advertisements for specific trains or tourist travel, and during World War II, a variety of patriotic messages and images. Most of the other form are usually folding leaflets. Some have ads for midrange hotels for the tourist or commercial traveler, package tours, bargain fares and PRR's long-distance trains.