I had an intersting experience yesterday morning at a NJ train show/swap meet. I overheard two men, one I know and one I don't, discussing the recent rash of thefts at tourist railroads. Obviously, I am appalled by what has been going on (recently and not so recently).

What made me pause was the two men commenting how the culprits should be strung up for what they did; one of the men in the conversation is a bit of a legend for illegal activies in and around railroads.

As I looked aroung the meet, which had quite bit of railroadiana, I began to think about how many of the items being sold were stolen at one time... and eventually fenced.

It's not often talked about, but theft and tresspassing are common in the railfan community. I am not throwing stones -- I understand about glass houses.

Certainly, not all railroadiana is hot. But I will bet you that not all of the 50 or 60 lanterns at a given show were properly purchased from their rigthful owners.

And, thus I wonder why we are suprised when a tourist railroad gets hit. What is the difference -- to the person inclined to do such things -- to steal from Strasburg or NS?

If the community at large tolerates illegal activity by publishing photos taken while tresspassing, holding horn collector meets or hosting events all over the country where items of questionable ownership are bought and sold, how can we in the preservation community expect historic equipment to be held to a different standard?

Again, I understand not all the items are hot and not all the people involved are criminals. But, you have got to wonder where things like lanterns, horns and whitstles go when they are stolen.

And, of course, 50 years down the road the guy who stole the whistle off a NYC such and such is lauded for "preserving" it. That's just one of many situations where the grayness of theft vs. preservation clouds the issue.

So, how can we begin to make a dent?

I offer two ideas:

1. Don't purchase railroadiana unless you know that it isn't hot

2. If you see a piece for sale and you question the integrity of ownership, ask the seller, take his name and contact the person or group you think are the rightful owners. If you are really sure the item is hot, notify the show operators and local police immediately.

What do you think? Does this hit too close to home for some of us? How do we justify museums presenting artifacts stolen 50-75 years ago as historic treasures -- and in the same breath telling people not to steal from railroads today?

Not easy questions...

Rob Davis

trains@robertjohndavis.com

> So, how can we begin to make a dent?

> I offer two ideas:

> 1. Don't purchase railroadiana unless you
> know that it isn't hot

I'll just offer a factual observation here: provenance of individual small railroad artifacts is impossible to establish. I have yet to see a switchlock or piece of dining car china offered for sale along with an original receipt of purchase from the railroad. So, the implication of Rob's comment 1 is that we should not trade any railroadiana at all, because provenance is, 99.99% of the time, impossible to establish.

Moral? Yes, unimpeachably so. But practical? Well, truthfully I'm not feeling any urgent need to approach CSX in Jacksonville to see if they want their B&O Adlake lantern back... even though it is almost certainly their stolen property from somewhere at some point...

eledbetter@rypn.org

Statute of Limitations on petty theft?

There of course is and was theft and theft. Builders plates glommed onto by slipping the gate guard at the scrappers in 1950 a couple bucks was probably overlooked by management then and we may as well follow suit now insofar as items with that sort of history.

The cultural imperative against snitchery which we all learned in kindergarden probably does in fact weaken us now. If I knew who stole the Strasburg stuff, I would call Linn and we would get a group together to have a discussion with the culprit which hopefully would culminate in recovery and a strong message about the wisdom in not trying it again. Might even call the cops if the culprit survives..........

Trespassing is another issue. There are times and places where it is just silly to assume a safety risk exists - a fear of liability action is more likely - but then again, I have seen many Stupid Foamer Tricks which only by actions of the gods were prevented from turning into critical situations.

At the Spencer joint TRAIN / ARM conference, two hapless representatives of the AAR public relations office were trying to espouse our showing their videotapes as a means of presenting a kinder, gentler, more frendly and accessable image of railroads to the public. They didn't take well the suggestion that we actually have an industrial imperative to in fact be friendly and accessable instead - might promote trespassing.

Dave

> Well, truthfully I'm not feeling any urgent
> need to approach CSX in Jacksonville to see
> if they want their B&O Adlake lantern
> back... even though it is almost certainly
> their stolen property from somewhere at some
> point...

Does that mean that if the Strasburg thief hangs onto the goods for 50 years, then it will be OK to sell? ;-)

I say that toungue-in-cheek, as I am not trying to be argumentative.

I guess the question is, if we all put our RR Police badges, when is stolen rr property OK and when is it not?

The message I heard at the train show was that "theft is really bad unless a) I did it or b) I am selling the results of it."

How do we define that gray area?



trains@robertjohndavis.com

Heavens to Mergatroid, you can really open up a can of worms here.

Yes, this is a problem. However, this is not necessarily the problem you might make it out to be.

