What are your memories of Railways 'when you were a young'un'?
The one that is the earliest in my memory is ---------------Being an orphan from three days old I lived with an Uncle and Aunt and two cousins until I was three years of age. Therefore it was at that time. (When I was four I lived with my Grandma and Granddad.)If I was three, then it was the Summer of 1950. Aunt and Uncle decided to take us to Bridlington for the week.It was a Saturday morning. Suitcases were packed. The excitement of going on holiday.As my Uncle had to work Saturday, he was to follow us the following day. (Six day working days were the 'norm' then.I remember how dark, dingy and very smoky the area around the ticket office at Leeds City Station was. My two cousins (Jean, 7 yr old and Margaret, 5 year old) and I watched as my Aunt bought our train tickets. Carefully she placed them in her handbag.With having two suitcases a Porter was needed and one was immediately on hand. Loading the cases on his hand barrow he asked "Which train.""Bridlington," Aunt replied. To which we scurried after the Porter to our waiting train.At last we boarded the train. Aunt lifted the suitcases on to the luggage rack above and we settled down in our compartment.Looking out at the platform, a huge Station Clock gave the time of 08.56. Aunt smiled as our train was not due to depart until 09.37.Another elderly married couple joined us in the compartment.Aunt looked out of the window and saw, not twenty yards away, a lady with a tea trolley. The clock said 09.04. Plenty of time."There isn't a queue I shall get some tea," said Aunt and alighted from the carriage.No sooner than she had bought the tea, she turned, saw and heard the engine take the strain an began the Schhuff, Schhuff, Schuff. The time was 09.07.Pandemonium struck in the carriage. Three of us screamed "Mam." Tears streaming down our cheeksWe were some way out of Leeds by the time the other couple in our carriage managed to calm us down.The Ticket Inspector arrived. Off course we had no tickets. Aunt still had them in her handbag. The Ticket inspector was dubious to our story, but we stayed on board.Finally we arrived at Bridlington. The elderly couple had their own suitcases, but they also helped us with ours.At the ticket barrier, the Inspector allowed us through to the other side, but had to wait there until the next train from Leeds arrived. The elderly couple waited with us.Thirty minutes later, the train from Leeds arrived. Amid tears of joy, Aunt thanked the elderly couple.The 09.07 departure to Bridlington from Leeds was a 'Duplicate' and not in the timetable.The week in Brid was great.
To the world you are someone. To someone you are the world
I cannot afford the luxury of a negative thought
My first train trip was on the Super Chief, from LA to Chicago, when I was five. I traveled with my mother.
Leaving the station, a porter held me up at a dutch door so I could view the scene.
Later, traveling across the desert, I viewed from the rear of the obs the semaphores still falling. Moving briskly, we were.
In our compartment, I noticed the area below the window was warm. I asked my mother why, and she asked a crewman passing by. He said it was because we passed a burning stock car in the night.
And I remember one of the dining car crew passing down the corridor ringing the chime that called us to eats.
Ed
I was 14, it was July 1951 in El Paso Texas. My birthday is in late July. Our next door neighbor was the Southern Pacific Yard Superintendent. I drove him crazy talking trains.He gave me the best birthday present I have ever received. He arranged for me to ride in the cab of a Southern Pacific Cab Forward (4287, 4-8-8-2) from El Paso to Alamorgodo New Mexico, 90 miles north of El Paso. It was a very hot day and back then the air conditioning consisted of windows open and 50MPH. I can still taste the desert flies in my mouth. The Fireman had warned me about the flies but a 14 year old never listens when he is having fun. Remember the engine crews always wore a neckerchief; well there was a reason for them.The return trip was in the cab of a SP AC-9 (3807, 2-8-8-4) after driving the Alamogordo SP staff nuts for several hours. The ride in the normal rear cab was not as neat as the Cab Forward but the engineer and fireman explained the operation of the huge locomotive and I got to operate the throttle and blow the whistle at every crossing.Now at almost 84 years of age I still remember that day like it was yesterday.Mel Modeling the early to mid 1950s SP in HO scale since 1951My Model Railroad http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/ Bakersfield, California Aging is not for wimps.
I sure can't top North Brit's or Mel's stories, but for what it's worth...
