"Taking Twenty" with the Virginian Brethren

NW Mailing List nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org
Thu Dec 3 21:33:05 EST 2009


Last night I had the pleasure of "Takin Twenty" with ten of the Brethren
and Friends of the Virginian Railway. Attending with us from Norfolk, VA
was former Virginian Railway Clerk, Abner Ersel Glass. Most of us know
him as "Little Abner" but last night VGN Clerk Glen McLain let it slip
that Abner was known as "Ersel" at Sewalls Point. Ersel told us of
recent flooding in Norfolk and memories of riding the Virginian
Passenger trains with his Mom. He said that she told him "there is no
need to take a bath two days before our train trip, because thirty
minutes after boarding, you will be dirty again". He also recalled while
clerking on the VGN, reporting a fire caused by the exhaust from one of
the VGN Fairbanks-Morse switchers working a lumber yard. He and the crew
were able to "stomp out the fire before it got to the lumber".

Also attending with us was Eddie Mooneyham, Vice-President of the
Roanoke Chapter NRHS and Friend of the Virginian Railway. It was like
Christmas already when Eddie brought out his "bag of goodies". He gave
the Brethren Hotel Roanoke (when the N&W owned it) coasters and had a
drawing and gave out several Shenandoah Valley Railroad hats and shirts.
He also brought VGN Timetable #15, an EL-C wiring diagram book, 1936 VGN
Safety Rule Book and an SC RR $5 bill for "Show and Tell". Eddie also
has for sale the perfect Christmas gift for a rail fan: Long Island 32
foot bay window caboose class N22B, #C67 complete with roller bearings,
primed and ready to paint in any shade of red you want. He "will let it
go for about $8,000".

Ebay had some "hot Virginian items" sold last week: Clear Tall Globe (no
lantern, just globe) marked "VIRGINIAN RY" for $401.10; 1950 VGN Annual
Report $14.50; 1958 VGN Annual Report $104.49; Set of VGN Date Nails
with VGN patch for $25.45; and a 1955 VGN "Coal on the Move" for $27.55.

I passed around the January 2010 "Trains" magazine and the Oct-Nov-Dec
N&WHS "The Arrow". A Dave Blaze photo of an original Norfolk Southern
covered hopper taken in October this year in Anchorage Alaska was also
shown. Also passed was Dale Wimbrow's 1934 "The Guy in the Glass" poem
that was made famous last Saturday when, now fired University of
Virginia football coach Al Groh, read it after Virginia Tech beat UVA
42-13. The last verse: "You can fool the whole world down the pathway of
years, and get pats on the back as you pass; but your final reward will
be heartaches and tears if you've cheated the guy in the glass".

We discussed the death of N&W engineer Fredrick A. Whittaker on
Thanksgiving Day. Wis Sowder was his friend and neighbor. Mr. Whittaker
was at the top of N&W's Radford Division Seniority list for years and he
retired after bringing the last Amtrak train into Roanoke. Many of the
Brethren knew him. Louis Newton asked me about a month ago if we could
help with getting Mr. Whittaker on our Bluefield Excursion train, the
first weekend in November. I worked with our ticket master, Jim Cosby,
and we got him, his daughter and Bill Honeycutt in the same car. We even
got a friendly couple to give up a nice window seat on the New River
side, so Mr. Whittaker could see the River for what turned out to be his
last train ride on his beloved Radford Division...

I showed the Brethren a clipping out of Monday's "Roanoke Times"
entitled "50 years ago today": "The first merger of two wholly
independent American railroads in modern time will become a legal and
physical reality at 12:01 AM Tuesday December 1, when the Norfolk and
Western and The Virginian become a single system--the expanded Norfolk
and Western Railway". My good friend and steam locomotive authority Bud
Jeffries emailed me on Tuesday about this and reminded me that the
merger took place also on a Tuesday, 50 years ago. VGN Engineer Raymond
East commented that it "seemed like yesterday when that first N&W diesel
and crew came to South Yard".

Posted at the Country Cookin' and given to the Brethren was a flyer
about our Candy Cane Shifter train rides on December 12 at our 9th
Street Siding of the Roanoke Chapter NRHS. We will begin at 9 AM and
give rides until about 4 PM. Mrs. Santa Clause will be riding the N&W
Caboose #518409 pulled by the Chapter's N&W GP-30 #522. There will also
be a drawing for an NS HO train set for some lucky rider. Tickets are
free but donations are gratefully accepted. All are welcome to take part
in this event.

I told a story to our waitress Princess about a train crew that stopped
by a restaurant and decided to "take their twenty there". The brakeman
and conductor went to a booth and opened their dinner buckets and
proceeded to start eating a sandwich. The waitress approached the men
and told them "You can't eat your own sandwiches in here". The crew,
being resourceful, immediately swapped sandwiches!

Time to pull the pin on this one!

Departing Now from V248,

Skip Salmon

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