Tr. 17 Consist & Tr. 51 Delay Report, BD Bristol, 9-7-1964

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I recently ran across two teletype messages dating from September 7, 
1964. The first one gives the consist of Train 17, the Birmingham 
Special, which message was sent from Roanoke, and the second one is the 
delay report filed by Radford Division Conductor C.R. Kesee on Time 
Freight No. 51, which message was sent from Bristol to Roanoke.. I have 
scanned them and put them into one image (attached.)  Obviously I picked 
them up at "BD" Telegraph Office in the Bristol station. The text of 
these messages read as follows:

BD4 KD16 NTXROANOKE VA SEPT 7 1964

TRAIN 17 X 6149 2950

901PM   916 PM <<<these are arrival and departure times at Roanoke>>>

H L HILL
735PM

W M BRICKEY
855PM

REX 6948 M BGHAM
SOU 153 R CHATTA
SOU 566 M CHATTA
SOU464 X CHATTA
SOU 725 N BGHAM
SOU 105 P BGHAM
SOU 1058 P BGHAM
NW 232 M  BRISTOL

TOTAL 8 CARS
C S NEWELL ..... 927PM

////////////////////////////////////

24 KD BD FN FILED 930PM BRISTOL VA SEPT 7TH 1964

WOT - KD
ROANOKE VA

NO 51 ENGS 922-734-533 DELAYED
ROANOKE 45 MINS WAITING ON TRAIN
RADFORD 40 MINS SET OFF AND PICK UP
PULASKI 10 MINS SET OFF AND PICK UP
GLADE SPRING 20 MINS SET OFF AND PICK UP
WYNDALE 10 MINS NO. 42

C R KESEE
956PM

/////////////////////////////////////////////////

Some remarks on the Train 17 Consist Message:

W.M. (Bill) Brickey was a 1918 hire Radford Division engineman.  H.L. 
Hill was a Norfolk Division Conductor, and I think he may have been a 
1918 man also.  735PM and 855PM are the times on duty at Monroe for the 
Conductor and Engineman... I cannot account for the different times on 
duty, especially since Brickey (who traveled from Roanoke for the job) 
is shown as reporting later than Hill.

Clarence S. Newell, whose signed the consist of Train 17, was the 
official at the Roanoke depot responsible for passenger operations.  In 
today's world he would probably be called the Passenger Trainmaster.  We 
would see him around the Roanoke station, always wearing a hat (so we 
knew he was a boss,) but I do not know what his exact title was or where 
his office was.  Almost every time I saw him he had the Stationmaster at 
his side, and I do not recall him ever conversing with any of the 
"working people."  I always wondered about his background.

Some Remarks on the Train 41 Delay Report:

Clint Kesee, the Conductor who signed the message, was a 1926 man, as I 
recall.  He was thin, trim and always alert, the kind of man with whom 
it was a pleasure to work.  I "broke" for him a number of times on the 
Bristol Line Time Freights.  Some time later in the 1960s, Clint was 
holding a job in passenger service and was the Conductor on Train 17 one 
night when a car near the head end of the train had one wheel derail.  
The derailed wheel was dragged something like 15 miles before it was 
discovered (west of Pulaski, up Peak Creek Mountain, as I recall,) and a 
large number of track bolts were sheered off.  Even though it was dark 
and the derailed wheel set would have been almost impossible to detect 
from the train, he was given a suspension of "90 Days in Lieu of 
Dismissal," a very stiff discipline.  I asked him about the incident 
later, and he responded, "How was I supposed to know that those two 
wheels were derailed?  Even if I stood on the back platform of the last 
car and watched the track all night, I could not have known those wheels 
were derailed."

Some Remarks on the "Services" on the messages:

A holdover from telegraph days, every message was endorsed at the top 
with a "service."  The "service"  showed the message number and the 
"personal sine" of the operator sending the message (and in telegraph 
days it also showed the "personal sine" of the operator who copied it at 
the other end of the wire.)

Here's my interpretation of the "service" on the message covering Train 
17's consist.

BD4 - 4th message of the day sent to BD
KD16 - 16th message of the day to KD, which was the Radford Division 
Message Office in Roanoke
GM - GM telegraph office in Gen Office Building, Roanoke, was also 
copied in on this message
NU -  "Personal sine" of the operator sending the message
NTX - Probably the designation of the teletype terminal (somewhere in 
Roanoke) from which sent

Here's my interpretation of the "service" on the message covering delays 
to Train 51:

24 KD - 24th message of the day to KD
BD - place from which message sent
FN - the "personal sine" of the operator transmitting the message

The message is addressed to WOT (W.O. Tracy,) the Radford Division 
superintendent, at "KD" Radford Division Message Office.

-- abram burnett



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