Louis..your analysis of the "railroad culture" is exactly right..Most of the men I knew met their demise as you have stated and for those same reasons. BTW..does the name E.R.Schrader "ring a bell" with you He was Supt at St. Joe in the early 50's and I even have a letter from him declining my request to ride the engine of train 93 from Corning to Villisca in 1951....
A couple of years ago I was visiting with a man..a bit older than I at our church whose name is Duane Schrader..He somehow knew I had a railroad background and told me about ......"Uncle Ed"...Well, guess what Uncle Ed is E. R. Schrader Duane's uncle..He is buried here in Lincoln and when ever I cross paths with Duane We have a brief chat about uncle Ed.
After I wrote my Sargent Schultz..."I know nothing" reply about the dispatching here on the Omaha and Lincoln Divisons I happened to think that there is a Young...younger than me that is guy ..Who started with the Q in 1974 as a roundhouse laborer at Hastings and later became a dispatcher...He left the Q sometime back and took over a family owned Car Wash business here in Lincoln...He just completed a buyout of his business by developer who is going to demolish his building and build some high priced apartments on the spot so he's got some time on his hands now. ....
I'll try to get together with Tom and interrogate him in some detail as to what he knows about who dispatched what and where..He belongs to our RR club and is reasonably knowledgeable about RR operation although I have to chastise him sometimes because he doesn't know about things I think he should know.
You spoke of knowing most of the operating officers referred to in the zephyr book...My grandfather knew every last one of those guys and I had met most of them myself.
I made several trips to Chicago with my GF when he needed to conduct railroad business face to face with those guys.
Here's quick story..of which there are many...We walked into one of the VP's offices at 547 West one day. You may or may not recall that in those offices there sat..in the outer office an army of clerks surrounded by LITERAL fence. The Chief clerk was the "Gatekeeper" and no one was allowed beyond the gate without his permission..Well, let's say that Chief Clerks were nothing but an obstacle to his progress to my GF. He wanted nothing whatever to do with them.
He and I walked up to the gate..He pushed it open and started walking toward the "inner sanctum"..My grandfather never spoke to or looked at the CC..we just kept on walking toward the door of "the man"...with the Chief Clerk following and yelling "YOU CAN:T GO IN THERE. My GF and I just kept walking and we went right into the inner office with the chief clerk trailing behind...As we came in the "MAN HIMSELF" jumped up and yelled "PETE....YOU OLD SON OF A BITCH COME IN HERE"...as he jumped up from his desk to shake hands with GF..Who then introduced me as "The TRAVELING ENGINEER ON THE ROCK PORT LANGDON AND NORTHERN". The CC then made a hasty retreat and GF conducted his business.
There are more stories like that, but you get the idea...I knew the railroad culture almost before I knew my A B C's.
Pete
-----Original Message-----
From: Louis Zadnichek via Groups.Io <LZadnichek=aol.com@groups.io>
To: CBQ <CBQ@groups.io>
Sent: Fri, Jul 13, 2018 3:36 pm
Subject: Re: [CBQ] Louis' mystery photo location Identified
July 13, 2018
Pete - Thanks. There's so few of us left that genuinely remember the Q, and even fewer who were actually employed by the Q. My dad was a great story teller and had a world of operating knowledge and memories of both Lines East and West that dated from the late 1930s to the late 1960s, but very unfortunately went to the "big General Office Building in the sky" much too early at age 66. Having spent time as an assistant division superintendent at Omaha in the mid-1950s, dad certainly could've described train operations in exacting detail. Many of the names of operating officials mentioned in the Denver Zephyr text within BB No. 55 were all colleagues of my dad and I remember meeting them as a youth. But, too many cigarettes, fatty foods and high stress that lead to heart disease resulted in dad's ultimate undoing. Speaking as his son all these years later, I can testify to the fact that all middle and upper level operating officials on the Q spent their careers in a high pressure cooker working environment. May be some one will eventually come along who can tell us more about how dispatching and operations were handled between Lincoln and Omaha - Best Regards - Louis
In a message dated 7/13/2018 1:06:18 PM Central Standard Time, jpslhedgpeth=
aol.com@groups.io writes:
Louis..I'll again say, I don't really know details of how the dispatching was handled..All I can say is that during my time the dispatchers were all in the Lincoln Depot...There was one DS who handled the CTC line west of Lincoln..and there was a "branch line dispatcher" and I think there was another dS who handled the Omaha Divison..probably to Omaha and maybe over to Balfour just east of P Junc where the Creston DS took over.
That's about all I know.
Pete
-----Original Message-----
From: Louis Zadnichek via Groups.Io <LZadnichek=
aol.com@groups.io>
To: CBQ <
CBQ@groups.io>
Sent: Fri, Jul 13, 2018 11:08 am
Subject: Re: [CBQ] Louis' mystery photo location Identified
July 13, 2018
Pete - Perhaps, you and your Omaha friends from the Q era could contribute something on this subject. My memory isn't what it used to be, but I don't recall any focused articles on Omaha/Lincoln dispatching in past BRHS Bulletins. I agree with Tristan that this would be an interesting Lines West subject. Best Regards - Louis
In a message dated 7/12/2018 6:48:34 PM Central Standard Time, tristan556=
aol.com@groups.io writes:
For me this raises some additional questions: how long did the operator at Ashland exist and how was the dispatching method divided from Lincoln to Plattsmouth and around the Omaha Line?
Seems that information from the Lines West, especially around the Omaha/Lincoln area is somewhat limited pertaining to operation and dispatching.
Tristan Dwyer