%Thomas The Tank Engine

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

Just want Bill Sellers to know that there are liberals of the FDR school who looked up to railroaders as kids too (1950's, Milwaukee Road).  I've never heard the Dems blamed/credited for Thomas before.  You put the magic of children and trains far more eloquently than I could.  But I don't think you are giving the kids enough credit.  Surely the Thomas phenomenon can only increase the number of kids that graduate to interest in the real thing.  And increasing the level of interest among the young can only help the railroad industry, by increasing the size and quality of the worker pool interested in a railroading career, right?

Ben, keep us posted on your progress with the sign!  If there's ever any problem with the zoning board, put me down as a contributor to the "Ben Blevins RR crossing Legal Defense Fund". If the GOP controls the board, put me down for X; if it's them pointy-headed liberals, $10X.

Tom Leuthner

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Today's Topics:

   1. Re: %Thomas The Tank Engine (nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org)
   2. Re: Potomac Yard clearance limitation,	or was it the
      Baltimore tunnels? (nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Fri, 8 Jul 2005 03:45:30 -0700 (PDT)
From: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org
Subject: Re: %Thomas The Tank Engine
To: NW Mailing List <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>
Message-ID: <20050708104530.74063.qmail at web51912.mail.yahoo.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

I'll only say this once.  Folks who know me know this already...
 
If my children are not welcome somewhere, I won't go.
If anyone thinks that I love trains more than my family, they've got another thing comin'!
If someone wants me to put anything ahead of my kids, I'll tell them were to get off the train!
 
Nothing is more important than my family.  I see it like this, when I'm dead and gone my tombstone will have my name on it.  Folks will say "he loved his family", or they'll say, "he loved trains..."  The latter sounds awfully shallow to me.
 
Lets don't make this personal. 

Ben Blevins


nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org wrote:
So, it has come down to this, has it? "This" meaning Thomas The Tank Engine.
It's not enough that today's government schools are filling kids heads with
politically correct liberal garbage instead of the truth. We have to
demean the
railroad industry by putting a stupid face on the front of a steam locomotive
to bring the subject down to the level of a child. That is utter
nonsense! I
started railfanning during the depression 30's around an all steam original
Norfolk Southern Railroad, and Atlantic Coast Line Railroad. I was to begin
the job of locomotive fireman in 1941 with the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad
out of Rocky Mount, N.C. on the south end of the Richmond District between
Rocky Mount and Florence, S.C., with rights also on the Wilmington District.
When I was a kid, nobody tried to bring the railroad down to my simple
level. The very thing that had appeal was the fact that a railroad was a no
nonsense "grown-up" mechanical marvel that moved freight and passengers
with the skill of special craftsmen who seemed born to work at their jobs as
they appeared to me to be having a good time and actually getting paid for it!
For one of them to take time to look down and talk to me made the likes of
Babe Ruth look like a nobody. I gained respect for the railroads, not because
they looked down at me, but because I looked up to them as a mechanical
marvel of sights, sounds, smells, and the ability to tingle my spine by just
doing their job, rain or shine, hot or cold. I was drawn to trackside just as
a moth is attracted to an open light. True, steam has gone, but to watch a
local freight come into town and pick up and set out a few cars, has the same
facination today that it had 50 years ago, and as a bonus today you have the
added convenience of listening to the engineer and brakeman talking to each
other on a scanner. No, we don't need funny faces on locomotives. You
only need an appreciation for a flanged wheel on a steel rail, and the sounds
associated with them, even down to a flat wheel or a flange squealing in a
tight curve. If those sounds have no appeal to you, then you are in the wrong
hobby. Bill Sellers, Norfolk Southern Railway ( Ret.) Gainesville, Ga. 

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Message: 2
Date: Fri, 8 Jul 2005 08:08:58 EDT
From: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org
Subject: Re: Potomac Yard clearance limitation,	or was it the
	Baltimore tunnels?
To: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org
Message-ID: <36.763b3f4b.2fffc6da at aol.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

As mentioned by Jim Foley, the controlling structure on the  Washington
Division (now NS's Piedmont Division) was at MP 112.2, in  Charlottesville.  
This
is an overhead bridge that carries U.S. 250 (Main Street) across the  tracks.
Because the structure is an ARCH, not all tracks would  clear TTX cars 
exceeding
17'9".  NO fully enclosed auto racks would clear.  Clearance was  so critical 
that
Southern had installed a detector at Proffit, six miles or so north of the  
structure.
(I don't know where the detector was for movements approaching from the  
south).
As a train approached the detector, it would project a beam across the main  
line.
If an excessive dimension car broke the beam, it would set into motion  
measures
to stop the train before it passed beneath the Main Street arch.
 
Clearance on the St. Thomas Division was so critical that auto racks  moving
Windsor-Fort Erie were equipped with 33" wheels, not 36" wheels.  GM  had an
assembly plant at Talbottville, Ontario which required such  equipment.
                                                                  Harry Bundy
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