The Atlantic & Southern Saturday Report

[Dennis Bourey]

Good one Judge. I think I'll stay in New Hampshire!!!!!!!

[deemery]

Here's a story from New Hampshire:

A guy moved to NH from 'down south' to operate a "Gentleman's Farm."  He was complaining to his old Yankee neighbor:

"This field is full of rocks.  Where did they come from?"
"Glacier brought 'em."
"Glacier?  A river of ice?  Here?"
"Ayuh."
"Ok.  So where are those glaciers now?"
"Went back for more rocks."

One thing I learned in my geology courses is we'll eventually cure global warming by a new glacial episode... 

dave

[GPdemayo]

Great one Bill.....especially is you're from Ft. Lauderdale (me) and your wife (Pegi) is from Miami. We always debate about which was a better place to grow up.

I kid her about being from that big nasty city to the south and she hits back about that tiny hick town from the north. Neither party to this difference of opinion has yielded in many a decade.

[Dennis Bourey]

Good one Dave.

[Judge]

Saturday Report -  September 25, 2021

The Board of Directors meeting was canceled today.  The next meeting is not scheduled until October 9, although there may be an informal inspection of progress between now and then.  The current emphasis is on structures for filling in downtown Tahope and the roundhouse area.  Once this phase of the project is finished, we can declare the Midlands to be "good enough."  Naturally, there will be little things that will need to be added here and there, such as completing the wiring for lights in downtown Tahope. 

It is mid-September in Central Florida, which is known as the lightning capital of the world.  It rains hard for an hour or more several times a week.  The rainy season coincides with summer vacation so the school children who visit Disney World get to stay cooped up in their $250/day hotel rooms and throw tantrums because they can't see Micke Mouse.  W. C. Fields would find this situation to be poetic justice.  Fields once said, "Anybody who hates children and dogs can't be all bad." 

Anyway, due to the weather situation, I thought a story involving one of Florida's thunderstorms might be in order.  The idea for this story came from a tale published in the February 1950, Railroad Magazine.  I have also provided a short video that gives you an idea about what a Florida thunderstorm is like.

                                                                                                       Stormy Weather in Florida

   "Sunny Florida" isn't always so sunny.  During the summer months, there are thunderstorms nearly every afternoon and the storms seem to get worse as the summer goes on.  By September the afternoon storms are like South Asia monsoons.  As one A&S fireman said, "It's like standing under a waterfall."  The storms subside as the hurricane season comes to an end and the afternoons are quiet by mid-October.
   One sunny morning in September 1949, Engineer Ethan Douglas and his Negro fireman, Jim, drew the Florida Special on its run from Tampa to Jacksonville.  This streak of varnish was powered by ACL P5A 1559, a USRA Pacific, and the consist included seven heavyweight Pullman cars. 
   Douglas pulled out of the station at Sanlando on time at 1:30 p.m. and headed towards the Ovalix and the steady 1% grade up from the Midlands to Summit and the City of Jacksonville's Union Station.  As fireman Jim said at the time, "Everything was crackers." 
   Long about 2:00 p.m. the thunder boomers began to show and it became obvious the Special was in for it by the time the train would reach its destination. 
   Engineer Douglas was an experienced hogger and had a reputation of being safety conscious.  When the first lightning flash popped close by and the thunder rattled the cab of the locomotive, Douglas slowed the train down from 65 mph to 50 mph. 
   Then the rain came.  It came down in sheets and began to puddle on the mainline.  The Pacific ran across a puddle that was the size of a small pond and a geyser shot up high enough to cover the boiler.  The wind slanted the rain against the right side of the locomotive and Douglas was unable to see anything past the smokebox of the engine.  "Hey, Jim," he hollered to his tallowpot, "can you see anything past the boiler?"  "Naw, suh," came the answer.  "Well we better slow this train down and ride this one out." 
   Douglas grabbed the throttle with his left hand and the air brake with his right and slowed 1559 down to a crawl.  When the train reached Palatka, the storm had passed and the Florida sunshine returned.  The Special arrived in Jax over an hour late but the Super congratulated Douglas on arriving safely.  A freight train that was following the Special was not so lucky and six cars derailed due to a washout near Deland.

The following video gives the viewer an idea about the intensity of Florida's summer thunderstorms.  Careful viewers will note that the motive power shown is a brace of ACL F2 diesel locomotives.  The relatively rare F2's were not so rare on the ACL and a number of them were bought before being augmented by numerous F3's.  It is difficult to see in the video, but the high fans on the diesels identify them as F2's.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUDy-pqv4Ak

[Zephyrus52246]

Good story and great video, Judge.  The CB&Q had 10 F2As as well.

