In the Shop: 1942

Dreimer, Lucky for you to have experienced working on these magnificent iron machines. I managed to help clean & polish N&W 611's main rods when she came through my town of Danville IL. It was my way of paying her back for all the great trips I had behind her in the previous yrs. And I was really happy to get a chance to work on her.

I'm fairly young to have that knowledge, but I worked as a teenager in a "Locomotive Works" shop that specialized in maintaining the last of these machines. I worked in the foundry, and also learned how to cast all manner of things in brass, iron, copper, etc...

One of the main customers was the Durango-Silverton Narrow Gauge Railway...in fact ALL of the "Journal Box Covers" were made by me, as well as a good portion of the luggage rack brackets in the passenger cars...all brass.

Another great Delano photo. Notice all the blurred ghost men tending the engines. There used to be thousands of them...now there are only a handful of men in the country with the knowledge to maintain steam locomotives. Amazing how quickly the technology vanished.