I deal with lots of horn and whistle collectors, as well as builders plate collectors, etc. In every case I know of, they try as best as possible to deal with reputable sources--for example, there's one noted dealer who obviously has a working relationship with a well-known scrap merchant, and raids the scrap lines for parts to assemble functional horns or parts for other collectors. The old days of steam being scrapped brought about huge numbers of bells, whistles, number plates, and the like being purchased from either the railroads (for scrap metal value plus shipping) or from the scrap yards (again, either the price of scrap, or in trade for a bottle of whiskey or a box of cigars per item!). The largest steam whistle collection in the nation was assembled by a Southern boiler shop owner that dismantled hundreds of steam cotton mills and presses--and went to great lengths to salvage the accompanying whistles, always with a fair offer. British Rail for years operated a small shop in a London station that sold everything from outdated timetables to locomotive nameplates.

I have had employees hand me "company property"--everything from employee timetables to hard hats to lanterns. These employees are among the best employees these respective railroads have, and they pay for extra lanterns just to give one to me. Or, they consider the "lost" hat well worth rewarding me for phoning in that broken main line rail in the heart of a downtown district. These guys are not in the same league as the employee that used to go to work with an extra-large lunch pail with a cold chisel in the back pocket, returning home with "hot dogs" from under the cabs of EMD diesels...........

And yes, I myself have "stolen" stuff. I have dismantled semaphore signals literally minutes before they were bulldozed, swaying at the top of a teetering pole as I frantically roped the blade down. I have stolen cast-iron crossbucks from the scrap heaps two hours before the scrap merchants showed up. And I have cooperated with shortlines to sell their collectible signage from their scrap heaps to benefit local NRHS or museum projects. As I type, I'm sitting in an office chair I rescued from a Conrail dumpster in Delaware in 1982. I've found CSX hardhats along the highway. I've traded company belt buckles. And I've even raided PRR GG1's on the scrap line to salvage parts, only to donate them ALL right back to preserved GG1 owners--and never see a thing done with them again. (Which is more than I can say for the noted railfan/preservationist that showed up a bit earlier and removed all the Westinghouse A-200-156 air horns, only to resell them at exhorbitant prices....) In fact, most of the "goods" I have stolen have been donated right back to respective preservationists, for better or worse. The Cape May Seashore Lines, for example, now has the semaphore blade from Wildwood and the milepost sign from Cape May--both "liberated" when there was "no hope" of railroading returning to town.

If we start demanding a receipt from everybody left and right, I can tell you that nobody will get anywhere. But simply because I know a lot of stuff was given away, I can never fathom how in heck anyone can pay hundreds or thousands for an object that probably cost a box of Cubans back when Cubans were still legal.

Okay, time to turn loose the dogmatic "theft is theft" absolutists. Go ahead, have at me.

lner4472@bcpl.net

> How do we define that gray area?

Well, I think you already did Rob--the unimpeachable moral answer is we shouldn't trade railroadiana. Any comprimise downward from that position is an individual rationalization probably rooted more in emotion and rationalization than logic.

Personally I collect 1. items of defunct technology of no convievable remaining value to the rightful corporate owner (my kerosene lanterns, and to a lesser degree dining-car linens) and 2. consumable or time-dependent items whose value to the value to the rightful corporate owner had a built-in expiration (timetables). I also generally collect items from merged, expired, or otherwise defunct corporations, not functioning railroads.

But that's my rationalization, its not a defensible, ethically airtight position.

eledbetter@rypn.org

First of all, stealing from a museum is simply wrong-- beyond the pale. It's like stealing from the collection plate in church. Whatever the provenenace of the item, if it's in a museum setting, it's "preserved". And, "I was keeping it from being thrown into the dumpster" is the rationale given by some (many?) for "taking" things from the big guys in the first place.

In steam days, plenty of jewelry could be had for peanuts from scrappers or even railroads (through official channels-- even PRR did it). Look at the photos of engines being cut up with all the goodies still in place.

But diesel items.... I've yet to see any first-generation diesel that went to junk with builder's plates on. Most lost them before coming out of service. And, how? Motive and opportunity...quite a few railroad employees took advantage of the demand for such items, and who is going to throw a machinist out of his own engine terminal?

In 1984, while conducting a photo project (action night photos of DL&W MUs on NJ Transit) with official permission and approval, I was offered an MU headligh/marker combo by a yard employee, the last night of operation of the things. Sure enough, one of the cars I shot that night was missing that same item. Nice. That was the third MU headlight offered by employees in two months. The MU headlight I have (along with the one my associate Mr. Hart has) were presented to us by NJ Transit officially.

I have seen known railroad employees with full, heaping tables at train shows, peddling stuff the average buff couldn't get near. I suspect that with the advent of E-bay, this sort of thing simply has gotten worse.

Glomming stuff is bad. Glomming from a museum is far worse. But, let's get realistic....... a lot of stuff that was "unofficially acquired" years ago now exists, and much is on display to the public, and it otherwise would be way down at the bottom of a landfill. That wonderful wall of RDG station signs from the Gettysburg Branch (at RRMofPA)...... anybody got an RDG Co. Stores Dept. reciept from Ernie Follweiler for them?

hpincus@mindspring.com

There will always be people who take that which is not theirs. They are self centered morons. They will *never* disappear.