Jeff

[GPdemayo]

The weather around here is a bit notional during the summer.....fun story and video Bill.

[PRR Modeler]

Very nice Bill. I remember when I moved to Florida back in 1995 during the summer every day around 2 pm there was a torrential downpour but it seems to get later in the day and not as much rain.

[Judge]

Saturday Report - October 2, 2021.

The Board of Directors meeting was cancelled for lack of an agenda.  The next board meeting is scheduled for October 9, 2021.

Your reporter recently read an article on the daily maintenance of steam locomotives in the April, 1941, edition of Railroad Magazine and it brought to mind just how much manual labor was needed to keep a steam locomotive running.  This week's story is adapted from that article along with a little help from Richard E. Prince's fantastic book entitled Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Steam Locomotives, Ships and History, which is out of print but can be found in bookstores and on line.

                                                                                                       Routine Maintenance on the ACL

   At the end of every run, steam locomotives need inspection and maintenance. 
        On a typical day, in 1950, engine number 1516, a USRA Pacific, pulled into the A&S engine service and roundhouse facility after completing a run from Jacksonville to Tahope at the head end of the 13-car Florida Special.  The date doesn't really doesn't matter because nothing changed maintenance-wise from the date 1516 was first steamed under her own power at the ALCO works in 1919 until her fires were dropped in 1951.
   When the engine entered the service yard, the engineer moved her to the water plug.  After the fireman filled the tank, the engine was turned over to the hostlers who ran her through a wash rack that used a high-pressure combination of hot water and kerosene to rid the engine of road grime, grease, and oil.  The wash left the moving parts almost spotlessly clean and that made it easier for the maintenance crew to spot defects.  The engine was then moved under the coaling tower to receive up to 17 tons of coal. 
   Next, the engine was moved into the roundhouse by the hostlers and turned over to the maintenance crew.  The roundhouse foreman, "Tater" Cartwright, reviewed the list of defects and needed repairs left by the engineer on the trip report and marked jobs for the various trades involved in the inspection and maintenance of the locomotive. 
   Chief Inspector A. H."Big Dawg" Smith checked for defects on the trip report and made a general inspection of the engine.  A man called a "tigger" followed "Big Dawg" on the inspection and tightened any loose bolts pointed out to him.  If a nut or bolt needed to be replaced it was marked with chalk.  "Big Dawg" was at the top of his game and he used his" little hammer" to "feel" any defects in the engine's running gear. 
   The boilermaker Inspector, Charlie Householder, checked for steam leaks and defective flues.  He worked quickly.  Fortunately, there were no defects today.  But if there had been any, the fire would have been dropped into the pit and he would thrown a plank or two into the firebox for a platform before climbing into that hell-hot inferno of a firebox to determine what work needed to be done. As you might imagine, Householder has to be leather-skinned to go into that sizzling oven, but he and his crew are tough and they are experts at this dangerous, dirty, demanding work.
   The "plumbers" inspect the feedwater line, the feedwater heater, the water pump, and other water connections.  The trip report indicated that the pump was intermittently sticking.  A close inspection showed a large nut to have rusted, causing the problem.  A "plumber" and his Negro helper attacked the problem with a sledge hammer and a five-foot chisel.  The helper held the chisel against the nut and the inspector swung the sledge hammer against the chisel to loosen it.  This took both skill and guts.  Once the nut was replaced, the pump worked without a problem.
   Two electricians inspected the wires that connect the steam generator to the headlight, cab light and other electrical devices. 
   The airbrake inspector looked over the air pump, the power reverse, and the brake rigging.  At the same time a machinist looked over the stoker while a carpenter inspected the cab for woodwork defects. 
   It took a dozen or more experts to tap, poke, thump, and inspect 1516 from pilot to tender.  After all, this locomotive has nearly 90,000 separate parts, many of which need their attention.  This process costs the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad about $12,000 a year in 1940 dollars.  Considering the ACL has 70 locomotives of the 1500 class alone, maintenance costs are a significant item in the annual budget.  But routine maintenance is only a small part of the normal upkeep of steam locomotives. 
   Brakeshoes are replaced every two weeks and cylinder rings are replaced every 6500 miles.  Additionally, there are regular repairs to cross heads and valves.
   The federal government places rigid demands requiring monthly staybolt inspections and replacement of faulty flues. Pops must be tested every 90 days.  There must be a boiler wash to remove mud and loose scale once a month.  This repetitive work keeps the boiler makers busy and provides fodder for other workers to tease them saying, "Boiler makers don't have a trade, they have a habit."
   The roundhouse at Tahope is a busy place.  There are often between five and ten locomotives serviced during a day.  The roundhouse crew is composed of over 60 men, many of them highly paid experts.  It is no wonder that the bean counters in the front office are carefully comparing the maintenance costs of steam vs. diesel locomotives.
   At the end of a typical day, "Tater" Cartwright calls home to his girlfriend, Peaches, and says, "Shugah, I'm on the way home.  Pull me some poke chops and a cold one from the Frigidaire." To which Peaches replies, "I'm fixin' to boil a mess of collards and potatoes to go with the poke chops."  She has gotten used to "Tater" demanding a full Southern dinner in the evening and no longer throws a hissie fit when he calls.  And that is the way life was in Tahope in 1950. 

