Ok,the discussion of commuter cars brought back an embarrassing story. After
about 18 months of service things were getting slow and I had a choice
between working once a week/every 10 days on the road brkmns extra board at
Aurora or placing in the yard at Eola. I chose 4:00PM relief in Eola as the 5
days steady pay was a big incentive.2 days in west yd,2 days east and
Saturday nights(as I recall we had Sun and Mon off) at Aurora.
The first Sat.evening we were pulling and pushing dinkies from the depot to
the Hill yd I received an education on the locking device on passenger cars
.We had pulled the first of the 2 night runs up from the Hill Yd to the depot
and I was to cut the train off from the yd goat.I pulled on the pin lifter
and gave the "go ahead" only to have the engine pull the whole train? So I
flagged down,pulled the pin lifter again and ended up w/the same situation???
Then Dennis Felker came down off the engine to show me how the pin lifter on
passenger cars required a straight up pull and then an outward rotation to
get up and over the "lock" that kept the pin lifter from operating
unintentionally at bumps,road crossings,etc.as frt equipment will do from
time to time. As you can tell I still remember the lesson very clearly.
Leo
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