Great stories. Has anybody ever compiled and published a book of caller
stories? These were interesting. I would like to read more.
John in balmy Tucson (but in July it will be 110).
On 1/26/11 2:31 PM, "Chuck Hatler" <gnhistory07@live.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> Gerald and Folks,
>
> The old rules required train service employees to live within one mile of
> their on-duty point. While that was for the employee¹s benefit, it was more
> for the benefit of the crew caller, who had to walk, run, ride a bike, or
> whatever to multiple residences to call a crew (remember, most of those crews
> were 5 men!). Company vehicles for crew callers did not come along until much
> later.
>
> My dad, who was a crew caller on the GN in Havre, MT., knew which window to
> rap on at night (to not wake the rest of the family up); and if engineer Smith
> was out of town, that engineer Jones would be at Smith¹s house, with Mrs.
> Smith, when it was time for him to go to work. If the employee was not at
> home, he knew which bar to find the employee in.
>
> One old crew calling story he told: The brakeman had been fired by the
> trainmaster for whatever rules infraction. The Japanese crew caller had given
> up looking for whoever he was trying to find. He was known for just pointing
> at somebody at that point and telling them they were called. Well, he found
> the former employee at that point and told him he was called. The former
> railroader protested, ³the trainmaster fired me.² Who would let a silly
> little detail like that get in the way of getting the crew called? Not our
> crew caller! ³You called!²
>
> The former employee gave up protesting and took the call. He made a couple of
> trips before he crossed paths with the trainmaster that had canned him. ³I
> thought I fired you?²
>
> ³You did,² was the response, ³but the Japanese caller put me back to work.²
>
> After some thought, the trainmaster knew he couldn¹t beat that and let him
> stay working.
>
> Another old crew calling story, I believe came out of North Kansas City. This
> was in the days of the old crew calling board. Everybody had their name on a
> tag and the tags were rotated as men were called. It must have been a
> holiday, for the board was puny to the point that they ran out of men and
> there was still one train to be called. The caller, fairly new, realized
> there was one name on the board, but not in active status, but laid off
> status. Risking the rath of the terminal supt. for delaying the train, he
> finally called the phone number on the tag. ³You are called for work.²
>
> The man responded, ³Are you sure?²
>
> ³Yes, I am sure.²
>
> ³Are you absolutely sure?²
>
> Getting exasperated by this time, he replied yes. Actually, if he had already
> called everybody on the board that was even a maybe, he was already
> exasperated, but good caller that he was, he was still trying to find
> somebody, anybody, to go to work.
>
> Well, in due time, the employee showed up and made the trip up to Lincoln, and
> made a trip back to Kansas City. By then somebody had figured out what had
> happened and when the man tied up, they politely thanked him for his services,
> escorted him off the property, went into the crew office, took the man¹s tag
> down and proceeded to beat it into a hundred pieces.
>
> The man had been fired quite some time ago for repeat Rule G violations and
> was never to have returned to work, except for the crew caller who had no one
> else to call.
>
> Chuck Hatler
> KC MO
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>
>
>
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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