What can be done?

1) Lock everything up behind plexiglass.

2) Remove anything of value; possibly replace it with crude replicas.

3) live with it.

and...

4) Stop buying stuff at train shows/flea markets. We help create a market for stolen goods.

For instance; that E6 (?) brake stand that was stolen out of the Shay in BC a decade or so ago - where did that go? How many people not in railway preservation actually would want such a brake stand?

John Stewart
Ottawa, Canada.

freewrl-1@rogers.com

> Personally I collect 1. items of defunct
> technology of no convievable remaining value
> to the rightful corporate owner (my kerosene
> lanterns, and to a lesser degree dining-car
> linens) and 2. consumable or time-dependent
> items whose value to the value to the
> rightful corporate owner had a built-in
> expiration (timetables). I also generally
> collect items from merged, expired, or
> otherwise defunct corporations, not
> functioning railroads.

> But that's my rationalization, its not a
> defensible, ethically airtight position.

A few years ago, a Naugatuck Railroad employee's timetable and rule book showed up on E-bay... vintage 1996. I got quite a chuckle out of that one! And, we get requests scrawled on lined notebook paper, to send the writer one, for free (just like a real railroad!!).

HP
NAUG Operating Dept.


hpincus@mindspring.com

Howard, your comment about diesels reminded me of a great "true tale" of recent railroad theft.

An engineer for MegaMerger Lines was excited one night when he was called for an AM run with a lash-up that featured the last operating locomotive from Pre-Merger Line in the lead. He woke early and went to the yard to renew his acquiantance with the Pre-Merger Line loco that he used to run daily before the merger.

He climbed up, took his familiar seat and tested the old gal's horn. WHSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!! No sound but air.

He climbed up on the nose to find that some time during the night, someone else with a soft spot for Pre-Merger Line locos took the horn!

Rob

trains@robertjohndavis.com

Take this case for example, a bell that is from a very well known source suddenly turns up. The story is his Dad took it off back in the 1930s,

Should the museum take it if offered?

Rational: Last remaining part of historic artifact, Corporation owner long gone, One of a kind item.

What do you think?

ted_miles@nps.gov

> Should the museum take it if offered?

Is he offering to donate it or sell it? My hope is that he wouldn't attempt to sell it on the open market--and if he did, who would be low enough to buy it?

My personal feeling is that an item from a preserved loco belongs to and on said loco--exceptions made for secure storage of originals with replicas in place. I have heard of one instance where, in a similar instance, the party with the numberplate had obtained it fair and square, but the museum group was able to arrange a trade of another member's similar number plate for the preserved loco's, with a bit of cash thrown to the other member for the second plate from a quick hat-passing from other members--all quietly and discretely.

lner4472@bcpl.net

If a semaphore arm drops to the ground, and no one is around, is it stealing or preservation?

I have, in the past, liberated artifacts from scrap piles. But, if ruthlessly objective, I must admit that even the loss of the paltry "scrap" value is still a loss to the corporate owner (and stockholders), and therefore, theft. Can there be any other way to look at it?

Railfans are addicted to their toys, so it is possible to overlook the fact that many of them left their rightful owners in an unrighteous manner. We become co-conspritors when we suspect as much and choose to ignore it. So, should that semaphore or crossbuck be allowed to pass thru the blast furnace and emerge as a Ford Expedition? Heaven forbid!

Stealing from a museum or library is a craven act and should be condemned as such, but I think we have all, in some small way, created the culture where such things can happen.

Mea culpa!

tr2manz@frontiernet.net

> If the community at large tolerates illegal
> activity by publishing photos taken while
> tresspassing, holding horn collector meets
> or hosting events all over the country where
> items of questionable ownership are bought
> and sold, how can we in the preservation
> community expect historic equipment to be
> held to a different standard?

Stealing should not be equated with photos taken while on RR property. Theft normally causes injury (i.e. loss) to the rightful owner. Photos normally do not. They are very different things.

In an ideal world, before discarding old items, a RR would offer them to a preservationist group (or even a collector). Rarely is this done because it takes time, and might become a legal issue (should someone get injured in the process).

Has anyone ever contacted a RR in advance and asked if they can have items which are being discarded? That would be an appropriate way to handle it.

I think most people realize the trespassing issue is largely one to protect the RR should someone get injured. It also makes it easier for the RR to prosecute someone doing damage to RR property.

For example, about two years ago while taking photos I saw that vandals had boobytrapped a CSX tunnel entrance in a way that could have killed the crew of the next train. Intentionally, I won't describe what was done. I walked to the tracks and dismantled the items. Should I be prosecuted for trespassing?

http://www.trainweb.org/oldmainline
intersys@insystem.com

More than once I've attended the Gaithersburg, MD, train show and remarked how it was probably the largest gathering of stolen railroad property that I've ever seen. I also keep an eye out for the air horn(s) that were illegally liberated off our locomotives within the last couple of years.

Alan Maples

AMaples@aol.com