Railroaders' Nostalgia > Remembering E.L.(Sandy) Sanford

Just remembering today one of my favorite hogheads on the Southern Pacific Railroad. Sandy took a lot of new fireman under his wing if he liked you and taught you the ropes. When I was a fireman still wet behind the ears he allowed me to run a hot shot piggy back train from the LATC (shops)intermodal yard in L.A. to West Colton, Calif. What I didn't know was that a certain road foreman of engines would be riding with us that day. When I found that out, I asked Sandy if I could take a rain check but he wouldn't have any of it. He said "you're probably a better runner than him anyway" I doubted that but away we went. I had a fairly good trip with just a slight overspeed at one point which I corrected without being told. When we got to West Colton and I dried off my sweaty palms, I figured Sandy would run on the return trip. Wrong! I took the seat on the left hand side and he said "get over on the other side, I don't need the experience". He said "get over there and try not to pull out all the handles by the roots, take a couple of tranquiseltzers and lets go to L.A." I got furloughed between May 1980 and June 1981, During this time, I kept in touch with Sandy and he continued to give me encouragement to hang in there until I got back. He didn't last too long after he retired but I was privileged to be one of the pall bearers at his funeral. He was quite a guy and I will never forget him.

Ray



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/20/14 16:48 by CR3.

Nice story. Its funny, most of the good guys didn't last very long after pulling the pin.


Nudge

Thanks for the nice story Ray. "Sandy" was truly one of a kind. I'll have to dig out some snapshots of him at the L.A. engine crew dispatcher shanty when they called him for a bicentennial special (with lots of press) that was going to Glendale (CA) station. Pretty funny stuff. I'd tell the story now but it just wouldn't be the same without the pictures! I think we've all got "fireman" stories about working with Sandy. Mine was on the westbound Kaiser Ore train out of Indio! What a trip that was!

Yes indeed, Ed Sanford was a real, genuine, character.
I posted a couple of my remembrances of Ed about 7 years ago. I don't know how to
attach them to this but you can do a search to read them. I did not know that Ed had passed away.
He would have loved giving these present day officials a dose of his humor. I would love to
just stand and watch the circus.

Charlie

Ed was indeed a great guy. While I can't say he was a railfan, if he knew you were, you were OK in his eyes. Perhaps we showed interest in the job and didn't just set over on the other side of the cab and sleep the whole time.

He would allow us trainmen who took interest to run also. On one trip on the Kaiser ore train, after cutting in the swing helpers at Thousands Palms, he said to me, "well get over here and take us to Colton". It did give me a bit of a rush to know I was the one controlling the heaviest train on the Southern Pacific.

We had a uneventful trip up the East side of the Beaumont Hill, which including taking the siding for a meet at West Palm Springs. Out of Pershing we were approaching the descending side of the hill, I said to Sandy, "guess you had better take over now". He said "so you only do the easy side?". For those of you who don't know the numbers on the SP's Kaiser Ore trains, they were a standard 100 cars at 130 tons per car, with the caboose the 'rubber stamp' weight was listed as 13,025. Now all you have to do is keep this monster under control on a 2% downhill grade. Well as we tipped over the crest of the hill, there was some serious puckering going on my part. All the way down the hill, I was all sweaty palms, concentrating on the speedometer and air gages so intensely I probably missed half the signals. Yet Sandy just set over on the fireman's seat just a relaxed as could be, you would have thought he was on spot for beans. When we pulled to a stop at Hunt's Lane at the bottom of the grade, I let out a big sigh, I made some comment to the effect that at least I think I kept everything right-side-up. He only chucked and only thing he said was next time you don't need to get after the air so soon at Apex, the helpers had to shove us a little until the whole train on the grade.

Sandy was famous for he harassing SP's L.A. Div. officials. Maybe some of the others who worked with him could tell some tales of his antics to irritate the management.

J.P.

