mudchicken Not sure I would agree with that sentiment. They know the language and they know how to manipulate the system to benefit the railroad. (Alex/ LARams guy was a trainman, but also one of those.)
Not sure I would agree with that sentiment. They know the language and they know how to manipulate the system to benefit the railroad. (Alex/ LARams guy was a trainman, but also one of those.)
Actually I was one of those green eyeshade-type guys from the Revenue Accounting area but I appreciate the props!
very well said, my Dad never went out on the railroad, worked in yards, freight house and yard office, but he knew what it was like to work in all kinds of weather when he was outside.And had a vital job to do loading freight cars or checking the seals and making sure they had not been tampered with, espec cigs and liquor cars. Had his battery lantern to swing around so he'd be seen, no bright tower lights in those days and steam engines, some co-workers did die when a train backed over them. Mom was glad when he got enough seniority to work in the office, much safer. And the joking around with his co-workers, everyone did have a nickname and some were not so nice. The office was right next to the yards, so there was a lot of action going on and the crews came inside to wait for their trains and shoot the bull. It was like a big frat and Mom could understand too as she had worked for Frisco and so did her dad, uncles and grandpa, who were over the road guys. I grew up with railroading stories and feel like I understand what goes on, even if I never got to work for one myself. No matter what the weather, the trains will get through and especially during WWII when Dad worked and trains ran every few minutes, since Frisco served Ft. Leonard Wood, a huge training base. I know my parents considered themselves railroaders and their RR retirement checks proved it. Dad never lived to retire but Mom got hers and widow's check for Dad.
Interesting that the term "railroader" is more encompassing than the term "trucker". No one would refer to a rates clerk for YRC (for example) as a trucker. That term is reserved for drivers and occasionally the higher ups.
mudchicken Present day, yes. (oh, farnsbark!)
Present day, yes. (oh, farnsbark!)
MC,
I will not divluge the detailis. Just call me " Lt. Columbo". My deputy buddies say I am a good detectiive. LOL.
Norm
NKP guy,
My career RR experience prior to becoming Right of Way Agent was 20 years in the Engineering Dept. working on an Operating Division, building 79 miles of new RR and then working for the Chief Engineer in Corporate Hqs. From that I had learned what ROW requirements a Railroad needed to operate in the ever changing world of transportation developement like TOFC and COFC or hauling new automobiles. I began as ROW Agent with the task of acquiring the property needed for two new yards that would service a new huge manufacturing plant.
So yes I had to know how railroaders worked and what "your railroaders" must have to do their work efficiently and safely. I indeed understood what happened when trains operated both in yards and on the operating lines; plus the ever present problems my company had with its existing property as times changed.
mudchicken: I appreciate your railroad real estate comments, especially the foul-ups resulting from a lack of good surveying.
When my neighbor sold his house next door (our houses date from about 1885), he found out from the surveyors that his house was on my land by 7", but Ohio has a law that after X number of years such an arrangement or situation is legal and doesn't have to be undone; it's never been a problem for me.
My Uncle Bob, who worked in NKP's real estate department, is responsible in a way for my interest in that great railroad. In 1951 he alerted my parents, who were renters, that the NKP was going to sell several houses next to its RoW in East Cleveland. Although it was wrong, he told my parents how much to bid! Guess what? Dad & mom became first time homeowners by buying a (run-down) house for $4,000 cash. In 1960 they sold the place (much improved) for $12,000. Thanks to Uncle Bob and the Nickel Plate, dad & mom never had a mortgage on that or any other house. You can guess what a financial blessing that turned out to be for our family then and since.
As I indicated earlier, no one would ever have mistaken Uncle Bob for a railroader (at least by my definition), but he enjoyed working downtown for the NKP; it was in his house that I first saw and picked up Taylor Hampton's book on the Nickel Plate, and thanks to him my bedroom window was level with a Berkshire cab for nine years of fantastic train-watching.
Farnsworth?
NKP Guy = May I introduce you to DiningCar (REAL railroader and a R/W Agent)
Railroad or not, if you're not really into the job and learning your profession/craft, you had best not tangle with me. In recent history, I've more than annoyed several attorneys, a utility land agent, title companies and other surveyors and engineers because I didn't buy the baloney they were spouting about railroad R/W.(Guessing and/or accepting hearsay is a pretty weak excuse) A couple of our railroad clients have discovered that they unintentionally have become owners of half of houses [In one recent case 2 1/2 houses] and commercial buildings because somebody was to cheap to pay for a proper survey or dealt with a fly-by-night title company. (scary how common this is getting to be)
Concept being: It takes all kinds to make a large organization function well. Hopefully those folks are all into what they're doing.
zugmann* I had a trainmaster that once said "brotherhood ends where the wallet begins". I don't know if truer words were ever spoken.
