Yikes! It's all gone!!

[ACY Tom]

Funny. We have a thread going here which features an unlikely pairing: A B&O steam engine terminal and a GN steam engine terminal. Dickens could have written A TALE OF TWO TERMINALS. "It was the best of times; it was the worst of times." I was in Akron last fall and I believe the oddly-shaped concrete coal dock was still there then. Did you know that the loop track left the mainline right next to the coal dock and crossed over the lower connection to the CT&V right next to the dock? I understand there was a coal delivery spout serving the upper track as long as the loop track remained in place. I've heard conflicting stories about the date of removal of the loop. Some say it happened before the end of WWII because aircraft wing assemblies from Goodyear Aircraft were being shipped out in excess-height cars and couldn't make it under the bridge. I have seen a photo of a B&O T-3 4-8-2 posed under the bridge. The T-3's were produced by Mt. Clare during the war. As a teenager many years ago, I climbed up to the top of the coal dock, and it was SCARY way up there! The Lady Baltimore 4-4-4 steam engine hauled the daily passenger train between Cleveland and Wheeling via Akron Jct. during the war years. Coming from Cleveland, she had to traverse the loop in the uphill direction, and her 84 inch drivers slipped badly if they ever had to put a 3rd car on the train. In those cases, a yard engine would have to give her a push. I like to think they used the little K-20 2-6-0 that they kept in Akron to operate the downtown Industrial belt line that served the lower Quaker Oats plant. My most lasting memory of B&O steam involved a lazy summer day in 1957 when I (age 11) was swimming with friends at Water Works Park in Cuyahoga Falls. A triple header of Mikados came plodding and blasting slowly up the grade to Munroe Falls with 3 black smoke plumes shooting all the way up to heaven. Is there anybody in the room who thinks I could ever forget that?

[daveklepper]

I'd like to encourage you to tell them.   If they happened 50 years ago, they should not bear much on current problems except as education, and thus they can be valuable.   I am certain they are not any more damaging that that Classic Trains runaway story.

[1oldgoat]

Don't encourage me to tell my stories. Half are unbelievable (even though they are true) and the other half I doubt the moderator would allow! I will say that the (union) employees along BN's Northern Tier were the most militant on the system. This resulted in some interesting management v. labor episodes.

[NorthWest]

Interesting. The resident SD9-3 also lives in the roundhouse, too, so at least some first generation power survives. Lately, it seems the SD75M dead line has vanished, outside to the north of the roundhouse.

A Superfund site? That may be why BNSF hasn't torn it down yet, it may be cheaper than cleaning up the area and putting in a new enginehouse.   

Thanks for the stories, always good to hear them.

[1oldgoat]

I guess the coal dock is still there. Do you know about the "Loop track"? It left the CT&V just behind the roundhouse, crossed a leg of the wye, and looped around to joined the mainline near the coal dock . It allowed passenger trains to run between Wheeling and Cleveland without a back up move, but I don't know if freight trains ever used it. My grandfather owned a cold storage warehouse near South St., just south of Erie's McCoy St. yard where the Erie and B&O double track mains and the PRR Hudson - Columbus secondary all ran parallel. It seemed like there was always a train going by. It's where I saw the last B&O steam in mainline service. I wasn't aware of when they stopped running, but when I heard the steam whistle at a nearby factory, I always though their would be a steam engine coming. I also remember my heartfelt disappointment when that steam locomotive never came.

[1oldgoat]

I started as a laborer, then hostler helper, and ended as an "engine mover"  (hostler).  When I started in '74, I remember one of the old heads telling me "Don't get too comfortable here, kid.  This shop ain't long for this world".  I ended up telling the newbies the same thing before pulling the pin.  It's been 7 years since and the shop is still there.  It's remarkable that they've never torn down any part of it.  Inside, you'll see truss rods keeping the roof straight.  They're now maintaining "third generation" diesels in a steam era structure.  What a contrast!  (I have a photo of a GN R-2 (2-8-8-2) being spun on the (112') turntable.

When they covered the outside with metal siding, someone quipped that it was like putting a tuxedo on a hobo.  One more earthquake of any magnatude and I expect a good portion of it will be reduced to rubble.  The land is likely a future Superfund site. 

Th guys there were truly a cross-section of humanity.  The work force had people of every ethnicity, age group and educational level. It was fun (mostly) working there (and the funniest place on earth), but I'm glad to be done and gone.

[ACY Tom]

I have accepted the fact that I have entered Fogeydom. People ask me how I can stand to have railroading as both a hobby and a means of livelihood, and I tell them the two are mutually exclusive. My hobby world involves jointed rail, interlocking towers, telegraph communication, steam locomotives, cabooses, frequent passenger trains operated by the Company that owns the track, and much, much more that is (in the words of Margaret Mitchell) gone with the wind. Around 1958-59, Dad and I would go down to the B&O engine terminal at Akron Jct. and shoot the bull with some of the old timers. I remember spending many hours talking with Bob Wink, an electrician who lived in New Castle, but stayed in Akron with relatives because Akron was the closest place his seniority was sufficient to hold a job. I would play on Q-4 2-8-2 417 (ex 4429), which was the last steam engine at the Akron engine terminal. That terminal was pretty unusual. It had a public road running through it, between the coal dock and the engine house. From any point in the engine service area, you could see Erie's black and yellow F's and FA's flashing by in perfectly matched ABBA sets. Pennsy freights boasted Sharks as often as not, but FM Erie Builts and other exotic types were often seen. The only way to get back there is to just close your eyes ..............

[Firelock76]

Of course you miss Ohio, it's home, even if you've been gone for years.  I miss New Jersey, not everything about it mind you, but a lot of it, even after leaving 27 years ago.

[NorthWest]

I was at Interbay recently...the roundhouse looks pretty odd with roll-up garage doors!

What position did you work in at the GN/BN?

[1oldgoat]

We all know how Akron, like many other "rust belt" cities, lost a great deal of most of the manufacturing base that generated countless carloads of revenue freight. Akron has lost my beloved Erie-Lackawanna,and the Pennsy. CSX's former B&O main is the only "big dog" traversing the (former) Rubber Capitol of the World". I followed the CSX from east of Cuyahoga Falls to the south end of Barberton, where it becomes a single main (another abomination!). In that distance there are only 5 or 6 switches off the main tracks! The W&LE and A&BC handle most of what's left, and that's not much. After I was discharged from the Navy my clerk job at McCoy St was awaiting my return with my military service time being added to my seniority and RR Retirement. I left Akron to check out the West Coast and never came back (except to visit family and friends). In retrospect, I was fortunate that I didn't return to my clerk position, but I do miss Ohio (mostly in spring and fall). Sorry to ramble and bore you guys with non-AC&Y stuff, but that "trip" along CSX triggered some bittersweet feelings. BTW, if you are interested in seeing where I resumed my RR career, hit Google maps. Go to Seattle. Just NW of downtown (along Puget Sound) is the BNSF mainline. Follow it north. About 5 miles up the line is the Interbay Roundhouse (at the north end of the yard). It was built by the GN in '29 and the entire structure is still intact!