I ran across this one in a Railroad Magazine from 1949, written by one Harry B. Chase, Jr. It points up the problems of maintaining a manual interlocking plant in cold weather.
'Twas the night before Christmas and out on the track Old thirty-three hundred was taking up slack. The signal and switch lamps were lighted with care In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there. The signal maintainer was home in his bed, While visions of overtime danced in his head. Forgotten were overalls, jumper and cap As he settled himself down for a long winter's nap, When down in the hall there arose such a clatter He sprang from his bed to see what was the matter, Away to the phone he flew like a flash, Slipped on the stairs and came down with a crash! The boss was phoning at eleven-fifteen: "There's more snow on the iron than ever I've seen, So go get your pants and your shirt and your jumper, And hook a ride up here on somebody's bumper, And we'll let you work like a busy old beaver." The signalman cussed and hung up the receiver. The freight yard resounded with moans and gripes, And snowdrifts were frozen all over the pipes. The towerman was trying to line up the route, While the fast midnight freight was blockaded to boot. The levers were jammed for two or three nights, And something had happened to all of the lights. 'Twas a job without rest, compensation or thanks To dig out the pipe lines and sweep off the cranks, But finally the signalman straightened his back, (For the snowdrifts were all shoveled off of the track) Returned to the tower and fell in the door, To spend Christmas Eve sound asleep on the floor. When on glancing around, his features turned blue-- For the snowplow was coming on track number two, With a little hogger so lively and quick, He knew in a moment it must be St. Nick! But old Santa, alas, just could not recall how To slow down his engine or lift up his plow! He highballed on through with a leap and a bound, While ballast and ice went flying around, And seventeen ton of snowballs and rocks Were piled on the pipe lines and pull wires and locks. He spoke not a word, but yanked on the whistle, And the steam blew away like the down on a thistle. The on down the line went the high wheeling Saint, While the signal maintainer fell down in a faint, But later recovered though filled with a fear Of shoveling snow for the rest of the year! And he heard Santa call, ere he steamed out of sight, "Merry Christmas to you, and do have a good night!" Charles Weston --- On Thu, 12/23/10, [email protected] <[email protected]> wrote: From: [email protected] <[email protected]> Subject: {S-Scale List} T'was The Night Before Christmas - 2010 Edition To: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] Date: Thursday, December 23, 2010, 7:28 PM MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL Jim Lyle I "lifted" this from the TTML provided by TCA. . To whit-- The following 'story', (adapted from an original by Clarence Clarke Moore) takes place each Christmas Eve at the Central Railroad of New Jersey's Bloomsbury Freight yard in northwest Warren County, NJ...a few miles from the Ready Made Trains/RMT office. Once again, we would like to share it with you and your family. Merry Christmas! Walter and Susie Matuch Ready Made Trains, LLC *************************************************************** T'was The Night Before Christmas - 2010 Edition T'was the night before Christmas and all through the yard, Every brakeman was on duty and working quite hard. The extra list was depleted and all were quite tired, But work they must or else just get fired! Each yard track was filled with boxcars of toys Lots of dolls for the girls and toy trains for the boys. The yard boss was screaming into the speaker alright Let's get those tracks switched out so we can call it a night. So out of the dunnigan they flew like a flash, Tore across the yard lead and made a mad dash. Checking the switch list and chalking the cars The sky was pitch black except for the stars. The freight cars were all flying and moving quite fast The pace was tremendous and surely would not last Over at the roundhouse, it was quite the same The Christmas Eve Special was a most important train. The engines were serviced and sat by the shed Ready for whatever long trip lay ahead. This train was important and that was made clear It was powered by new BEEF® diesels instead of reindeer. Three A-B-A little diesels were ready to go, Glistening underneath a light cover of snow. Usually steam-powered in many years past These little BEEF® diesels were sturdy and fast. The hogger marked up...the best on the list He checked the engines and nothing was amiss. A CNJ veteran of many, many years A ringing bell was simply music to his ears. The engineer was Santa...of course we all knew And believe it you must because it is true. Many miles tonite this special train would run Completing its long journey before the Christmas morn sun. The Christmas Train was soon complete...engines, freight cars and hack Santa whistled the air test and looked down the track. All signals were green and glowed bright in the night. A highball came from the conductor that relayed all was right. Slowly Santa notched out the throttle and the BEEF®s answered the call As the train passed the shanty it was looked over by all. No hotbox or stuck brake was heard as it passed Because soon on the mainline the speed would be fast. With Santa at the throttle...now in Run 8 A schedule had to be kept and no time to be late. As the caboose markers glowing red into the night The Christmas Express was soon out of sight. Over the train radio came a message...loud and quite clear It rattled across the yard for all the brakies to hear "Your job is complete...the train is right MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT!!! [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/S-Scale/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: [email protected] [email protected] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [email protected] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
