Pete - I do not envy you as no matter which family member ends-up with the
bell, some one is going to be very, very unhappy. Whereas your son is of an
age and, I assume, emotionally close enough to appreciate what the bells means
intrinsically to you, your grand son by your daughter is not. It will
always be "my grand daddy's train bell" and in saying that, I truly mean no
disrespect. One answer may be to donate the bell to the Patee House Museum and
let it join the artifacts off the two spot. Or, sell it and divide the
funds. The bell with its proven Q history might fetch as much as $3,000, maybe
more. When my dad passed away, he had already pretty much divided
his Q railroadiana collection between my younger brother Ken
and myself. I was always more interested in the material than my brother,
so dividing what was left really wasn't much of a issue, as I recall. I do
not have the problem that you have in that I have only one child Miles who is a
professional railroader in the finance and accounting section of the NS in
Atlanta. Even though Miles is, surprising to me, no rail fan nor rail
historian in the sense that we are, he will eventually end-up with all
my railroad iron, as my wife calls it, and other collections. I will leave it to
Miles to read my rail fan memoirs at some later date so he can better appreciate
what all this truly means to me, then he can do with it all whatever he
wants...... I will say this, as a lifelong railroadiana collector, it's
very much what you call a "graying market," in that fewer and fewer folks are
collecting it and paying less and less as there's so much of it out there for
sale from folks who have, as you say, marked up for the home terminal. People
collect what makes them "warm and fuzzy" and so few people are now left
that remember the Age of Steam and all that went with it that the market for
such collectibles is decreasing, unless someone has a truly
special item to sell, such as your bell. Personally, I have two front
mount bells off O5a's, the 5615 and 5624. My brother has the bell off the
5622, I believe. All three bells were purchased through the Q's
Galesburg Storekeeper off the deadline there by my dad in, I recall, 1959.
The bells are in original condition complete with flaking lead paint and
all..... I would be interested to know if any other Group members
own Q steam engine bells, whistles, builder's plates or whatever and
their stories behind how they acquired the artifacts -
Louis
In a message dated 1/29/2013 1:22:17 P.M. Central Standard Time,
Jpslhedgpeth@aol.com writes:
Louis
Speaking of "keepsakes" like your M4 headlight..I have the bell off EX
CB&Q 440 ne B&MR 156 )in my garage. This engine was
featured in Hol's piece "Modern Americans in a recent BRHS bulletin)..I had
the number plates and builder's plates off Baldwin 2-4-2 T Class of 1913 No. 2
of the RPL&N and they are now at the Patee House Museum in St. Joe,
MO.
I have a 51 year old son who wants the bell and an 18 year old
grandson (my daughter's son) who both want the bell. My son was
here last spring and I was ready to let him take the bell home with him to
Savannah, GA and when my daughter found out she was "distressed" because you
promised the bell to Spencer (her son, my grandson)...so I made a
"Solomon like" decision..actually I just postponed a decision by just putting
the bell back in the corner of my garage and telling them...When I'm gone you
guys can fight over it.
I sure wish I could have gotten the whistle off the 440, but I was 17
when she was scrapped and the deal had already been made with the scrapper
before I knew about it...As it turned out...as I found out reading some old
correspondence...my dad had to pay the scrapper $25 for the bell and they
weren't happy about that even.
The bell is in the same condition it was when taken off the engine...I've
done no cleaning or refurbishing on it. My sister has the bell off No.2
and she sent it off to some kind of machine shop and they polished the brass
and cleaned up all the steel. She has it in her living room by the
fireplace...I was always told to leave stuff like it was and this I did.