My Dad (who worked for the Mopac as a chief clerk) had an expression, "There is NO unselfish motive." Even Mother Teresa gets satisfaction from her choices. We choose our occupations and if it gets too unsatisfying, we quit.
Balt and his words of wisdom with a few changes could also be applied to the OTR industry. Think about it many of them are gone from their homes for weeks sometimes months at a time sleeping in a different state each night eating who knows what from where loading up all over the place going to customers that may or may not give a crap if they even have access to a restroom. Yes that one happens more often than you realize still. They deal with weather extremes from -40 below in North Dakota with -80 below windchill to 120 degrees in the shade in the deserts across AZ in the summer. Yet they do it for the most part hidden no one knows who they are unless they screw up and someone gets hurt in an accident then everything they have ever done is put under the microscope for all to see and they all pray this prayer Lord please help me get thru this day safe and may all those that I interact with on the road also be safe around me in their actions.
That prayer was recited to me by my husband and several of my drivers over the last year. Why they all know that dreaded feeling of having been in the worst accident anyone can be in were someone you were involved in with died. Just remember while they are not railroaders they also have extreme responiblities they carry on their shoulders ever single day. In a train your interaction with traffic is limited they are surrounded by it all day. Their jobsite aka their truck outweighs the normal car 20 to 1 when fully loaded and takes 3 times the length to stop. So please if you can remind your loved ones to please give them room on the roads they are mostly family men and women all doing the same thing your doing a job to support their familes. Sorry just a few words from a trucking company worker that is married to a now disabled driver from an accident.
Watched the You Tube video.
Wow. Wasn't that a laugh riot?
54light15 There's an old blues song that goes like this and it's all that I know, A railroad man will kill you if he can and drink your blood like wine. Does anyone know the rest? I wish I could find out who did it.
There's an old blues song that goes like this and it's all that I know,
A railroad man will kill you if he can
and drink your blood like wine.
Does anyone know the rest? I wish I could find out who did it.
https://genius.com/Dirk-powell-mole-in-the-ground-lyrics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AwjzzuT0Rw Read the analysis of the song
http://jkadcock.blogspot.com/2013/10/railroad-man-will-kill-you-when-he-can.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bascom_Lamar_Lunsford
https://www.loc.gov/folklife/LP/SongsandBalladsAFS_L21.pdf
I tried to sell my two cents worth, but no one would give me a plug nickel for it.
I don't have a leg to stand on.
The magical people of RITland?
It's been fun. But it isn't much fun anymore. Signing off for now.
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.t fun any
zugmann What's a clerk?
What's a clerk?
It's those folk all bottled up in an office tower in Atlanta.
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
*Sigh* Yet another piece of work that reinforces the notion that the railroad only runs with engineers and conductors. Also, to whomever said clerks are not railroaders, what a foolish statement.
Mechanical Department "No no that's fine shove that 20 pound set all around the yard... those shoes aren't hell and a half to change..."
The Missabe Road: Safety First
NKP guySome engineers who roar through our town blow at their hours for the crossing as if they realize thousands of people are trying to sleep; others seem to feel it their duty to make horn-blowing last as long as possible.
I blow in accordance to federal regulation. If I hit someone and wasn't blowing the proper amount, then it's my ass on the line. Can't be nice out here anymore. It is what it is. Heaven help you if you only blew for 13 seconds.
As for as the term "railroader": I really don't care. It's just a term. Most of us are out here for a paycheck - not some higher calling*. There's some 'railroaders' out there (and probably here, too) that wouldn't consider me a 'railroader' because I don't currently run road trains or stay in dirtbag motels. I don't lose sleep over it.
* I had a trainmaster that once said "brotherhood ends where the wallet begins". I don't know if truer words were ever spoken.
Thanks, Balt, for the nice piece on railroaders.
Not to put too fine a point on it, in my opinion the people who don't work on trains are "railroad employees" or "work for the railroad." I had an uncle who worked in the NKP's real estate department; suffice it to say no one ever considered him a "railroader."
"Railroaders" are, I think, just as Balt's essay described them: the guys who work on the trains, but the other folks are vital, too, of course.
In that essay, Balt, I thought the most vivid paragraph was the part about engineers. "We share the feeling of screaming through small towns in the middle of the night ringing our bells, belching black smoke and blowing our horns." Great image! Some engineers who roar through our town at those hours blow their horns for the crossing as if they realize thousands of people are trying to sleep; others seem to feel it their duty to make horn-blowing last as long as possible.
In the middle of the night I love hearing fast-moving trains, operated by railroaders, blowing those horns and ringing those bells.
zugmann Randy Stahl The part about new traveling fast got a chuckle from me. Telegraph, telephone, tellarailoader.