[ACL1504]

Tahope Roundhouse is a very busy place.

Tom 

[PRR Modeler]

A great insight into maintaining steamers ready for use Bill.

[BandOGuy]

Thanks for the update, Your Honor!

[GPdemayo]

Lots of fun facts....thanks Bill. 

[Jim Donovan]

Well Written Bill;

Reading it you can hear the constant clamor of men working, metal cooling, and loud talking. The humid air hangs on you while smelling of kerosene, soot and sweat.  Must have been something to see.

Jim D

[Judge]

Saturday Report, October 9, 2021.
   The Board of Directors meeting scheduled today was canceled due to the CEO's recovery from skin cancer surgery.  It was tentatively rescheduled for October 16, 2021.

    Many of the readers of this weekly (?) report do not know that Central Florida has a thriving cattle industry.   That is why the City of Tahope has its own slaughter house and meatpacking plant.  The facility, known as Butts Meats, is named after its builder, Bob Butts, who also owns Barlow's Bar-B-Que (see p. .  The combination of owning the slaughterhouse and the only bar-b-que joint in Tahope County guarantees Bob a decent return on his investment.
The current plan for the A&S Railroad is to install a fairly good-sized icing platform at Summit so perishables can be shipped "up Nawth" without spoilage. 
Your reporter thumbed through the September 1940 issue of Railroad Magazine the other night and found an article on privately owned freight cars.  The information provided in the article pertaining to reefers was particularly interesting.  The labor involved in the days before mechanical refrigeration and the amount of ice needed per car to travel across the country must have resulted in staggering costs. 
Anyway, your reporter thought the readers of today's report would find the subject interesting.

                                                                                                               THE ICE AGE

   There were one and three-quarters million freight cars on rails in the United States in 1040.  Nearly 290,000 of them were privately owned.  Nearly 123,600 of those cars were "reefers"- cars designed to transport perishable products such as meats or vegetables.  These cars could be quite colorful and served as moving billboards for the owners. 
   About 95% of the perishable traffic moved from the South, the Southwest, and the West toward the more densely populated regions of the Northeast.
   Those were the days before mechanical refrigeration became common so reefers were equipped with wire mesh basket-type bunkers and outside hatches located on roofs, through which ice was loaded for cooling. 
   The typical reefer was 47feet long with an inside length (between the ice bunkers) of 32feet, 10 inches.  The walls were 14 inches thick and filled with heavy insulation.  Reefers had a double roof with heavy insulation between the upper and lower sections to protect the car top.
   Since the reefers were cooled by ice, icing facilities, including icing platforms were necessary.  Icing the reefers was a labor-intensive job involving many men and a lot of equipment.  The icing platforms were designed so that blocks of ice could be moved by hand from the icing facility to the reefer's ice hatches.  A reefer with a load capacity of 80,000 pounds required 10,000 pounds of ice and it was not uncommon for reefer trains to contain 40 or more cars.
   Faster trains eliminated a number of icing stations.  In 1919, a test shipment in a 40-foot reefer made the 2470-mile trip from California to Chicago over the Santa Fe in nine days and nine hours.  It was iced before and after loading in California and required 5985 pounds of ice to fill the bunkers.  By the time the reefer arrived in Chicago 15,885 pounds of ice had been used. 
   By 1940, California produce was delivered to New York on the ninth morning out.  Faster schedules reduced the time of travel significantly and quicker loading had reduced the time spent at icing stations, as well as their number.
   In spite of the cost of transporting perishables in 1940, it was still cost-effective because the railroads charged by the weight of the lading and a 1000-pound steer, when fully dressed only weighed about 500 pounds.  And the cost of transport of livestock was greater than the cost of transport of dressed beef due to government requirements of feeding, watering, and exercising livestock while in route.

                                                                                                     Icing Facility on the Pennsy

                                                                         

                                                                                                  Laborers loading ice into reefers

                                                                         
   
                                                                          Here is a video of a reefer train on the Atlantic & Southern Railroad.
                                                                                 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLk50mPWfbU