Train Orders - Roanoke - Part 2

[NW Mailing List]

Maybe the following is the missing Part 1:

Gordon Hamilton

 Somehow the formatting on my original message to you was scrambled, and it all became one huge paragraph.  Here it is again, properly formatted...  --adb 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>



 Much could be written about this, and I will give you the entire picture ... over the course of several emails. But I will start with the Radford Division in 1964.  


By 1964, the entire Radford Division (Roanoke to RD at Bluefield, plus the Bristol Line) was Rule 261 territory (CTC.) That meant that there was no current-of-traffic on the main tracks and that all trains proceeded on signal indication, regardless of class or direction. The timetable still gave a schedule for all trains (First Class being the passenger trains, Third Class being the Time Freights, and Fourth Class being the locals,) but schedule and class really meant nothing. The Time Table schedules were really for information alone. ALL trains ran by signal indication alone. For example, the Train Dispatcher could hold the signal on No. 18 at Glade Spring and and bring an extra freight slobbering up the hill against him, with no orders being issued to any train. (In the old days, this would have taken a Train Order: "Extra 752 West has right over No 18 Chillhowie to Glade Spring.") The only Train Orders normally issued were for speed restrictions or passing sidings being blocked with cars. 


However, I do recall that when No 3 and No 4 were run in sections due to the heavy Christmas mail, or when an occasional Passenger Extra would be run at this time of year, Train Orders would be issued. For instance: "Eng 512 run as First No 3 Roanoke to Bluefield on the following schedule Lv Roanoke 6:45PM Christiansburg 7:55PM Ar Bluefield 9:55PM." This really wasn't the way things should have been done according to the generally accepted Train Order procedures, but the N&W often deviated from "Standard Code" procedures. Sometime just before I started in 1964, the use of "Train Signals" (i.e. all sections of a train except the last one "carrying green signals") was stopped in CTC territory. So, both First 3 and Second 3 carried no green flags or classification lamps. 


Now, as to Clearance Cards. EVERY train was required by Time Table to get a Clearance Card at its initial terminal. This was a check to make sure that no train got out and running without any orders the DS had for it. The way this worked was as follows: Each "initial terminal" had a Telegraph Office (in N&W parlance, but which in reality hadn't had telegraph instruments for four years.) At Bristol, this was the operator at BD. At Radford, it was the operator at CN. At Shaffers Crossing, it was the soperator at DO (which was at 16th Street until around 1962 or 1963, but had been moved to the Hump Building by the time I hired in 1964.) At the Roanoke Passenger Station, the operator handing Train Orders for passenger trains was MH, but MH was closed not long after the last passenger trains, No's 11 and 12, were pulled off the Punkin' Vine in the early 1960s. So, here is how the situation worked at "initial terminals." The Conductor of every train originating at Bristol would go into the Telegraph Office and ask for orders. The operator would give him two sets of Train Orders (one for the Conductor and one for the Engineman) or, if there were no orders, two Clearance Cards stating "I have no orders for your train." If originating at East Radford, the Conductor went into the Telegraph Office there, and the routine was the same. 


If originating at Shaffers Crossing, the Conductor went to DO and asked for orders. But by 1964, there was no longer an operator at MH, so how did trains originating there get orders? And at Bluefield, RD tower had been torn down and there was no operator at the East Yard Office either, so how did trains originating there get orders? The answer was a typically N&W answer: Have the messenger boy deliver them ! For passenger crews originating at the Roanoke Passenger Station, the Dispatchers from Norfolk Div, Shen Div and Rad Div would phone the Train Orders and/or Clearance Cards to the operator at DO Shaffers Crossing, and the messenger boy would drive them to the passenger station and hang them on a bulletin board which had four sections on it, one for each direction out of the station, and the passenger crews would pick them up there. For all crews originating at Bluefield, both freight and passenger, the Radford Division Dispatcher would phone the orders to the Pocahontas Division Dispatcher's Office in Bluefield and someone there would write them out and send them by messenger to either the passenger station or East Yard Office.


MH was an intresting situation. I was in that place many times as a kid, and the chatter of the telegraph instruments was fascinating. MH had the Train Dispatchers' Wires for all four directions out of Roanoke. On the first floor of the station building, beginning from the west and going eastward, were (1) the Post Office Transfer Clerk's office, (2) MH Telegraph Office, (3) a very small trainman's room with a window into MH, (4) the Passenger Trainmen's locker room where conductor's ticket boxes were kept on shelves and kerosene markers were kept for the passenger trains (all markers being changed at Roanoke,) and (5) several Signal Department rooms that I was never in. 


After the operator at MH was taken off, the Comp'ny erected on the east wall of #3 (above) a very large black wooden board with hooks on it. I don't remember how many hooks, but I do recall that white lettering saying "East," "West," "North" and "South." It was on these hooks that the messenger boy would hang the orders that he had brought down from DO. For some reason there were also large metal rings, about 5" in diameter, each having a tag. The tags said "Shen Div," "Nfk Div" and "Rad Div"... they are the only ones I recall. After hanging up the orders for the passenger crews, the messenger boy would hang the ring/tag on the hook atop the orders he had just posted. Now the best part is... I have two of those tags (which were obviously made in East End Shops) !!!!! They are now on a big ring of switch keys that I gave to my son several years ago. I'll get them back and photograph them for you. 


Oh, MH was a Radford Division office, as was the tower at Randolph Street (which apparently never handled Train orders.) 


I'm copying Jim Blackstock in on this wire as he probably worked the messenger job and hung orders on the board at MH. 


In 1964, the engines were equipped with radios but coverage was almost nonexistant. About the only place you could reach the dispatcher was from the top of Christiansburg Mountain. Obviously, some kind of radio base tower had been set up there to address the helper situation on the VGN side. I can recall old Engr Bob Jewell trying and trying to "click in" the dispatcher and saying, "This #$%&* thing doesn't work. You're will have to go to the phone box, Sonny." And indeed, the phone box was the means of communication 98% of the time. This meant that a trainman paid attention to and learned the locations of such things. The saying was, "There's a phone box every mile, so you'll never have to walk over a mile to find one." The radio was almost never used for anything. All intra-crew communication was done by word of mouth or by hand signal. 


On the N&W, train and engine crews never copied Train Orders directly from either the Train Dispatcher or an operator. The above description represents things as I knew them when I hired on the Radford Division in 1964. 


Next time I'll write about how things were done on the other Divisions. I'm glad you asked the question. Answering it brought back fond memories. 


-- adb


 //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// ----- "Ben Blevins" wrote: > Abramos, I have what may be a lengthy question. But, I simply don't have a clue because I haven't asked anyone, or even given it a though until now. In the time that you first came out, and up until radios came about, how was train dispatching accomplished? I know today the dispatcher gives them their orders via radio and proceed by signal indication, and they will come on and tell them when and where they will have a meet. But, I don't know how all that was handled before radios came about. Would you mind to give a curious young railroader a lesson on it? brb > >


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  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: NW Mailing List 
  To: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org 
  Sent: Monday, November 30, 2009 8:49 AM
  Subject: Re: Re:Train Orders - Roanoke - Part 2


        I haven't been able to locate Part 1 in the archive.  Since the original message from 'adb' was forwarded to the nw-mailing-list, it may have come another forum.  I would like to read it also.


        Dick Kimball 




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