Pete
-----Original
Message----- From: LZadnichek <LZadnichek@aol.com> To: CBQ
<CBQ@yahoogroups.com> Sent: Tue, Jan 29, 2013 12:49 pm Subject:
Re: [CBQ] Story POsts
Pete - Steam mesmerized me, too. After experiencing the 5632/4960 fan
trips of the 1960s, I had always wanted to own a steam engine. My wish came
true in the early 1970s when I and two friends purchased a wood burning
Baldwin cabbage stack logging 2-6-2 from the Alger Sullivan Lumber Co. in
Century, FL. At the time, I was a broker at Pinto Island Metals that was a
large regional scrap yard in Mobile, AL. I had been sent to the saw mill that
was closing to survey the obsolete machinery and equipment for its scrap
value in order to formulate a bid. I was very surprised to find the derelict
2-6-2 with slope back tender at the mill marked as scrap. To make a long
story short, my friends and I bought the engine known as No. 100 for scrap
value, had it loaded on an oil field flat bed trailer and trucked to the scrap
yard where we restored it to operation using steam fittings and packing
from engine rooms of Liberty Ships that were being dismantled at the ya
rd. Once restored, we used the 2-6-2 to occasionally switch the yard including
a mile run up the island to the Frisco interchange. The No. 100 was featured
in a two page spread by Railfan Magazine in, I think, 1976. One of my
partners in the 2-6-2 was the late L&N engineer J.R. Phillips who had been
the last steam qualified engineer on the Mobile & New Orleans
Division. J.R. became like a second father and taught me just
about everything there was to know about "small" steam power. Through
J.R., I was able to meet SR steam master mechanic Bill Purdy and other Dixie
steam icons of the era. These luminaries included Tom Lawson of Birmingham,
AL, for whom I later wrote the introduction and sections of his
wonderful book "Logging Railroads of Alabama." The other partner was
Max Grice who was general manager of the yard. Pinto Island Metals did
their switching on the second shift, so I was a broker from 8 am to 5 pm
and engineer (or fireman if J.R. was off his usual run) on the 100 during the
evening hours. We burned pulp or drift wood from the Mobile
River with occasional old ties and took water with a hose from a
fire hydrant. The engine steamed beautifully and was powerful enough to pull
anything in the yard. The 100 also was very useful in steam-heating tank
cars full of Bunker C fuel oil that had been pumped earlier out of the
ships being scrapped. The oil would harden like tar and had to be heated again
to be pumped off to tanker trucks owned by waste oil dealers. I spent
many nights keeping the 100 hot so its steam could be used to heat a string of
tank cars. Many, many memories here of being alone on a hot steam engine
under the stars at night along side a snake infested swamp listening to
the frogs and alligators. Mosquitoes were seldom a problem, just crack the
fire box door and let some smoke into the cab...... A ll there was
to do was keep an eye on the steam gauge and when it dropped a little, toss in
a couple of logs. Plus, once or twice a night, I'd have to put the injector on
for a little water. It was just me and my steam engine...... Whereas I didn't
get coal soot and cinders all over me, I always came home to shower and change
clothes smelling like a bon fire (or so my wife would tell me). There is also
a Q connection to all this. The 100's original headlight was rusted out,
so I replaced it with one from M4a 6324 that my dad had given me as
a birthday present years earlier. So, after illuminating Q mainlines
from Chicago to Denver and Galesburg to Beardstown, the headlight
ended-up on a logging 2-6-2 switching an Alabama scrap yard. J.R. and I
both freely interchanged the steam whistles we had on the No. 100, so I had a
chance to hear what my five chime iron top off an O5 and brass three chime off
an O1a sounded like with 180 psi of saturated st eam. We later sold the
100 to the Whitewater Valley Scenic Railway and years afterwards they sold it
to Alger Sullivan Historical Society that returned the locomotive to Century,
FL, for permanent display. A well traveled logging 2-6-2 to say the least.
Today, nothing remains of Pinto Island Metals and its industrial railroad, the
entire tract having been redeveloped by the Alabama Port Authority for
unloading shiploads of steel slabs consigned to the Thyssen Krupp steel mill
north of Mobile. The 100's headlight is now displayed in my home along
with the two whistles and all I have to do is glance at them and I'm
overwhelmed with memories -
Louis
Maybe I should "go on the Road" with
that.
Here's a little story which I'll clean up a bit, but I can't resist
telling it.
We were at Langdon one day and the south local was there and we were
transferring merchandise across the high platform. I was wearing my
usual "black face" and arms as well.
I remember the fireman on the local yelled at me....l "hey look
at the little...... "ethnic slur" boy on the RPL&N"....No one took
offense in those days.
Pete
-----Original
Message----- From: HOL WAGNER < holpennywagner@msn.com> To:
CB&Q Group < cbq@yahoogroups.com> Sent: Tue,
Jan 29, 2013 8:01 am Subject: RE: [CBQ] Story POsts
Pete: There can't be many people in the country --
the world, even -- who can say they fired a 4-4-0 in revenue service!
And a former Q 4-4-0 at that! Hol
To: CBQ@yahoogroups.comFrom: Jpslhedgpeth@aol.comDate: Tue, 29
Jan 2013 00:22:40 -0500 Subject: Re: [CBQ] Story
POsts
One of my few regrets is that I never
got to work with a steam engine. IIRC the last steam on the
Lincoln-Hastings line was 1955 which was a year before I hired out...Summer
56, my first summer they kept a steam engine at Ravenna for protection..IIRC
it was the 5080. At that time waycars were still changed at
Ravenna. The switch engine worked nights
1:00am-9:00am. The rule was that if a road train was "called in" for
within a half hour of the switch engine going off duty it had to be
held over to make the change..Otherwise the crews make their own waycar
change.
On several of my mainline trips Lincoln-Ravenna at Ravenna the
switch crew would be working with the steam engine to make a waycar
change.
There was were two locals which tied up at Ravenna 6 nights a
week. The Burwell Local and the Lincoln-Ravenna local. These
locals used a Geep for power, hence there was always a diesel for the switch
engine to use, but if those locals got out in the morning and the switch
crew was held over they would use the steam engne.
I got forced to the Ravenna switcher late summer of 56...It was an
awful job..Not much work but all nights and me staying in an old non ac
hotel getting no sleep and the job paid little or no OT...
