Leo et al
I didn't want Leo to think that I didn't see his comment about my comment re
"timeslip artist" so here's a comment of little or no value.
It's been quite a little time back, but I seem to recall some conversations
regarding newspapers, but not in the official handing sense, so at the risk of
being redundant...(so what else is new) here are some memories from my dim
and distant past...only slightly embellished.
Newspapers were one of the perks of being a trainman...It seems that in some
form or other they were always handling newspapers...no pay being involved.
The suburban men would go through the cars gathering up discarded
newspapers, keeping some for their own reading pleasure, available at a good
price
(free), and distributing some to other railroaders along the route...ie
station
agents, carmen, enginemen etc. They were kind of a "currency".
I can remember in being around the depot at Langdon, MO in my growing up
years when trains 20-21-26-27 would arrive. Seems like the conductor or
brakeman would always have a roll of newspapers he would throw off to the
operator.
These would be such big city dailys as St. Joseph News Press & Gazette,
Kansas City Times and Star, Omaha World Herald. They would also have other
"customers" ie section foremen, signal maintainers etc along the way...even
perhaps a lonely farmer or like person along the way.
In my years on the Rock Island riding the trains "downtown" it seems like
the trainmen were always gathering up newspapers.
I've probably related this before also but I have a laugh or two every time
I think of it. When Jim Christen and I would make our summer trips over the
CB&Q branchlines we always began with a trip from Corning, MO to Villisca,
IA. One year as we got on the coach at Corning and were wandering through the
car (It was always the 3537..one of the steel six wheel truck combines made
for branchline service.) we came across quite an array of newspapers
(probably they were some combination of the Omaha papers and Chicago papers
which
would have come off of No. 15 or 29 (fast mail) at Villisca.
The train crew had probably been perusing these on their "down trip" and
just laid them spread out across a couple of seats to be completed on the "up
trip". Well, Jim, having a file clerk's mentality can't stand to see anything
lying around, so he just scooped up the papers and tossed them out the
window.
As we headed up the line as No. 93 we noticed the brakemen walking up and
down the car, obviously looking for something...One of them stopped and
said..."Did you boys see any newspapers on here"?? NOOOO of course not.
They may
have suspected something, but we were never formally accused.
Pete
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