1908 - Slow Trip of Doubleheader

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Roanoke Times - January 14, 1908

Slow Trip of Doubleheader

   A double-header freight train that left Roanoke Sunday morning at 
one o'clock had about as strenuous an experience as ever falls to the 
lot of railroad men. The train was made up of fifty-four cars, many 
of them loaded, and the trouble began when the heavy grade by 
Cloverdale and Troutville was reached.
   Six different times the draw head of a coupling apparatus pulled 
out and finally, all effort to take the train in its entirety to the 
top of the slant was abandoned. It was divided into two sections, and 
each section was taken to Troutville separately.
   Troutville is ten miles from Roanoke and it was exactly 9 o'clock 
when the last part of the train was placed there. In other words, it 
took the train just eight hours to go ten miles, a little over a mile 
an hour, and the train crew had almost made a day's work, and still 
had many more miles to go before they could have a chance to rest.
   When the last section was taken into Troutville, the first car, a 
flat containing an oil tanks, was fastened to the engine by means of 
chains, and this car had to be left on the siding.

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- Ron Davis, Roger Link