The Adventures of a Teenage Trackman
C.A.Detwyler
Until the summer of 1943 the only
paying job I had ever held was mowing Mrs. Van Buskirk's lawn. This 50 cents a
week job kept me in soda and peanuts quite well, and the one afternoon a week
didn't cramp my style too much. When my father started questioning me as to my
summer plans that June, I thought he had more lawns lined up and wasn't
interested and tried to talk my way out of them.
At the end of this little talk he announced that the Erie was hiring
trackmen at sixteen. The War made it necessary. I was to get my little self
down to the track supervisors office in the station and sign up or else.
The next day I applied, was given a trip pass to Jersey City for a
physical, and at the close of school, I went to work. The fact that I would be
working the rest of my life never entered my mind. I was off on a "great
adventure".
I was assigned to the Montgomery Branch gang of Joe Papandrea, better
known as Joe Papp. We were stationed at "MQ" tower and worked between Goshen
and Montgomery. I can still see the New York Central's FX class ten wheelers
rocking down the track past us.
The branch crossed the Graham line at "MQ". So there were two gangs
headquartered here Walt Warren's Graham Line crew was the other gang. They
covered from somewhere west of Moodna Viaduct to the "O&W" bridge west of "MQ"
crossing. The way the two gangs worked it was hard to tell who belonged to
what crew. Very often we worked together.
When we were on the branch with cinder ballast we got 60 cents an hour.
When we went out on the the main lines where there was stone ballast it was 65
cents. Eight hours a day, six days a week. Union scale.
On my first day I pulled every spike on the inside of the east rail from
the route 207 crossing to the O&W diamond. Every kid in town was there to
offer encouragement and advice. Then we proceeded to prove to the world that I
couldn't swing a spike maul. I still can't. At tamping ties I was a master of
sitting on a bar and holding the tie up to the rail. I could shovel tamp in
cinders, but pick tamping in crushed stone, FORGET IT.
Marvin Ellis, a member of our gang, accidentally put me on to something. We
were cleaning the ditch between the pond and the track at Eager Road Crossing
when I heard him yell,"stick your head out at me will you", and bring his
shovel down hard. He threw a dead snake onto the track. Joe Papp took one look
at it and announced that he had to go to Montgomery. We put the Motor car on
the track and took off alone. We went back to work. Later Marv told me Joe was
afraid of snakes. This was duly filed for future reference.
One day a month later we were raising low joints south of the cripple
track at Egbertson road. Joe as boss was sighting the raises. This meant that
Joe had to lie down and look over small blocks to a level board set up ahead
of the job to see if the raise was high enough and not to high. I killed a
Garter Snake and when no one was looking I coiled it up and put it next to the
rail by the lead block where Joe would lie down. He did and didn't see
anything. We made the raise and he was about to get up when he turned his head
an there was this snake not six inches from his nose. He shouted "Geesa ma
crist I gotta go Goshon, jumped on the track car and took off. We didn't see
him till quitting time.
The next day it was his turn to laugh. I was told to go to a nearby
farmhouse for water. To get there I had to climb the right of way fence. This
was what they call sheep or small livestock wire hung on used boiler tube
posts. I had climbed up one side with my left hand on top of the post. I swung
one leg over and started to change hand preparatory to going down the other
side when out they came. About twenty Yellow Jackets and they were VERY angry.
I fell off the fence face down in the mud. Every body had a good laugh. I got
stung three times.
When both gangs worked together we would go to the job on one motor car.
I was forced to ride at the front next to the wind shelf. Walt Warren smoked a
corn cob pipe full of Yellow Gold pipe Mixture. Phillip "Scotty" Treacy had
another cob pipe and he filled it with sun dried cut plug chewing tobacco and
Sammy Amodio would fire up one of those Italian twisted cigars. The wind would
come over and around that wind screen a blow all that smoke to me. I was not a
smoker at that time. Sometimes it would really get to me.
One morning both gangs boarded the caboose of a work train. We were going
to set off rails and ties for a track program west of the big fill near RED
ONION. I went up into the cupola for a better view. Joe Papp was to flag the
job on the east end. He stayed on the platform and talked to the brakeman. As
we neared the fill the train slowed and someone yelled "Joe this is where you
get off." He dashed in, grabbed the flag case and his lunch pail and jumped
off. As we pulled away I looked back. There stood Joe with just the handle of
his lunch bucket. The rest of it was nailed to the caboose floor. They made me
take it back to him.
During my second summer of track work, both gangs went to Goshen and
boarded a train of hopper cars loaded with cinders. We were to help the Goshen
and Florida gangs dump them on the Pine Island branch for ballast. This was a
regular occurrence in the black dirt area. This process called for opening a
pocket under the car and dumping the contents onto the track. A tie was placed
ahead of the rear truck. As the train moved this spread the cinders neatly to
the level of the rail head. But the ashes didn't fall out that easily. They
had been in the hoppers a long time, been rain soaked and gotten thoroughly
packed. To shake them loose some of the men had to beat on the sides of the
cars with heavy hammers. This caused a hollow to build from the bottom up. The
younger men were sent up on top to break through from there by poking into the
crust with long pipes. After a hole opened we could shove the rest down with
shovels. There was always a chance you could fall when it let go. So we poked
with one hand and held on with the other. When you got one empty it was onto
the next.
About noon we pulled into Pine Island for lunch and to let some L&NE
trains go by. When we started back, I found that one of the water cans had
been filled with beer. We were on our second pocket of the afternoon when one
of the Florida men came up and announced that he would show us how it should
be done. From the smell I guessed that he had finished the beer all by
himself. He stood squarely in the center of the half car load and rammed the
pipe down into it. On the third jab it gave way. Some body yelled, the train
stopped short, and we all started to dig. The people on the ground got to him
first and pulled him out through the hopper door. He tried to laugh it off but
it didn't work. The track supervisor had arrived in time to see the whole
performance and sent him home. We went over there on several similar trips and
I never saw that man again.
Being a teenage trackman was hard work. But I learned a lot. Like what
creosote does to bare skin if not washed off promptly. That sun light
reflected off rails and ties can give you just as good a sunburn as direct sun
light. I would like to be able to go back and do it again but life doesn't
work that way.
