[PRCo] Re: Is It Genetic?

[ROGER Jenkins]

Well probably is as my mother and Uncle as kids sat out on the front
stairway on Huntington Ave. in Boston and copied down streetcar numbers
as there were 4 or 5 Boston Elevated Ry. lines that passed by their
house as well as Boston & Worcester interurban cars . [Mass. only true
interurban line ]  Later on a trip to Gloucester where they had a summer
home , the car which was being driven by my mothers father , was hit by
an Eastern Mass. St .Ry . trolley , bending a fender on the car when he
swerved to avoid a dog that darted across the side-of-road track in
front of the trolley , which was beside him. My father was met by my
mother at the Gloucester Theatre where he played organ accompiament for
the silent films that played there. [I like organ music , mostly
classical and popular which for some reason most trolley fans also like
! ]  When I was 5 and my brother 9 , my father brought a Lionel
trainset home for us at christmas . [model train bug bit then ] . Before
the war my father was employed at the prison in Lewisburg Pa. where the
Reading RR went thru town which became a favorite place for me to hang
out to watch trains. Since my father was already in the Army Air Corps
reserve when the war started we all got moved to near Langley Field Va.
for training of my father and there was a trolley to ride to town on for
shopping !  [ which line I don't know]  It went into Newport News
outside Norfolk.  We all went to Puerto Rico and were there for a short
time then evacuated when Dec. 7th happened. Back to my fathers mothers
place in Boston where more trolley riding really took place. To make a
long story shorter , trolleys in Birmingham Ala. were seen when my
father got stationed at USAF BASE at Craig Field outside Selma Ala. and
we ended up back in Boston  from 1948 on. So a lot of trolley riding to
school there got me going in the HO trolley habit. Til 1972 when O
trolleys took over.  Genetic yes I would say so but also being near
trolleys has something to do with it as well.