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

[NW Mailing List]

Last night I had the pleasure of "Takin Twenty" with six of the Brethren
and Friends of the Virginian Railway.  We signed two Happy Birthday cards.
One is for one of the Best Friends of the Virginian Railway and President
of the Roanoke Chapter NRHS,Jeff Sanders.  Jeff is the "whipper snapper" of
the group at 68. The other one is for Dewey Houck former Virginian Railway
Surveyor who will be 80 tomorrow.  Dewey is also very active in the Mullens
area saving old artifacts and buildings especially those once connected
with our beloved VGN.  We also made final plans for the Road Trip to
Victoria on Saturday.


 For Show and Tell and to answer last week's question, I took a recent ebay
purchase.  The first standard VGN issue battery powered hand lantern was a
Genesy made in Kansas City.  It has two lights and two switches and the
housing is made of copper (coated with nickel I think).  This one I
purchased on ebay has many cracks on the side and I can see how they did
not perform as intended and why the VGN changed over to the Star.  I told
the Brethren about an item I did NOT get on ebay (I was "sniped"):  A sugar
and cream set made by Reed and Barton with VIRGINIAN RAILWAY on the
bottom.  It went for $545.99.  The Genesy lantern seems to be out there in
a lot of places and most look like they are in bad shape.  I paid $17 for
it.


 I told the Brethren about our Roanoke Chapter NRHS being asked by NS to
loan our tool car #1407 for the movement of Y6a #2156 back to Roanoke from
St. Louis.  When she gets here, the trinity of steam, an N&W class A, J,
and Y will be on display together.....predicious!



 Ernie Hubble was with us last night and I had to kid him a little about
the Kansas City Royals being such a good team....he is a devout Giants
fan.  He told a story about Minnie Pearl stating that "I want six female
pall bearers with I die".  When asked Why, she responded "A lot of men
wouldn't go out with me while I was living so I don't want them taking me
out when I die!"  Landon Gregory told of visiting Richmond recently to his
brand new grandson's birthday party.  During the visit he sneaked over to
Colonial Downs.  His wife Sandra found out about it and quizzed him about
how much money he lost.  Landon answered "I had a very good horse...it took
six others to beat him".


 We talked about the Amtrak Exhibition train being in town last weekend.
Someone asked why it had two locomotives and I had the answer.  The second
"unit" is  Non Powered Control Unit (NPCU) #406 which has a generator for
head end power,carries baggage and has the original cab...they call them
"Cabbage" units


 The Jewel from the Past is from March 27, 2008: "Since Cornbread is going
to be 'laid up' for a while,while his new hip heals, he is considering
taking up playing the piano.  Recently he inquired about someone who could
tune his piano.  One of the Brethren suggested a fellow who could do the
job.  Cornbread called him and the man said 'Yes, I can tune a piano, I can
tune anything'.  This prompted Cornbread to respond, 'But can you tuna
fish?'"


 Time to pull the pin on this one!


 Departing Now from V248,


 Skip Salmon


 DXXXIX
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