All this discussion of Green Coal finally brought an old memory to the
surface.
And yes theres a tie to the Q. Read on.
As a kid our house was the last one in the neighborhood with a coal furnace.
Rausch Coal(corner of New York and Lincoln in Aurora) would delivery the coal
and conveyor it into the coal bin thru the basement window early each
fall.And sure enough I remember the green paint and also wondering how paint
got on coal. Based on memory and what I've learned from these discussions and
John's excellent BB on the Q in coal country I know we received what must
have been mine run coal.There were huge pieces (much larger than the firemans
scoop we used to feed the fire(dont ask how that ended up in the basement,
but with many family members as Q employees I'll let you figure it out)down
to what must have been egg size and dust.
Heres the Q connection.
In order to keep the coal bill down Uncle Ray (carman at Eola)would come over
on a Sunday in October and Dad and us two boys would climb in his 50
something Chevy p/u and go to the old west Rip at Eola near the Wagon Bridge.
At this time Cat,Barber Greene, and Austin Western all loaded equipment onto
Q flats.Each mty returning would go to 'A' yard and get stripped of all the
blocking. This was typically done on A-1 which was closest to the rip and the
fence line of the property(remember on the Q all non classification trks are
number from the outdie inward,just the opposite of yard trks). We'd load the
truck up till the springs wouldnt take any more from what had been tossed
onto the ground from the flats. After several trips we'd have a large area of
the basement next to the coal bin stacked to the floor joists with this heavy
blocking. It kept the coal bill down but the cinders along with nails were
another matter.
Leo
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