[PRCo] Re: Historical Question

[Herb Brannon]

Thanks for the photo captions.
Even today I look back at the streetcars I have ridden in my lifetime, even
though limited to a few Peter Witts and lots of PCCs in many cities, this is
something that many younger people will never be able to do in their
lifetimes. Throw in a mix of Brill, St Louis Car Co, and Pullman Standard
trackless trolleys in several cities and that's even more which I have seen
and experienced that many never will. I wish I could have experienced the
Indiana Railroad 1931 lightweight highspeeds, especially the parlor-lounge
types and the route from Indianapolis to Louisville. Then too I have been
able to operate PCCs in Pittsburgh, something that many wish they could have
done.

On Sun, Feb 13, 2011 at 14:21, Fred Schneider <fwschneider at comcast.net>wrote:

> Fantrip Herb!   ... M1, West Penn 832 and 3756 were operated under their
> own power to the museum site.  The next Monday the scrappers cut the power
> and continued ripping up the tracks from the museum site northward.
> Dick Steinmetz told a story at an NRHS meeting in the Lancaster or
> Harrisburg area that he had the fastest imaginable ride ever up through
> South Hills Tunnel that day in a single truck car.   He was in M-1 out of
> Ingram that day and the operator had the controller against the peg up
> through the tunnel.
>
> Either he or someone else told a neat story about stopping for lunch in
> Canonsburg.   Here were hundreds of guys flooding town looking for food.
> One restaurantier asked, "How did you all get here?"   He was told by
> streetcar.   "But they quit running months ago?"   He was then told about
> the museum excursion.
>
> Sometime after that vandals chopped down the trolley wire at the museum
> site and gutted some of the copper out of West Penn 832.
>
> I remember how Herman Rinke used to be one of those obnoxious types in the
> ERA office in New York City.   No matter what subject came up, he was old
> enough to always be able to jump in and say he had been there and see it
> all.   I guess I'm now old enough to be the same kind of S. O. B.
> I have to admit guys there were things my mentors talked about that I
> wished I had ridden.   I'm really not singing that song, "I've been
> everywhere."
>
> Wouldn't it have been nice to have ridden the West Penn from Uniontown
> through New Stanton to Connellsville like Steve Maguire did?    No I didn't
> ride that.   I never even rode the mainline.   Only rode a few blocks in
> Jeannette.
>
>  Or Altoona and Logan Valley from Altoona to Tyrone like my good buddy John
> Bowman did back in 1933?   Johnny also rode the Wilkes-Barre and Hazleton
> ... what a ride that must have been over two mountains.
>
> And Jim Shuman enjoyed the riding the Indiana Railroad from Indianapolis to
> Peru to Fort Wayne to Anderson to Indianpolis to Louisville and even to
> Terre Haute.   WOW!    Jim talked about going to Allentown to see the first
> ex C&LE cars on display before they went into service in 1940.   I was just
> born then.   I never even rode the Liberty Bell route ... only saw the city
> cars in Allentown in 1952, the year before they quit.
>
> And my old vacation companion Donald Duke told this great story about his
> dad's card playing buddy coming into the Duke home and saying, "Do you know
> what your son has been doing after dinner?   Seem that one evening President
> Smith got onto one of his cars and found the motorman studying for his
> college classes and the conductor sitting back in the rear corner of the
> car.   After chatting with both of them he asked, "And who is running the
> car?"   Turns out that Don Duke used to go out after dinner and spell the
> motorman so he could study ... Don made a round trip from San Marino to
> Glendora.   "Your son is a good motorman ... better than a lot of our men
> ... but we have to stop letting him do this," Smith is alleged to have said
> to Norman Duke.     Don could have written the book, "I was a teenage
> motorman."    Don't I wish I had the same chance!
>
> Sad that all these old friends are now dead....
>
> Friday night I drove to a Tractioneers meeting in Washington DC.   Ara
> Mesrobian asked how I could still drive all the way down and back in one
> night.   He said he would be camped in a hotel!    I guarantee in a few more
> years I will understand Ara.   I no longer drive to Pittsburgh and home just
> to get an Eat 'n Park hamburger!
>
> Oh well, my fun and games was pulling leverss at the Pennsy's interlocking
> plant in Lancaster during the summer of 1957 when the regular block operator
> was sick.    Then there was the chap at the local bus company who worked
> evenings with me at Sears Roebuck ... after the store shut down, we would go
> to the garage.   He would fuel the buses and I would drive them into the
> garage.
>
> We all have our stories, don't we.....
>
>
> On Feb 13, 2011, at 1:19 PM, Herb Brannon wrote:
>
> > On or about February 7, 1954 a low floor car (3756?) was moved from
> > Pittsburgh to Arden. How was the car moved; under it's own power (if the
> > PRCo tracks to Washington PA were still intact) or on a truck?
> > --
> > Herb Brannon
> > In Cuyahoga Valley National Park
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
>


-- 
Herb Brannon
In Cuyahoga Valley National Park