Chapter 10 - WORKIN' ON THE RAILROAD

10.1 POWER COMMISSION TO CANADIAN NATIONAL

The decision to leave the Manitoba Power Commission and go to work for Canadian National was primarily a result of my having a lifelong love affair with railroading. My love of railways really began (as indicated in an earlier chapter) from exposure to the railway in Rivers as a boy and the interest engendered in the romance of the rails in stories of daily happenings brought home by my dad from his job in the yard office. This interest was further enhanced through reading the old pulp Railroad Magazine, which featured stories by men who had worked as real railroaders as well as information articles such as locomotive rosters prepared by the magazine's staff.. While I read this magazine avidly from 1932 to about 1940 I got started on it because our new Anglican minister, Rev. E.S. Williams felt that as Rivers was a railway town he should bone up on railways. When he knew how interested I was, he kindly passed each month's issue on to me.

The matter was brought to a head in early 1953 as a result of a number of factors. I had by then been working for the M.P.C. for 7 years as an Electrical Engineer and while they had treated me well and I had enjoyed the work and the people the railroad was in my blood; I felt I would be happier in the long term if I could obtain work there.

In the days of steam there were not too many opportunities for electrical engineers, but in the early fifties it became obvious that diesel-electric locomotives were going to supplant steam which would most likely create some need for electrical engineers in the railway. Diesels had been used in yard switching since about 1943 and by the late '40's they were taking over key passenger trains in the U.S.. When Tom Woodhall and I went to Schenectady to work on the G.E. system analyzer the Soo Line train out of Winnipeg was pulled by a diesel and I talked myself into riding the cab as far as the border. This was an introduction to the new beast and I found it quite interesting indeed. Also, in 1952 the first diesels had shown up on a test trip through Rivers. They had pulled a train of 130 empties which compared with the 100 that a steamer might pull, and that made it seem as thought the hand-writing was on the wall, Diesels, would replace Steam!

Coincidently I had gotten to know Major J.L. Charles, (Chief Engineer of Western Lines) who had offered me a job in the signals department of C.N. not long after I joined the Power Commission. I was papers chairman of the Electrical branch of the Engineering Institute of Canada in Winnipeg so when he said that S. W. Fairweather, who was Vice-President of Research and Development for C. N. would be in town and might be available to speak to us I said our group would surely be delighted. Fairweather delivered a most interesting paper on the Economics of Railway Transport which I found most interesting as it gave the idea that there was more to the business than just running trains. I was also quite fascinated by the the man's knowledge of railroads in general. By this time I was really beginning to make up my mind to try to make the shift; the Power Commission's farm electrification was completed so it might be a convenient time to make the break. Also, I was attracted by the thought that C.N. was a national enterprise rather than a provincial one and that working for the railway would give a broader perspective than continuing with the M.P.C..

A few days after Fairweather's visit I told Major Charles that I might be interested in joining the railway. I showed him some economic studies I had made dealing with the proposed new generating station to be built in Brandon. He suggested that I write to Mr. Fairweather and that I could use his name as a reference. I got a reply from Mr. Glen Chestnut (Fairweather's personnel officer), who said he would be in Winnipeg shortly and would like to interview me. The interview took place in the Fort Garry hotel and after an exchange of correspondence Chestnut confirmed that he could offer me a job as an assistant engineer in the Dept of Research and Development in Montreal.

I talked it over with Anne who agreed with it if that's what I really wanted to do. For the only time in our life together (which, as we shall see, entailed quite a few moves) she whimpered a little at the thought of leaving behind her family, friends and general life in her home city of Winnipeg. In all of our moves she never placed any restriction on me except to ask that i provide a decent house for hwer and the children. Her dad, George Walker was a bit grumpy about our leaving as he would have preferred to see me working for a private company where one could get perks like stch sharing plans. All he said was "it's going to be the railway" and that was that! The officers of the Power Commission and other associates like our good friends from Pioneer Electric were very good about it, giving me a lunch, some kind remarks and mememtos at the Carlton Club on Main Street. When the lucheon broke up I recall driving home in a state of high elation at the prospect of cachieving a lifelong dream shouting out loud, "I've done it, I've done it!!"

