Nostalgia & History > GP20 Tuesday: My first engine!

In May of 1978 I went through a week long switchman ~ brakeman class preparing for my new employment with the Santa Fe. After 3 days of classroom grilling on safety & operating rules they took us into a quiet spot in the yard to teach us how to mount and dismount moving engines and cars. I made sure to remember my very first Santa Fe engine in those early days. After marking up in June of 1978 I actually shot the 3113 in 1979 in Emporia before catching it again in 1980 in Newton. But I wanted to post these 2 Newton shots with a nod toward the RR terminal I took those classes in. Good memories here! Thanks for listening… :^)

1. & 2. AT&SF 3113 in a pair of views at Newton, KS on January 28, 1980.

Thanks for looking back!
Lance Garrels
santafe199

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Nice shots and good story Lance!  I took that class in Amarillo.
Bryan

A week!!?? We had three weeks of classroom and three weeks of student trips on all the yard/local jobs in our district and one mainline trip in April and May of '79 with a hire date ofd 5-29-79. And we were paid a whopping $25 a day. I about went broke hiring out with UP.

x6924w Wrote: > ... A week!!?? We had three weeks of classroom and ..............

Well, I don't know what to tell ya. On May 28 (Sunday) I was shooting my last Kodachrome as a civilian. Early Monday morning I was in class in Newton. After 3 solid days of classroom stuff I made one student trip in the yard. And I established my seniority date of 6-6-78 as soon as I returned to Emporia from my one student round trip on the Emporia ~ Salina local...

Lance

Added: I don’t remember what we were getting paid. Maybe $10/day?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/26 10:54 by santafe199.

I worked on the Santa Fe one summer in 1973 out of Wellington, KS.  Then we had pysicals that included a back xray.  They were sent to Chicago to be reviewed by the company doctor and he would wire the Chief Clerk to the Trainmaster and tell them who was good to hire and who to reject.  (That policy changed when women started to be hired and they did away with the xrays in case the applicant was pregnant.  When we were notified we were hired, we had class in the basement of the old office in Wellington with a senior switchman holding the class.  The first day of class there were 20 of us, split up between people hired as switchment for the yard there and the rest were road brakemen.  I worked the road extra board that summer.  The class instructor had a finger missing and at our first break we were talking and wondered how he lost that finger.  That afternoon the Special Agent paid us a visit and finger printed all of us the old fasioned way, and said since we were involved with interstate commerce, the prints would go to the FBI in DC.  After 2 days in rules class we went the next afternoon for some time out in the yard getting on and off equipment, tying handbrakes, and watching a couple of guys face plant getting off equipment on the wrong foot.  The instructor when talking about handling couplers and knuckles did show us how he lost that finger.  We passed our rules test on Friday and we were scheduled to work one switch trick in the yard, one round trip to Waynoka on a freight, and one more round trip to Waynoka on the mainline night local working everywhere that needed a switch.  The daylight yard job was interesting, the engineer was in his 70's and he kept passing his physical every six months, except his crew had to help him on and off the engine, to start the day, go to coffee, go to beans, go to coffe, go home.....

Jim Wilson

In May 1972 I hired out with Santa Fe in Winslow and we had a similar class. We had GP30s and GP35s interchangeably. GP20s were mythical beasts on the Coast Lines back then, said to exist, but no one had ever seen one. All that training getting on and off moving equipment would be for naught when the practice became prohibited some years later. I have a fond memory of one evening riding the top of the rear car of a long cut of RD reefers we dragged to the top (west) end of the yard, watching meteors in the dark Arizona sky.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/26 17:18 by eljay.