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

[NW Mailing List]

Last night I had the pleasure of "Takin' Twenty" with ten of the 
Brethren and Friends of the Virginian Railway. We signed a Happy 
Birthday Card for Bill Turner, VGN brakeman and conductor. Bill started 
on the N&W October, 1950, and after the Korean Conflict was over, signed 
on with the VGN in August, 1957. He retired from NS, December, 1991, and 
will turn 79 tomorrow.

I passed around a flyer for the Roanoke Chapter NRHS Spring Excursion 
trip from Roanoke by bus to Lynchburg, and Amtrak to Washington DC for a 
five-hour layover, and return, on April 20, 2011. Their web site has all 
the details of this trip. Speaking of the Roanoke Chapter NRHS, at our 
annual dinner meeting last week, those who did not get a 2011 NS 
Calendar at the January meeting were given one. There was one left, so I 
brought it to our meeting last night and had a raffle and the winner was 
Ken McLain. At that meeting, Jeff Sanders remembered those who took the 
west bound last year, and mentioned VGN Trainmaster Rufus Wingfield. 
Also passed last night was a poem given to me by the VGN Station 
Renovation Architect, Barry Rakes. It was given to him by Mrs. R. W. 
Smiley, widow of an engineer known by Wis Sowder and several of the 
Brethren. The poem contained the following verse: "Also that amazing 
tale when old Captain Barger left Oakvale, on board two experts at many 
games, none other than Frank and Jesse James".

The Jewel from the Past is from February 10, 2005: "I showed the 
Brethren the email from Doug Harris of Auckland, New Zealand who saw 
Russell Inge's photo that I posted and said 'Please tell Slick his fame 
has reached New Zealand'. Of course this got a lot of 'hoots and 
hollars' and jokes about unusual animals that live in New Zealand and 
how Slick would fit right in there". Note: After the recent earthquake 
in New Zealand, I emailed our good friend Doug Harris and asked if he 
was OK. I got a response last night: "I'm way out of the quake area, but 
know some modelers in Christchurch. It's about 2 hours flying time south 
of here...about 20 people were killed in the Cathedral which has 
collapsed, and the current death toll is put at 75 with around 300 missing".

Passed around was the latest issue of "Classic Trains" with several 
stories about the N&W. Also passed was a photo I took last Saturday of 
an eastbound coal train on the old VGN. Highlighted in the photo was 
milepost V251, just west of the Salem Connection and the old VGN Station 
location. Another photo passed was of the new replica of the passenger 
shelter that sat at Nutbush, now an exhibit at Greg Elam's Victoria Rail 
Park. Greg had the nearby Lunenburg Correctional Center manufacture and 
donate this fine example of VGN "shelterdum"...

For "Show and Tell" I brought my friend John McDaniel's EL-2b 
Maintenance Manual. This inch thick VGN manual gives instructions as 
well as photos on how to maintain the streamliners. Items of interest 
include: "1. Every 120,000 miles, the EL-2b windshield wipers were to be 
removed, cleaned and oiled with automobile machine oil; 2. Before every 
trip, the pantograph collector wear shoes were to be lubed with graphite 
grease (Dixon 1924 or equivalent) and 3. The Controller Drum segments, 
after every 30,000 miles were to be cleaned and lubricated with Vaseline".

 From last week, Daniel Winter III corrected me with the peanut plant at 
Suffolk being Birdsong (not Bird Song). Dave Phelps, who is retired from 
the GE plant in Erie PA corrected my reference to the old diesel 
switcher VGN #6 as being an "Alco-GE". It was 100% "just GE". I got my 
information from the Harold A. Reid book. (Harold A. made any miscues in 
the book; H. made none). Landon Gregory and Raymond East, who worked 
with the peanut trains and plants in Suffolk, said that yes, every fall 
there was a run on good clean box cars for the plants. Landon said that 
he had orders to not let any box cars with lime in them "any where near 
Planters".

The ebay report this time includes the following VGN items sold: Early 
1900 Tidewater RY documents sold for $360.69; Slide of VGN Trainmaster 
and 4-6-2 meet for $47.79; "V. Ry" Adlake #185 lantern for $489.07; 23 
Blackhawk Color Slides for $24.99; EL-C Operating Manual for $92.99; 
Operating Manual for F-M Trainmaster for $74.99 and a layout of Elmore 
Yard for $26.00.

Finally, Richard Shell wrote me when he recognized Benny F. Sammons in 
the two Landon Gregory story. He recalled an incident with him and Benny 
that involved brokering goats, Fred and Willie, and hauling them in the 
back of a Firebird. Seems that the goats got away and were lured back 
with Corn Pops. He got them home only to have them escape the day before 
hunting season opened in Botetourt County. Richard lives not far from 
Lithia, VA, on the N&W. A fellow told me once that in that part of the 
county, in the dog days of summer, mosquitos get so big that "they have 
their own ticks".

Time to pull the pin on this one!

Departing Now from V248,

Skip Salmon

CCCLVI

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