"Takin' Twenty" with the Virginian Brethren by Skip Salmon

[NW Mailing List]

Last night I had the pleasure of "Takin' Twenty" with eight of the 
Brethren and Friends of the Virginian Railway. Rufus Wingfield was able 
to be with us after a couple months of rehab from a fall. "Ruf" was in 
full "I ain't been here for a while and got a lot to say" mode. We 
signed a Happy Birthday Card for Harry Bundy our "original Norfolk 
Southern Railway guru" and former operator, who traveled and rail fanned 
with the one and only H. Reid, while he researched his famous book, 
which is the original "guidebook" of the Virginian Railway. Harry is the 
"mayor" of Bonsack, VA and his answering machine instructs callers to 
"leave a message after we get to the spark track". Harry is one of the 
younger members of the crew at 72.

Ruf brought with him a photo and clipping from Monday's "Roanoke Times". 
The photo was taken in 1960 (just after the VGN-N&W merger)looking east 
from the Franklin Road Bridge into the VGN Roanoke Yard. It shows the 
trackage and all lead tracks into the Roundhouse, Baker (automobile 
unloading) track, Coach, and shop tracks as well as leads to the Motor 
Barn and wye tracks and other stub tracks. Ruf explained to us each of 
these tracks and how they were used. He was Yardmaster at the time. The 
article told how the N&W extended the VGN Yard west, adding over ten 
miles of track and costing $2 million. Ruf explained that after this 
extension was finished, coal trains leaving Roanoke were about 50 
hoppers longer. Several 250 coal trains were made up. Landon Gregory was 
working at "AG" tower near the Wasena Bridge, while this extension was 
made. Note: "AG" was the center point that separated the VGN Norfolk 
Division from the VGN New River Division. He said that Lanford Brothers 
Contracting did the work of "moving the Roanoke River over" by adding 
many truck loads of stone into the river and cutting back the bank, 
north of the river.

The Jewel from the Past, like on in Chuck Jensen's Hamilton 990B is from 
September 23, 2004: "'Slick' Inge (VGN Trainmaster) remembered a special 
train with officials once stopped at AltaVista at the Lane Furniture 
Company, where they manufactured the famous Lane Cedar Chests. He said 
that the special train had priority of course, over all other 
operations. Mr. Beale (VGN President) and Mr. Lane (CEO owner of Lane 
Furniture) spent quite some time discussing a piece of wood that 'Slick' 
could see from a distance while the rest of the railroad stood still. 
After the discussion, and when the special was under way again, he asked 
what the piece of wood was. It seems that Mr. Lane had made a special 
rifle stock for Mr. Beale from about 25 different kinds of wood, for his 
favorite rifle".

Passed around was the July-August issue of "NS Biz" which has "Agbar", a 
German Shepard, on the cover and "A different breed of railroad 
employee" title. This issue highlights the 13 dog K-9 force of Norfolk 
Southern Corp. I asked the Brethren if the VGN "cinder-dick force" had 
any K-9s? After the laughter subsided, Raymond East said that if they 
had, maybe they "could have tracked that elephant in the snow". (This 
referred to an earlier comment made by someone about the VGN special 
agents not being able to "track an elephant in snow")

The ebay sale of VGN items this time includes the sale of: 1945 VGN 
Timetable for $26.17; Kurt Reisweber's "VGN Rails" for $39.99; 1957 
slide of EL-2B & BA #507 for $23.49; and 1954 negative of a Guyandotte 
River Business Car photo for $29.85.

Raymond East, Wis Sowder and Glen McLain talked about life in the yard 
office and VGN janitor Esau "Shorty" Ollie. Seems that "Shorty", even 
though he was over 40, looked much younger. Wis said that "'Shorty' had 
to show his ID when he bought beer". Raymond recalled once the city of 
Roanoke painted the Franklin Road Bridge and had to pay several VGN 
employees for a new paint job on their autos. Raymond recalled that the 
Southern Railway had to pay many Lane furniture employees in AltaVista 
the same for their cars when they painted the Southern trestle. "It 
hasn't been painted since" added Raymond.

Finally this: A pirate was talking to a "land-lubber" in a bar and was 
asked how he got his peg leg, a hook in place of one of his hands, and a 
patch over one eye. The pirate responded "I lost me leg in a battle off 
the coast of Jamaica and my hand to sharks off the Florida Keys". "How 
did you loose your eye" asked the land-lubber. The pirate answered, "I 
was sleeping on a beach when a seagull flew over and crapped right in me 
eye". The land-lubber asked: "How could a little seagull crap make you 
loose your eye?" The pirate snapped. "It was the day after I got me hook!"

Time to pull the pin on this one!

Departing Now from V248,

Skip Salmon

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