Hi Milt:
I don't know about the Special, but there is a photo in the Rockpile Museum
in Gillette of the last steam switcher in Gillette. It's the 4960, so it
was her territory at the time.
The senior Brakeman/Switchman in Edgemont when I hired out was John
Michaels. He was holding the rear man job on the Hiline (Deadwood job), but
finished out braking on the mainline for Harry Porter after they abandoned
the 4th. Sub. He liked working with me because I knew steam. Mike told me
he liked switching with steam better than diesels. "You could tell what the
steam engine was doing by how it sounded. You didn't even have to look,
just give a 'come-ahead' and wait for four or five exhausts and give 'em a
'stop' and you knew where he was. These damn diesels sound the same all the
time." He told me that the last engine he remembered at Edgemont was a C&S
Mike.
I rode the "Way Freight" trip to Rockford one time. I'll bet that switchin'
with that O5b was about as bad as switchin' with a MAC or Punkin'. You
could tell that the track didn't like it much either......"groan, snap,
creeek".
BTW, are you the R. Milt Clark I used to know back in Wisconsin?
Mike Decker
----- Original Message -----
From: <BRHSlist@yahoogroups.com>
To: <BRHSlist@yahoogroups.com>
> Date: Sat, 24 Feb 2001 22:17:42 -0000
> From: unclemilty@a...
> Subject: CB&Q 4960
>
> I have a photo of the 4960 and a diesel unit trailed by several heavy
> weight coaches taken at the east end of Laurel Yard, MT on 5/5/1963 by
> R. V. Nixon. It was one of a series of photos taken that day by Mr.
> Nixon in the Billings area and on the Greybull Line (according to his
> photo log).
>
> Are there any in the group that might know what the 4960 was doing at
> Laurel at this time?
>
> Thanks.
>
> Milt Clark
> Missoula, MT
> unclemilty@a...
>
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