I thought surely one night of the three weeks I was there I'd get a
chance with the Black Beauty as one of the switchmen called it...Well, it
never happened. So as far as the CB*Q is concerned I'm
steamless...However in my early life on theRock Port Langdon and Northern I
spent lots of time on the 440 and 2 Spot. I wasn't big enoough
to lift the shovel, so I picked up the coal and threw it in the firebox by
hand..And then of course I had to wipe my hands on my face...My dad was the
engineer the last 3 years of operation and he could work around coal and
dirt all day and never get any on himself...Such was not the case for
me.
Pete
-----Original
Message----- From: Noel Crawford < georgecrawfordsr@comcast.net> To:
CBQ < CBQ@yahoogroups.com> Sent: Mon,
Jan 28, 2013 8:28 pm Subject: Re: [CBQ] Story POsts
Pete:
Non of my people worked for
the Q or any other RR. However, I have kid memories of the folks who did. My
brother in law's stepfather, Rick Walthers worked as an engineer starting as
a fireman on steam engines. I remember the day we were painting the interior
of the Brown McDonald store in York. Rick was working with us when he got
called for the extra board. He took of for Lincoln like a dog with a tin can
on it's tail. It is a wonder he made it in time for his call driving 50
miles down old highway 34 years before the interstate. When his train came
through York, my dad and I were out on the embankment overlooking the line.
Rick was firing a Mike 04a. He was in the gangway grinning like a kid. The
engineer gave us a long tug on the whistle cord which put a bigger grin on
my face. Rick loved steam but hated diesels. Towards the end he really
disliked his job. He died in the 80's of lung cancer. One of the best
stories I have of him is when in the 70's he put an extra e mpty box car in
his train which was the local. He knew they were going up to Benedict on the
old KC&O. He then got the crew to help him take the big heavy roll top
desk out of the Benedict Depot and haul it back to Lincoln. It was the
original desk from the KC&O. He restored it to pristine condition.He had
gotten permission from someone to do this. Anyhow I would have killed for
that desk, but his widow gave it to Rick's daughter for her husband who
worked for the UP. They still have it. By the way I am 3 score and 12.
LOL
Noel
On 1/28/2013 8:40 PM, HOL WAGNER wrote:
Pete: I'm a year older than Louis, so you've got
a decade on me, too. And what a decade: The differences
between the 1950s and the 1960s were monumental in railroading, with the
change from steam to diesel and the decline of passenger service.
I'm lucky to have ridden a number of Q passenger trains in the late
'50s and early '60s, while service standards were still quite high, and my
all-tme favorite dining car experience was eating dinner in
the old heavyweight diner-lounge car (car 325 for those who care) on
No. 26 out of Kansas City for Omaha. While I don't recall what I had
(except that there were peas, and the Q always served the best peas
I've ever eaten), it was just the ambience of the whole setting, with
superb service by the dining car crew and the fabulous ride of the old
heavyweight car which had the rear half of the original dining room
converted into a lounge, complete with rear end windows, creating
something of a solarium. Never left that car all the way to
Omaha! Hol
To: cbq@yahoogroups.comFrom: Jpslhedgpeth@aol.comDate: Mon,
28 Jan 2013 20:12:40 -0500 Subject: [CBQ] Story
POsts
Charlie...I hope you
really mean it when you say that this "good stuff" ie stories is
going to get preserved...I've often wondered over the years if someone was
actually doing it.
I've done some writing on my own regarding my "Adventures" as a
Terminal Trainmaster on the RI, and am gathering material...actually I've
already gathered it..just a matter of getting it on here and other
places...for a Burlington Story...I've got the title, which I'll not
reveal here, but this recent stuff started by Louis Z. has "tripped my
trigger" and now approaching the Biblical "three score and 10 plus 10 if
your strong"...I'm closer to the "home terminal" than most of you so the
time of procrastination is almost past... Time to do it is now.
I've appreciated so much John and now Louis emphsizing the important
of the Stories....I've always thought that the people side of the
railroads was "where it was" for me...
Louis your "word picture" of the TCZ arriving at LaCross was
great....My granddaughter is a golfer and she played that course last
summer..She came home and said.."Grampa...that golf course was right by a
railroad track...the whole picture came immediately into focus.
The smell of the diner is someting one never forgets...When my dad
and I would be waiting at Langdon for 21 and 26 back in the 50's...they
usually met somplace around Langdon so we would catch them both...26
carried a diner-parlor car on the rear end...As the train would leave and
the diner would go by the platform the aroma of dinner preparations would
waft from the open kitchen door and the grinning black chef would toss out
a bone to the "depot dog"...Actually he was the Langdon postmaster's dog
and his name was Spot. We would usually make the Langdon
trip before having supper at home and those diner smells created a
"lustful desire" for a "dinner in the diner"...well my mother always had a
good one for us when we got home.
Pete
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