"Takin' Twenty with the Virginian Brethren" by Skip Salmon

[NW Mailing List]

Last night I had the pleasure of "Takin' Twenty" with seven of the Brethren
and Friends of the Virginian Railway. We signed a Happy Birthday Card for
Ernie Hubble, son of Roundhouse Foreman "Red" Hubble and nephew of several
other Virginian Railway supervisors. Ernie is one of the youngest of the
Brethren and turned 71 last night.

Wis Sowder told the group about working in South Yard as a Clerk when the
new roller bearing cars first arrived. The first class "with the new
fangled bearings were the tank cars. They were usually black and were very
quiet when moving, so you had to really be on your toes when working in the
Yard at night". He and Landon also talked about how some Yardmasters were
very particular when the #72 Ford train came in. "It was scrutinized every
second until it left town, and emotions clashed when a car had to be
shopped out of it". This prompted me to recall working as a Supervisor at
Shaffers Crossing and having to tell a Yardmaster that a unit had to be
changed out when trouble could not be fixed on the spot. I remember that
most Yardmasters spoke two languages, English and Profanity....


>From last week, I have discovered that the lever found in "Slick" Inge's

VGN tool box is an independent brake handle that has been modified with a
90 degree offset in order to clear the knee of the Engineer. These may have
been used on a VGN Electric as "Slick" thought. I will take the handle to
VMT and see if it will work on the EL-C. The EL-C Operators Manual shows
the independent handle positioned very low and looks like an offset one
would work better. More on this later.

For Show and Tell I took several photos I purchased last Saturday at a Yard
Sale in Lafayette, VA. They were taken by a gentleman who retired from the
Environmental Hazmat Service of NS. Landon Gregory identified the photos as
being from a C&O cabin by the type of equipment in the photo. Also shown
was an NS Virginia Division watch I got at the Yard Sale that Landon
immediately purchased from me for his collection.

Also passed around was the April 2013 "NRHS News" and latest Roanoke
Chapter NRHS "Turntable Times". The "News" featured an article "J611 may be
returned to rails by VTM" about the "Fire Up the 611" study. An
announcement about this project will be made at a news conference tomorrow
at 11AM at the Virginia Museum of Transportation. The "Turntable Times"
features on its cover a photo I took of the Chapter's T-6 #41 pulling heavy
weight sleeper "Lake Pearl" and newest car "Scioto County" #1489 across the
Diamond at "JK" Tower. The "Lake Pearl" is being restored at the Chapter's
9th Street facility by VMT contractors and the "Scioto County" former Budd
sleeper converted to coach is being restored by volunteers for Chapter use.

I had a Catholic joke for the ending of this report but my censor talked me
out of using it. If you want to see it, contact me at
gkholine at cox.net<http://do/mail/message/mailto?to=gkholine%2540cox.net>for
a copy.

The Jewel from the Past, like those in Bill Johnson's Hamilton 959b is from
May 3, 2007: "Someone was kidding 'Cornbread' Victory about the small town
in Tennessee where he grew up. They said the town was so poor that they
used a sign on the highway for their name, "Resume Speed".

Time to pull the pin on this one!

Departing Now from V248,

Skip Salmon

CDLXXVII

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