Randy Stahl The part about new traveling fast got a chuckle from me.
Telegraph, telephone, tellarailoader.
Several times I have seen jokes told at the home terminal arrive at the AFHT well before the person who told them.
Great post Balt, really sums up reality neatly.
And I will always consider the clerks, sectionmen and others to be railroaders. It just wouldn't be a railroad without track, customers and (above all) paperwork.
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
BaltACD, that post was magnificent!
All the more reason to wave at a train's head-end crew when they pass. Steam locomotives, cabooses, semaphores, position-light signals, all have passed, but the heroes are still out there.
Randy StahlThe part about new traveling fast got a chuckle from me.
The part about new traveling fast got a chuckle from me.
Many years ago on a WICT train to Chicago I finished the run and got cabbed to the hotel.
We arrived at about 5 am , woke up about noonish , went outside of the hotel to smoke and promptly got arrested for robbing the gas station across the street from the hotel.
It didn't take long to get everything straightened out but.. By 9 pm when our train arrived in Fox Lake even the Metra car cleaners knew I got busted for armed robbery....
Of course every dispatcher, operator, train crew was on the radio asking how much the WICT was paying us..
Randy
mudchicken Not sure I would agree with that sentiment. They know the language and they know how to manipulate the system to benefit the railroad. (Alex/ LARams guy was a trainman, but also one of those.) The engineers/architects/surveyors around me are sure I came from another world (Grand Railroad of the Holy Faith) and speak in heiroglyphics half the time (FGROW, DOT#, undercutter, frog angles, lead distance, bent stockrail, A&B blocks, cribbing, little "o" distance, bents, EE BR, spring line.....whut the?) ... But I suddenly get popular when they have to deal with a railroad because their project is "the most important ever" for a nanosecond. Some of those account execs keep railroads alive....I don't see anybody trying to offend the beancounters, claim agents or attorneys... (for that matter, I'm sure many of the high and mighty here have no true idea of what a surveyor does [there are 3 surveyors on Rushmore with that insignificant (?) "other guy"] besides look through an optical astronomy telescope (the damn recent History Channel docudrama on the Royal Gorge War left us in stitches . Telescopes are not vernier transits and wye/dumpy levels. Anything with tripod legs is a transit ) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUFpuvh8tVw ABSOLUTE CRAP factually and visually... Back off a little folks. think about it. The original post is still good in trying to explain the different breed of cat.
The engineers/architects/surveyors around me are sure I came from another world (Grand Railroad of the Holy Faith) and speak in heiroglyphics half the time (FGROW, DOT#, undercutter, frog angles, lead distance, bent stockrail, A&B blocks, cribbing, little "o" distance, bents, EE BR, spring line.....whut the?) ... But I suddenly get popular when they have to deal with a railroad because their project is "the most important ever" for a nanosecond.
Some of those account execs keep railroads alive....I don't see anybody trying to offend the beancounters, claim agents or attorneys...
(for that matter, I'm sure many of the high and mighty here have no true idea of what a surveyor does [there are 3 surveyors on Rushmore with that insignificant (?) "other guy"] besides look through an optical astronomy telescope (the damn recent History Channel docudrama on the Royal Gorge War left us in stitches . Telescopes are not vernier transits and wye/dumpy levels. Anything with tripod legs is a transit )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUFpuvh8tVw ABSOLUTE CRAP factually and visually...
Back off a little folks. think about it.
The original post is still good in trying to explain the different breed of cat.
It's a shame that anyone can be so ignorant as to look at a transit and call it a "telescope."
Johnny
MC, proir to the D&RG - ATSF sitoo at the Royal Gorge the significant western gunfighter Bat Masterson was a grader as the Santa Fe built toward Dodge City. He along with a brother later became part of law enforcement in Dodge City and as Bat's reputation grew he served in similar positions throughout the west. His "loyalty" to Santa Fe placed him in the Royal Gorge situation where he never fired a shot. Railroaders come in all in stripes as you point out.
Not to the Railroad Retirement Board, though. All of them are still covered for retirement by RRB.
BaltACD Ulrich But what about the administrative and sales people.. are clerks and "account executives" railroaders too? For the most part, they are not railroaders, they could be doing the same type jobs at insurance companies, bank, health providers - any number of other business types and not have their jobs changed in any material way.
Ulrich But what about the administrative and sales people.. are clerks and "account executives" railroaders too?
But what about the administrative and sales people.. are clerks and "account executives" railroaders too?
For the most part, they are not railroaders, they could be doing the same type jobs at insurance companies, bank, health providers - any number of other business types and not have their jobs changed in any material way.
Yup, that makes sense..
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