I got to work with Sandy a few times as a brakeman back in the late 70's on the West End Pool. When I went into engineservice I didn't see him much account he was LA Division, and I was San Joaquin. He was quite a character, but you couldn't help but like the guy...and his hip flask full of ice tea LOL!
Sandy Sanford was the only engineer I knew of that had a locomotive named after him. I believe it was originally the SP6800 (U25-B). I remember seeing his name E.L.SANFORD painted very professionally below the engine number. I'm sure there's a story about how that came about...
That engine is now owned by Orange Empire, in Perris, Ca., and renumbered SP3100, but without Sandy's name below the number...kind of sad.

cewherry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Yes indeed, Ed Sanford was a real, genuine,
> character.
> I posted a couple of my remembrances of Ed about 7
> years ago. I don't know how to
> attach them to this but you can do a search to
> read them. I did not know that Ed had passed
> away.
> He would have loved giving these present day
> officials a dose of his humor. I would love to
> just stand and watch the circus.
>
> Charlie

A search of author cewherry and keyword sanford turned up your 3 stories:
Naming of SP Locos (Modern Day) <http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,1497657,1497657#msg-1497657&gt;
Characters and other 'worthies' I've met <http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,1497686,1497686#msg-1497686&gt;
Another Ed Sanford story <http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,1498113,1498113#msg-1498113&gt;

Thanks for taking the time to write up the stories!

mapboy

I have a few borrowed 1981 LA-WC train registers from "SPLoopConductor" and I don't see his name on any of them. Just for kicks here are the engineers whose last name begins with the letter "S":

Sharman
Smelt
Simmons
Saunders
Streeter
Schoengarth
Strand
Sosnowski
Seuferling
Stuart
Schott
Strube

But no Sanford. Must have been working a local.



Allen



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/21/14 16:15 by bradleymckay.

bradleymckay Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I have a few borrowed 1981 LA-WC train registers
> from "SPLoopConductor" and I don't see his name on
> any of them. Just for kicks here are the
> engineers whose last name begins with the letter
> "S":
>
> Sharman
> Smelt
> Simmons
> Saunders
> Streeter
> Schoengarth
> Strand
> Sosnowski
> Seuferling
> Stuart
> Schott
> Strube
>
> But no Sanders. Must have been working a local.
>
>
>
> Allen


His name was SANFORD!

Uncle Joe,Seffner,fl.

retcsxcfm Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> bradleymckay Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I have a few borrowed 1981 LA-WC train
> registers
> > from "SPLoopConductor" and I don't see his name
> on
> > any of them. Just for kicks here are the
> > engineers whose last name begins with the
> letter
> > "S":
> >
> > Sharman
> > Smelt
> > Simmons
> > Saunders
> > Streeter
> > Schoengarth
> > Strand
> > Sosnowski
> > Seuferling
> > Stuart
> > Schott
> > Strube
> >
> > But no Sanders. Must have been working a
> local.
> >
> >
> >
> > Allen
>
>
> His name was SANFORD!
>
> Uncle Joe,Seffner,fl.


Opps! Brain cramp. Fixed...


Allen

bradleymckay Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I have a few borrowed 1981 LA-WC train registers
> from "SPLoopConductor" and I don't see his name on
> any of them. Just for kicks here are the
> engineers whose last name begins with the letter
> "S":
>
> Sharman
> Smelt
> Simmons
> Saunders
> Streeter
> Schoengarth
> Strand
> Sosnowski
> Seuferling
> Stuart
> Schott
> Strube
>
> But no Sanford. Must have been working a local.
>
>
>
> Allen


they are all retired or deceased except for Strube ...

John Strube was the the regular fireman on my first student trip over the West End from L.A. to West Colton in 1979. Jim Hasbrouck (termite)was the conductor. I think the engineer was Mike Bangs.

Map Boy, thanks for posting the Sandy stories. I guess we all knew about the ice tea in a bourbon bottle thing. Have heard the story that Gyralite posted too but would love to see the pictures. Sandy always threatened to pull into Marne siding on his last day, call a cab and just abandon the train there but he let us down on that one. I did hear a story of how he set off a fireworks display on the engine nose in that siding on the 4th of July. One of the funniest things I remember wss seeing him one morning after he retired outside the engineers locker room in L.A. He was holding on to a long piece of string that was attached to a stick which was proping up a bushel basket with some corn kernels under it. He had just aquired a bird dog and was trying to catch Taylor Yard pigeons to train his dog with. Another time when I was called to fire for him it was raining and I showed up with an umbrella. He said I looked like Nick Harris who I assume must have been a snappy dresser or something. Sandy used to have a blow up pillow for sleeping in carryalls. God knows what else he had in that grip. There is a picture of Sandy standing by the engine with engineer George Will and Conductor Hector Racacot when he was a fireman on the short lived passenger train that ran between L.A. and Niland with an E unit and two cars. It's in John Signor's book about Beaumont Hill. The photo was taken by Brian Black.

Ray



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 12/22/14 12:42 by CR3.

I worked with Schoengarth out of Yuma and El Centro a few years back. Good Engineer!
He was a RFE for a time in Dalhart too.