Large Scale Central

Nice story from the N&W

General Discussion
#1

This just happened today. My wife and daughter and I were out in Shepherdstown WV, visiting her sister and her husband. My daughter (age 4) and I saw train tracks at one end of the park so we walked down and I told her about how you can put a penny on the tracks and it gets “squished.” So we put a penny on the rail. For he rest of the day, no train. Finally we hear a train coming, and we rush down to the track. It’s a big one–three N&W locos with a long train. Looks like an SD 80- MAC in the lead, with an SD 60 behind it and I didn’t get a good look at the last one, but it comes to a rumbling stop and it’s just sitting there, 100 yards from the penny. So I walk down with my daughter towards the train. And hands sticks out of the cab and waves. So we go a little closer and I show my daughter the “blow the horn” gesture. She does it and the horn blows, and then the front lights start blinking. My daughter is delighted but she’s also a little scared to go any closer, so we sit down on a the edge of a culvert and wait.

Well the front door opens and out comes the driver–it’s a woman, maybe in her fifties. She walks over towards us and I ask if we are causing her any trouble. She explains that they are waiting for a train to pass in the other direction before proceeding. I ask a couple questions and then say introduce my daughter. The woman looks at her and says “you know, a girl can grow up to do whatever she wants to do. You can even drive a big train if you want to.” I thank her and she gets back in the cab.

After a while the train finally moves and she waves as she goes by. Our daughter was delighted. And then, after the whole train passed by, we found the penny. It looked, she said, like a potato chip.

So now she’s bringing it into her preschool on Monday for show and tell. That engineer did a very nice thing for a little kid.

#2

Very nice story. Thanks for sharing.

The N&S west yard end is across the street from my house. When the locos sit awaiting entry many of the engineers will toot the horn and ring the bell for the neighborhood kids who come running over to see it. Once, the engioneer or conductor got out and gave them N&S safety coloring books and pencils. A very small thing to do but my daughter still talks about it to this day.

#3

That is a cool story.
As kids, we used to put the penny on the rail over and over again, to see how big we could get it.
Ralph

#4

Good story.

#5

What a great story!

#6

Neat -What a great experience. There’s a good chance that when she grows up that this will be one of the few early childhood memories she retains. :slight_smile: :slight_smile:

#7

I of course did this too when I was a kid. My father tells a story of trying to put a big old brass door knob on the rails. Then while working at a hobby shop I was asked to take some product down to a local Boy Scout jamboree. A local scout master talked about the trains and models so all I had to do was babysit the trains. His take on it was much more negative than that. About teh dangers of putting things on the tracks. (sigh) Too bad.

All the childhood joys are too soon gone.

Chas