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Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment

Author: D. B. Arthur

Date: 05-21-2022 - 18:06

Bill Webb Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I remember that spur. Cruising thru the parking lot with covered hoppers.Sure wish I would have taken pictures.I had my camera too. Thanks for the post and look back.

You've done a good job of photo-documenting a lot of locals that don't run anymore.

I found an old email from Don Richardson where he recalls a funny story about that spur. He also talks a little about the on-again/off-again passenger service between Fullerton and San Bernardino. Here is a cut-and-pasted reproduction of it:

(1) That spur at Anaheim Stadium never had a name that I know of. It saw little business and I only operated over it once. There's is a humorous story about that, though. I was working the First Santa Ana Switcher and we had a car to deliver to a warehouse at the end of it. Nobody on the job had ever been on it, so we decided to shove the car to a spot. The dispatcher insisted that we clear the main there, so we ran around the car at Orange and shoved it ahead of the engine while pulling the train.

At the time, the spur went through an orange grove that is now the stadium parking lot and on a curve to the left. The head brakeman was a prior rights switchman named Don Potter that I had worked with when I first hired out in 1952 and he was an engine foreman. He went on the road when he gained brakeman's seniority in 1959. He was riding the car we were shoving and the orange trees were so overgrown that I couldn't see him. He finally had to crawl around the corner of the car and ride the front ladder to avoid being brushed off the car. Now I couldn't see him at all. We finally got over State College Blvd. and out of the orange grove, only to find that the warehouse was only accessed by another spur off the main spur that came from the other direction. All that shoving for naught! We had to drop the car in order to spot it. Then we had to shove the whole d___ed train back through that orange grove back to the main line with the switch lined against us.

Years later I was working a road switcher on the Harbor District. We had a prior rights trainman for a conductor and two prior rights switchmen for brakeman. We loved to argue about who was dumber, a brakeman or a switchman. One said a brakeman couldn't switch a carload of perfume out of a trainload of manure. Others said a switchman couldn't count to twenty without taking his shoes off. The head brakeman ended the debate by stating that on his first road trip they shoved a car for five miles and then dropped it. I replied that I was running the engine that day and remembered it well. That brakeman was Don Potter.

(2) The Desert Wind ran over the Second District from its inception on 10-26-79 until 4-27-86. I was the engineer on 10-25-79 when Amtrak ran a promotion special with its President Alan Boyd on business car Beech Grove to position No. 35 to depart Ogden the next day and worked it regular for years. I made my first trip over the Third District on No. 36 on 4-28-86 so I guess I was the bookends on its Pasadena phase. Fireman R.C. Wilson was running the engine out of Fullerton and we had a road foreman of engines riding with us to qualify us over this unknown territory that hadn't seen passenger trains for over eight years. Santa Fe had cut the passenger speed to 60 mph in the interim and I soon realized that Wilson wasn't aware of that, but talked to him in code to inform him of that fact. The road foreman didn't catch on and we kept our speed down to 60 mph.

Don Richardson

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Subject	Written By	Date/Time (PST)
Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	D. B. Arthur	05-21-2022 - 07:51
Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	GRD	05-21-2022 - 07:59
Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	///	05-21-2022 - 08:34
Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	Bill Webb	05-21-2022 - 09:59
Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	D. B. Arthur	05-21-2022 - 18:06
Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	K-Town Rail	05-22-2022 - 16:05
Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	Negin	05-21-2022 - 10:04
Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	Peter D.	05-21-2022 - 12:08
Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	D. B. Arthur	05-21-2022 - 12:41
Re: Submitted For Your Approval - Fifty-eighth Installment	George Andrews	05-22-2022 - 20:06

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D. B. Arthur Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Bill Webb Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I remember that spur. Cruising thru the parking
> lot with covered hoppers.Sure wish I would have
> taken pictures.I had my camera too. Thanks for the
> post and look back.
> 
> You've done a good job of photo-documenting a lot
> of locals that don't run anymore.
> 
> I found an old email from Don Richardson where he
> recalls a funny story about that spur.  He also
> talks a little about the on-again/off-again
> passenger service between Fullerton and San
> Bernardino.  Here is a cut-and-pasted reproduction
> of it:  
> 
> (1) That spur at Anaheim Stadium never had a name
> that I know of. It saw little business and I only
> operated over it once. There's is a humorous story
> about that, though. I was working the First Santa
> Ana Switcher and we had a car to deliver to a
> warehouse at the end of it. Nobody on the job had
> ever been on it, so we decided to shove the car to
> a spot. The dispatcher insisted that we clear the
> main there, so we ran around the car at Orange and
> shoved it ahead of the engine while pulling the
> train.
>  
> At the time, the spur went through an orange grove
> that is now the stadium parking lot and on a curve
> to the left. The head brakeman was a prior rights
> switchman named Don Potter that I had worked with
> when I first hired out in 1952 and he was an
> engine foreman. He went on the road when he gained
> brakeman's seniority in 1959. He was riding the
> car we were shoving and the orange trees were so
> overgrown that I couldn't see him. He finally had
> to crawl around the corner of the car and ride the
> front ladder to avoid being brushed off the car.
> Now I couldn't see him at all. We finally got over
> State College Blvd. and out of the orange grove,
> only to find that the warehouse was only accessed
> by another spur off the main spur that came from
> the other direction. All that shoving for naught!
> We had to drop the car in order to spot it. Then
> we had to shove the whole d___ed train back
> through that orange grove back to the main line
> with the switch lined against us.
>  
> Years later I was working a road switcher on the
> Harbor District. We had a prior rights trainman
> for a conductor and two prior rights switchmen for
> brakeman. We loved to argue about who was dumber,
> a brakeman or a switchman. One said a brakeman
> couldn't switch a carload of perfume out of a
> trainload of manure. Others said a switchman
> couldn't count to twenty without taking his shoes
> off. The head brakeman ended the debate by stating
> that on his first road trip they shoved a car for
> five miles and then dropped it. I replied that I
> was running the engine that day and remembered it
> well. That brakeman was Don Potter.
>  
> (2) The Desert Wind ran over the Second District
> from its inception on 10-26-79 until 4-27-86. I
> was the engineer on 10-25-79 when Amtrak ran a
> promotion special with its President Alan Boyd on
> business car Beech Grove to position No. 35 to
> depart Ogden the next day and worked it regular
> for years. I made my first trip over the Third
> District on No. 36 on 4-28-86 so I guess I was the
> bookends on its Pasadena phase. Fireman R.C.
> Wilson was running the engine out of Fullerton and
> we had a road foreman of engines riding with us to
> qualify us over this unknown territory that hadn't
> seen passenger trains for over eight years. Santa
> Fe had cut the passenger speed to 60 mph in the
> interim and I soon realized that Wilson wasn't
> aware of that, but talked to him in code to inform
> him of that fact. The road foreman didn't catch on
> and we kept our speed down to 60 mph.
>  
> Don Richardson

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