Nostalgia & History > WAG Wednesday: 216 & the Date of Infamy!

You don’t have to be a history fan to recognize the depth of what President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s congressional address on December 8, 1941 means to our country. No American today, 75 years later, who has heard that recorded speech can possibly ignore its implications. For a nation full of people the whole world changed with the events of the previous morning of December 7, with that speech a day later serving as an exclamation point.

Art Gibson (William Arthur Gibson Jr) asked me to write up a special thread for this 75th anniversary of that Date of Infamy, which just happens to fall on WAG Wednesday. Art tells me he was a mere 5 years old that day, but clearly remembers many of the days’ events from a family perspective. His father Bill (William Arthur Gibson Sr) had taken him on a routine visit down to the local RR scene. At the UP facility they found UP 2-8-0 #216 sitting between assignments. Bill took the opportunity to pose little 5 year-old Art in the fireman’s seat & on the left front of the engine. The 216 was an unusual visitor in the Topeka area. It was theorized that this engine had found its way down from its regular Nebraska stomping grounds via train #187.

The number 216 would become significant in Art’s early, ‘formative’ railfan years. Father Bill and a few of Bill’s railfan friends already had pet favorite RR numbers which they kept a constant vigilance for as each trains’ engines & cars would pass by. Bill’s long time friend William Oliver Gibson (no direct relation) liked the number 95 while another long time friend Ray Hilner’s number was 88. At the time the events at Pearl Harbor took place Art had a toy telephone with which he practiced, among other things, calling his doctor. But at the ripe old age of 5 Art could only dial the numbers 2-1-6. So the number 216 became the number Art would identify with during his long and ongoing railfanning tenure. Bill’s favorite number was 2811. And he would almost certainly have been “wag2811” to Art’s wag216, had he been able to experience the unique joys of Trainorders.com.

For the father & son Gibsons the day of December 7, 1941 had all sorts of pleasant memories with Art posing in childhood glee on Union Pacific #216. It changed drastically only when they got back home to 1726 Washburn and learned that December 7 had become the “Date of Infamy”, altering their world forever…

1. & 2. Two slightly different roster shot angles of UP 216 sitting at the roundhouse facility in north Topeka, KS. Bill did the best he could with that nasty utility pole barging into the shot.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/12/22 00:48 by santafe199.

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3. Here’s 5 year-old William Arthur Gibson Jr happily posing as a fireman aboard the 216…

4. …and again on the left-hand side of the pilot.
(Images 1-4 taken December 7, 1941)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/12/22 00:49 by santafe199.

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5. Art thinks this print-scanned image of UP 216 was taken in Nebraska, probably sometime in the 1930s. No info was available on the print itself.
All photos taken by William A. Gibson (WAG) Sr.

Thanks for remembering Pearl Harbor!
Lance Garrels (santafe199)
Art Gibson (wag216)



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/12/22 00:50 by santafe199.

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Now ther are some GREAT memories!

My heck. Here all along I thought it was a narrow gauged Mogal. Alas, that may be going too far back into history.
Dave in Msla

Art216,
I also had a leather cap like yours that I wore when I was a kid also. upkpfan

santafe199 Wrote:
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>. It changed drastically only when they got
> back home to 1726 Washburn and learned that
> December 7 had become the “Date of Infamy”,
> altering their world forever… 

 1726 Washburn? That's literally a block away from me right now.  Hmm! Neat!

- Jeff Carlson 

Hah! Love these shots!

Thanks for posting them here!

- Jeff Carlson 

santafe199 Wrote:
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> 3. Here’s 5 year-old William Arthur Gibson Jr
> happily posing as a fireman aboard the 216…
>
> 4. …and again on the left-hand side of the
> pilot.
> (Images 1-4 taken December 7, 1941)

At least we know where he got the hard head from wearing that leather cranium cover!  Great pictures.

Great photos!