Railroaders' Nostalgia > BN Pacific Division Friday July 25 1980

I learned Chiefin' on the B&OCT from PEJ. His brother JFJ was The Chief. PEJ was 2d trick chief. FWR, the day man retired and there was a shuffle. PEJ went to the day trick job. I was on the 3d trick job. The 2d Chief was up for bid. On the day it closed, JFJ told me that if I didn't bid the job, he would write it up and sign it for me. I wound up on 2d Chief and learned the job from PEJ.

Among the things he taught me were, the only acceptable way to do anything was thoroughly and, correctly. The railroad was mine. I was responsible for all of it and there were no acceptable excuses for letting it get screwed up. It might get screwed up for something beyond your control, but if you could have done something to prevent or mitigate the problem, JFJ would figure it out with lightning speed and bring smoke on you with the same speed. The message was the same as when I was accepted to be a train dispatcher in the same office. If you're not going to do it right, you don't belong here; save us the trouble.

Part of the Chief job, since it was responsible for the whole railroad was to know what was happening. We were the other side of an open door from the trick job, so we knew all of it without leaving the chair. In pre-CTC days, dispatchers kept a mental picture of the railroad and used the sheet for reference. Working on the Chief side of the door still provided the ability for the mental picture. On SP and BN, I had a practice of going to the trick jobs about once an hour to see what was happening. The answer I don't know to any query from one of the bosses was less than unacceptable.

PEJ taught me the single piece of paper concept. Every day, he took out a fresh sheet of 11x17 paper, folded it to a 8 1/2 x 5 1/2 size and put the date at the top of the front face. Everything that he wrote down during the shift went on that paper. At the end of the shift, it was filed in the live file for the next shift. The next day, it went into the dead (storage) file. If you needed to leave the desk to go to the trick room or see the Superintendent or whatever else, you had the state of the railroad in your hand at all times. Later, I would learn that the Akron and Cumberland chiefs had a big preprinted sheet, like a trainsheet, for that purpose.

The SP Bakersfield Chiefs were using a similar practice. When I got to BN, there was an array of clipboards, books and notes. I started chief work on Seattle in 1980, after returning from exile in Havre. The big, blank sheet wasn't going to work. I needed something like the Cumberland Chiefs were using. I developed a four page form that I could reproduce on the office copy machine.

Here is Friday July 25 1980 3rd trick. There are sheets for west and east Seattle - Yardley (Spokane), the coast line (Seattle - Vancouver BC), helper power, booster power (units assigned to work as a 4th unit between Wenatchee and Skykomish on 3 unit trains) and on the back of that sheet, car counts for predicting trains.

Just a few descriptions of what is there, but as time is short and I can't write a whole story at the moment, I'll let folks ask ad lib.

cf - call figure (dispatcher figure used to set the crew call)
f - figure
S through the helper boxes - single
S 17/8 for example, set out 17 loads 8 empties - P instead of S is pick up
1h30ml 1 hour 30 minutes late - ma is minutes ahead
12k - midnight
YD Yardley
WC Wenatchee
OM Cashmere
CH Leavenworth
WI Winton
CK Merritt
BR Berne
SN Scenic
KY Skykomish
BA Baring
GB Gold Bar
RO Monroe
W Lowell
JN Everett
MU Mukilteo
DR Edmonds
R Richmond Beach
BD Ballard
RB Interbay
FD Ferndale
GN Minot (Gavin Yard)

R___ time relieved (off duty)
IB Interbay (in COMPASS)

TUP - Transport Under Pay

Notes near engine numbers such as 30-13: Line 30 on the tonnage chart Minimum Continuous Speed 13 mph

On the helpers and boosters sheet, the 9 and 13 column are tonnage rating at 9 and 13 mph

The car count sheet shows cars on hand at Tacoma, South Seattle, Interbay and Everett for the trains shown. BU-HM Burlington - Bellingham, MN-VN New Westminster - Vancouver.

TAW



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/18 03:06 by TAW.

Westward trains and notes on the back 43 Cashmere 10m for 2/88 and 4, 97 Skykomish 20 minutes 2/130 IB 24 and set out Everett



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/15/18 15:30 by TAW.

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Eastward and notes on the back 4 Edmonds 15m for 3, Mukilteo 5m slide fence, Everett Jct 10m 97



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/15/18 15:30 by TAW.

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Coast Line and note on the back Form Y order between MP 98 and MP 100 between Bellingham and Ferndale 715a until 501p

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Helper and Booster power and over on the side, 2217 is at Skykomish on a work train. It's due monthly inspection 25th will swap for 2206.

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Car counts. I had just started doing chief work on this division and didn't yet know all that I wanted to know. Later, I developed a bigger and more sophisticated sheet after I found that the engineering depart was happy to make Diazo copies for me as needed. I have a couple of them yet and will post at some future time.

In the mean time, there is probably enough on these to keep some folks busy for quite a while. Ask questions about it as desired.

TAW

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Interesting reading Tom. Just a quick scan reveals some names: Grant Lien conductor on 97-22 just retired within this last year after reaching the top
or next to the top of his roster. Gravel voiced R.J. Wolf conductor on 43-24. The helper conductor Law I believe was Dave Law newly arrived on BN after
the demise of the MILW. Strange he would be working out of Wenatchee so soon. Perhaps he had been Shanghai'ed off the Interbay board on a temporary
vacancy. On the locomotive side, I see that all of the helper power were 6 axle units. Guess the last of the 4 axle units had been banished off the hill,
at least on that day. On the Vancouver BC side as well as 144-143 to Sumas, still a lot of the covered wagon F's are found. Thanks for posting these.

Charlie

I just noticed something interesting. 2/88-24 is Amtrak equipment making a slow trip. They got an SD40 at Sky and left it at Cashmere for 97GN22 that had just enough power to pull its own shadow. 97GN22 swapped the work train power at Sky.

97GN22 spent three days getting to Wenatchee from Minot. 83GN20 spent five days between Minot and Wenatchee.

It's mid-1980. Things are getting screwed up, but not as screwed up as they're going to get. Red Hot Smokin'Awesome Z train 43 brought two units to Wenatchee from Spokane. 82, hot merchandise/perishable train needed a unit at Sky. Vancouver BC business is way off. 183 and 184 are light and in the couple of days before and after that I have, 133 and 134 were annulled for lack of traffic.

At Bellingham, the Cherry Point local went to New Westminster and the New Westminster local went to Cherry Point.

TAW

Tom,

Do have anything from the SP, on the Coast, etc?


Nudge

spnudge Wrote:
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> Tom,
>
> Do have anything from the SP, on the Coast, etc?
>
>

Unfortunately, no, except a train order book from the Eugene office that is exactly somewhere.

TAW

TAW,

Only saw one "TO order book" and it was in an investigation. Never got to dig into it. Thanks,


Nudge

spnudge Wrote:
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> TAW,
>
> Only saw one "TO order book" and it was in an
> investigation. Never got to dig into it. Thanks,
>
>

When I find it, I'll scan some pages.

TAW