Craig,

You are getting a great guy in Michael. He is very knowledgeable and very professional. We always looked forward to Michael coming over and helping us when we needed an extra hand.

Congrats,
Jason Johnson
Operations Manager
Ohio Central Steam Dept.

jmjohnson@ohiocentral.com

> My listings for 1946 show 135' tables at
> East Yard Los Angeles, Green River and
> Ogden. There were 126' tables (which would
> hold a Big Boy with some overhang) at
> Cheyenne and Caliente. We know the Cheyenne
> table is still functional, but not sure
> about the others. Green River's was still
> there a few years ago.

Thanks for the info, Bob.

> Remember the first plan for Steamtown
> Scranton, where they envisioned a Big Boy on
> a constantly rotating turntable, covered by
> a big striped circus tent?

I never heard that story! Oh my. The Big Boy in a Big Top. That would have been, uhm, interesting....

JimE

Jim's train pages
jrevans@accuREMOVEsort.com

Hey Linn-

Need a Curator/ Archivist with wood car maintenace/ resto experience and a working knowledge of at least the basics of steam operation? ;-)

TJ

> Strasburg has attempted to find employees
> from the rail enthusiasts in the past to no
> avail. A notice on this board brought three
> responses, none of which worked out. The
> same post in a local paper brought over 70
> responses. It is a puzzle to us. Granted we
> were looking for people with certain skills
> but it still surprised us that so few people
> were interested. We pay a lot more than
> minimum wage and have excellent benefits. Go
> figure.

> Having read all of these posts, I must agree
> with Erik that a bigger problem may be
> funding our preservation efforts. The recent
> downturn in the tourist industry has hit us
> very hard and I know it has hit others as
> well.

> Most business models that I have seen from
> consultants base their predictions of
> success on the entirely erroneous assumption
> that everyone wants to ride a train. When so
> many vendors of mainstream wares are
> competing for a finite amount of disposable
> income, it is pretty tough for special
> interest outfits like us to compete. For
> instance, the new Cabela's that opened in
> the middle of nowhere about an hour north of
> us, gets as many people on their busiest day
> as we get in July!

> Sustainability is the key. Living within
> your means and not flooding the market with
> tourist railroads. A friend in the industry
> once told me that he got one train ride per
> vacation and it didn't matter which train it
> was. He felt this was pretty typical of the
> general public. There are only so many
> people who will pay money to ride a train.
> That number of people will support X-number
> of railroads. More railroads than that and
> you weaken all and it becomes survival of
> the fittest which is fine if you are one of
> the fittest. But sometimes our most
> historically valuable railroads are the
> weakest economically and when the market
> becomes saturated with "pop-up",
> "flash-in-the-pan" railroads we
> increase the risk of losing some worthwhile
> entities. I guess as long as everyone wants
> their own railroad to play on nothing will
> change.

> We get all excited when a new railroad gets
> started. Personally, the WW&F really
> trips my trigger - really neat! For rail
> preservation, that is a battle won, but it's
> the war we have to win. Does winning any
> particular battle contribute to winning the
> war. That, in my opinion, is the question we
> are not asking. And if we did ask it, we
> probably wouldn't have the answer - I know I
> don't. I believe long term survivability
> means we better find that answer.

> We are such a small industry that the
> regional impact area per railroad is quite
> large. Until we look at the big picture and
> find some reasonable way to
> "regulate" ourselves, survival is
> a more a matter of politics, personal
> agendas, and economics and less a matter of
> worthwhile historical preservation and
> overall health of the industry. Survival of
> the fittest has led to many extinctions.


Port Huron Museum
tjgaffney@phmuseum.org

Hi,

You have to be a memeber of the milk train Yahoo Group to view the link below, but it is worth it. Blake Tatar and several of our dairy nuts were out "railfanning" old PRR branches in PA when they stumbled upon the old creamery at Grover, PA.

Out back are two very intact Borden's milk tanks, the kind that were paired-up on NATX National Leasing flat cars and slid off for local truck delivery.

These are bell-shaped tanks and even show rust patterns from the Borden's lettering.

Now, I am not aware of any National milk flats left in exisitence, but there are plenty of highway trucks these could be mounted on. They sure would look nice at the Naugy... hint, hint...

The significance of this find is huge. Previously, we knew of just one of the tanks in exisitence, and it is very much modified.

If there is a group in the northeast looking to interpret milk trains, these babys are a rare catch!

Rob


http://photos.groups.yahoo.com/group/milktrains/ls
trains@robertjohndavis.com