My earliest recollections of trains:
I was maybe three or four and the family was returning to Casper from west towards Shoshoni (in an automobile). We passed by the grungy old Standard Oil Refinery at the west end of town. There was a long low viaduct (made of concrete if I remember correctly) with a very long row of tank cars parked on it. The cars were waiting their turns at the oil loading racks.
My first ride on a train was in the cab of an old Chicago & North Western Geep as the engineer switched cars at the industries in Riverton Wyoming. My mother and I had arrived in Riverton late in the afternoon, on our way to pick up my brother in Jackson the next evening. Our motel was right near the station, so I hoofed it over there to check out the train that had just arrived. The engineer was just climbing down out of the cab and saw me eyeing the engine. He told me if I came back early in the morning I could ride with him as he worked the next day. I was 18, and that was in 1974.
Mark P.
Website: http://www.thecbandqinwyoming.comVideos: https://www.youtube.com/user/mabrunton
Im sure there are alot of memorys stuck in the cobwebs of my mind from seeing trains pass at grade or out in the wild so much.
Even so, no memory earliest or not, rings clearer than my first ride. Only waiste high to a grasshopper at the time, the ride was everything a kid could ask for.
Standing next to ole #4501 was another thing. A very scary, hissing, belching, screaming, noisy, terrifying kinda thing.
Lil did i know i just met the love of my life.... TRAINS!
PMR
My mother loved trains. Before she was married she traveled by train over much of the country east of the Mississippi and some further west as part of her job.
I was prettyi young, but she knew the Rutland was going to switch from steam to diesel. She and her father took my friend and I on a trip northbound from Manchester, VT to Rutland, so that we could say we had traveled by a regularly scheduled steam powered train. We took pictures of us at the station, but none of the train. The part of the trip I remember most was when we had to take a siding so a southbound freight could pass.
Have fun,
Richard
My first train journey was about 1955 or so. I think I was 5, maybe 6.
We lived in Weston, CT, then still a relatively rural "town" not that far removed from the days when farming was the mainstay of the area.
I wanted to ride on a train, so my parents drove down to South Norwalk, where the New Haven had a branch northward to Danbury. During the day, service was provided by a single ancient MU electric car.
My mom brought me on the train up to Cannondale station, and my dad drove the car up and picked us up.
That was my first "train ride" on the Danbury Branch, but not my last. 26 years later I had my first qualifying trip there as an engineer, running FL-9's and old New Haven coach trains.
But the rest of my running there would be on freights for Conrail, locals out of Danbury and stone trains out of New Haven.
I miss working on the Branch. As I type this I can hear the Metro-North shuttle coming north towards the end of its trip, blowing for the crossings south of Danbury...
(WNCH-99, at South Norwalk, waiting to pick up orders and go north up the Danbury Branch, 1984 -- snapped this while waiting for the signal)
Good to see the dusting out the memory box and reading the great stories.
Keep them coming.
David
OldEnginemanI miss working on the Branch. As I type this I can hear the Metro-North shuttle coming north towards the end of its trip, blowing for the crossings south of Danbury...
Had to throw this one out there for you, Old Engineman:
Car Crashes Into Pole along Metro-North Tracks by Metropolitan Transportation Authority of the State of New York, on Flickr
Cheers, Ed
My dad told me that I was three and loved watching trains in a yard in Switzerland on vacation. I have no memory from it. Later, when I as a young teen, we started the process of making one on a 4x8 plywood sheet, but I lost interest. Here we are 30 years later and I have a much larger train effort. I'm planning on showing him the layout this weekend!
To the OP: You made my day by starting this topic!
Re Ed's post and pic: "Had to throw this one out there for you, Old Engineman"
That's the first crossing south of Danbury Station. It's actually in the middle of a small interlocking (CP 423), which is just one switch where the engine is sitting. Back in the days I worked there, the Danbury Branch was still manual block.
The guy picked the right place to crash (look at the building in the background). I had some car repairs done at Mike's -- they did ok by me.
Just heard the shuttle blowing for those crossings a couple of minutes ago.
"One difference between pessimists and optimists is that while pessimists are more often right, optimists have far more fun."
In a previously life I was on the orphan train in 1859
As Steve Allen used to say "all seriousness aside" I don't really remember that.
I remember taking the Pennsy GG1 from Baltimore to NYC in the late 50's, the streamlined and multicolored cars of various railroads in Pennyslvania station;
The toilet that emptied directly onto the tracks, and the dining car where we ate breakfast.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley