In 1956, when I was ten years old, my mother took a job as a cook on a huge wheat farm, just north of Nunn, Colorado, a tiny town noted for painting "Watch Nunn Grow" on its water tower. Frequently, some wags would add "smaller" to the slogan, which was pretty much what happened.

From the farmhouse window, we could see a steady parade of Northerns, Challengers and Big Boys, sometimes doubleheaded, on freight trains. Trips to Greeley for shopping brought acquaintance with 2-8-0s and 2-8-2s of both the UP and Colorado & Southern, my first up-close exposure to steam.

Here, in July 2003, is a special 50th Anniversary trip for the Rocky Mountain Railroad Club, with Challenger 3985 renumbered as 3967, the locomotive that had pulled the RMRRC trip half a century earlier.

Having lived in the east for over three decades now, I've yet to personally see the reborn 3985 in operation, but it's really something to realize that were I standing in that farmhouse window today, I could still occasionally see a glimpse of what I saw 47 years earlier. Is anyone else on the list able to do that today? If so, we'd like to share your memories.

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=23922
ryarger@rypn.org

The ROW across the street from my house once carried high flying interurban cars from the Cleveland & Southwestern along with the freight business that supported the apple industry in the area. All gone, never to return ..the interurban, the apples and the embankment is due to be bulldozed soon.

lamontdc@adelphia.net

Bob,
I grew up on the CB&Q Ottawa/Streator branch in the 50's and 60's. I had a parade of black or Chinese red GP7s, "Greyback" F units and many steam excursion literally in my back yard. I got to know many of the crews, riding with them and even getting my first chance at running a pair of Geeps.

I moved out of the family home next to the branch in 1973 only to return to Oswego twenty years later with my own family. The homestead has since been sold and the branch is now the Illinois Railnet shortline, powered by two B23-7 G.E.s and a lone CF7. I'm about four blocks from the tracks but Sunday through Friday evenings, I can hear the pair of GEs chugging up the hill through town with two dozen or so loads of silica sand. And I can still go to Arizona to visit my good friend #4960 who used to trundle through my backyard, again alive and well, in the loving hands of the Grand Canyon Railroad. Thanks, Robert! Thomas Wolfe was wrong....you can go back home.

Don C.

milw261@sbcglobal.net

A friend of mine purchased the house next door to the house I grew up in just south of Elberon, NJ along the New York & Long Branch.

As I toured his "new" place, I had a flashback to my childhood and trains... from my grandmother's room, a sharp-eyed tiny railnut could look across the block and spot a gap in the trees large enough to note the type and color of the locomotives and cars passing in the daily commuter parade.

My grandmother's encouragement and all the wonderful moments in that house are only fond, fond memories, but if I snuck back up there 30+ years later, I could still see the trains... and if Mr. Levin brings his ponies to the shore, and he feels like painting out the pretty PRR lettering on his E8's (and painting the third one black) it might just LOOK like 1972 all over again!

Ahhhh...

Rob

Near my childhood home...

In 1982 or so I moved into a house a block away from the old DL&W main in Scranton and lived there until 2002. Its funny, when I first moved there I was lucky enough to see the occasional Conrail local with an SW 1500 or similar unit. A few years later steamtown began running and a 10 year old train nut's dream came true. Later on came the RS-3's, C636's and such.

By the time I moved in 2002, after 20 years of a railroading timewarp, I still went to the kitchen window when I heard train coming.

Dave Crosby

bing@epix.net

> As I toured his "new" place, I had
>> My grandmother's encouragement and all the
> wonderful moments in that house are only
> fond, fond memories, but if I snuck back up
> there 30+ years later, I could still see the
> trains...
> Ahhhh...

As I suspected grandparents are key figures in igniting the appreciation for trains..same with me-fortunately my grandmother is still with us-91 and sharp as a tack.. though not up to walks in the Penobscot-Solomon's gap area anymore.



superheater@rrmail.com

> As I suspected grandparents are key figures
> in igniting the appreciation for
> trains..same with me-fortunately my
> grandmother is still with us-91 and sharp as
> a tack.. though not up to walks in the
> Penobscot-Solomon's gap area anymore.

My paternal Grandmother lived in a barn-like apartment building on E. Market St. near Brittain Rd. in East Akron (it still stands today). Some of my earliest train-watching memories were of running into the back yard when we heard the horn of the Medina local coming back to Brittain yard and watching a pair of back-to-back AC&Y F-M's roll by with a short consist. Because of where my grandmother lived, I may be one of the youngest fans around that remembers the AC&Y pre-N&W takeover (I was six when it occured). One of the ironies of the hobby is that fans younger than me would give most anything to have seen the F-M's, while I regret not having seen their Lima Mikes.

pww57@hotmail.com

It seems all this insanity started the same way with the grandparents house in Jersey City (256 5th Street) backing up to the now national historical treasure on the elevated railroad to Harsimus Cove (JH). Wartime days and nights of GG1's P5's,M-1's, NYC Mikados, B-6's, C-1's, H's of all classes and an never ending stream of exotic box cars.

All gone but the memories, the stonework, and the residual passions.

What started in Jersey City was nurtured on the NYLB in Belmar.

If there was sufficient interest a trip would be doable.



v-scarpitti@att.net

So, Bennett, are you looking for ticket-buyers, car hosts, or the number of a good psychiatrist? <:-D

LNER4472-NOSPAM-@bcpl.net

Fine Bennet, lets put a Freudian spin on this and blame the grandparents.

In my case starting at a week old a visit to one grandmother required a trip downtown on the IC, a cab wst down Randolph Street to Northwestern Station and the C&NW north two stops. (This routing was almost door to door.) The other grandparents were reached by either the IC downtown and a cab to Grand Central followed by the Pere Marquette to Holland or a cab to LaSalle Street and the Michigan Central to Kalamazoo. Even at age less-than-three the Pere Marquette was preferred on account of the dome that my mother did not realize had been sold.

Note to Mr. Mitchell- the only shrink I know who is any good at dealing with this syndrome can probably be found at trackside on Saturday morning.

MEA

> It seems all this insanity started the same
> way with the grandparents house in Jersey
> City (256 5th Street) backing up to the now
> national historical treasure on the elevated
> railroad to Harsimus Cove (JH). Wartime days
> and nights of GG1's P5's,M-1's, NYC Mikados,
> B-6's, C-1's, H's of all classes and an
> never ending stream of exotic box cars.

> All gone but the memories, the stonework,
> and the residual passions.

> What started in Jersey City was nurtured on
> the NYLB in Belmar.

> If there was sufficient interest a trip
> would be doable.


ptrmgtsvc@juno.com

I have a similar story, yet it doesn't exactly deal with grandparents. When my brothers and I were young in the early 70s, one of our "big trips" was the occasional car ride (my parents didn't own a car until 1976) to Dickson City from Scranton to see my Dad's bachelor uncles. Three of them living in a ramshackle house left by their mother.
The Erie-Lackawanna and Delaware & Hudson ran in the back yard, (along with the O&W in earlier days.) Road crossings at Boulevard and Bowman St. gave plenty of warning that the train was coming, and we'd all race to the wire fence to wave at the train. On Dec, 30, 2003,setting up for a New Years Party on the other side of the tracks, I heard the Delaware-Lackawanna diesel blowing for the crossings. I didn't run, or wave, but still got to see the train pass, much slower than in the 70s.
The kicker to this story is that my parents who encouraged the waving in Dickson, were always cursing the same D&H trains passing through the flats in Scranton .

http://www.nps.gov/stea/

> It seems all this insanity started the same
> way with the grandparents house in Jersey
> City (256 5th Street) backing up to the now
> national historical treasure on the elevated
> railroad to Harsimus Cove (JH).

> All gone but the memories, the stonework,
> and the residual passions.

Those pesky grandparents! Mine had a laundry at 5th & Wyoming in Philadelphia. I spent the summers of 1956 and 1958 enjoying the endless parade of PCC cars on the 47 and 50 line, even daring to walk the two blocks to the shops behind PTC headquarters on Wyoming Avenue.

Lucky for me that many of those same PCC cars have found a new career on San Francisco's F line and I can both have my dream of a personal streetcar and share the experience with the public, all without having to pay for maintaining it. And Market Street Railway is going to restore the Iron Monster 162 that may have been the car that put everything in motion with a trip through Twin Peaks Tunnel out to the Zoo in 1955.

Bennett, when you're in the railroad business, you can go home again.

Francis Wong



flwong@danceart.net

> It seems all this insanity started the same
> way with the grandparents house.

> All gone but the memories, the stonework,
> and the residual passions.

Those pesky grandparents!

My had a laundry at 5th and Wyoming in Philadelphia. I spent the summers of 1956 and 1958 on the front stoop watching the endless parade of PCC cars on line 47 and 50. Sometimes I'd dare walk along the 75 trolleycoach the two blocks to PCC headquaters on Wyoming Av and their shop behind.

Lucky for me that many of the same cars have found a second career on the San Francisco F Market vintage streetcar line. I get my dream of of a personal trolley without having to pay for it, and get to share with the public, too. And now Market Street Railway will be restoring Iron Monster 162--it or a sister started the entire journey with a grinding trip through Twin Peaks Tunnel out to the Zoo in 1955.

Bennett, when you get into railroad preservation, you can go home again.

Francis Wong

flwong@danceart.net