10.2, AN INTRODUCTION TO WINTER RAILROADING

The final letter from Glen Chestnut was dated Jan. 13, 1953 and enclosed passes for myself and the family to go to Montreal. I left Anne and Robin and Maria (until I could find a home in Montreal) and boarded Train No. 2, the eastbound Continental Limited on Jan. 30. It turned out to be a trp to remember, a real humdinger of winter steam railroading, travelling all through Northern Ontario bucking snow with a temperature of - 25deg.F and a north wind of 25 mph! I rode the cab in the vicinity of Longlac, where the engineman explained that with the drifting snow, whe wind wipe along the train and the heavy use of steam to heat the 14 cars, he could only get 40mph out of engine 6063 instead of the usual 60 mph.(see photo).

At one siding we had a meet and no.1 Westbound was required to take the siding. The main track had been ploughed, but the siding had not; moreover, there was as large windrow of semi-packed snow at the switch. The engineman on no.1 entered the siding at low speed, not wishing to derail on hard packed ice, but he could not maintain enough momentum and with only the engine and the first two cars in the siding his engine slipped and stalled. He tried to back up to get another run at it but the big driving wheels spun in vain so neither train was able to proceed. Contact with the dispatcher revealed that a snowplough and freight engine were just two sidings east of us and they were sent to get us going. They coupled onto the tail end of no.1 and with both engines working in unison were able to shove no.1 into the clear, so permitting us to proceed.

We made the usual servicing stop at Hornepayne, but our troubles were not over. Because of the weather and the heavy snow and cold they coupled a feight engine onto our head end as a helper. By the time it was coupled up our own 6063 had some frozen pipes. The division Master Mechanic, a Mr. Payne, was there and he with his crew tried valiantly to thaw the pipes using the old style kerosene torches and balls of burning waste. At one stage the boiler inlet pipe froze so they could not get water into the boiler. At the last minute, when it seemed that we mihgt have to take 6063 to the shop they got the pipe unfrozen and we were able to leave town. As a result of all this and continued slow running we were 12 hours late by the time we got to Ottawa where the weather began to moderate. We changed engines for a 6100 class 4-8-4 Northern type and left for Montreal. The track was relatively straight and in good shape so he made the best of it. Timing the mileposts I was quite thrilled that he was travelling between 80 and 90 mph! Unfortunately this resulted in an old style journal box on an express car overheating so we had to stop near Montreal to cool it off and then proceed the rest of the way at reduced speed. The whold trip was a lesson in the effects of rigorous winter on train operations and a tribute to the men who had to cope with it day in and day out to keep the trainas rolling. Even in these latter days of multiple unit diesels and Centralized Traffic Control with heaters on main line switches Northern Ontario winter railroading is no sinecure!

10.3, MEETING FAIRWEATHER AND HANDLING COMMUNICATION JOBS

On the morning of Feb. 2, having got settled as a guest of old friends George and Ruth Morison until such time as the family could be brought to Montreal, I got myself down to the old CN Headquarters at 360 McGill St. This building, which still stands, (1998), was built in 1898? as the headquarters of the Grand Trunk Railway, the predecessor of CN in the East. Though not a large building by to-day's standards it was, with its heavy stone construction, imposing enough for me, enthralled with the idea of actually working in the headquarters of CN, so far removed from Rivers yard office where my dear dad labored faithfully for over 30 years. After all this was where all department heads and staffs were located; it was where President Donald Gordon had his office and where his chaufeurred limousine waited for him at quitting time with a copy of the Montreal Gazette on the back seat so he could catch up on the news of the day on his way home!

Inside, the building had very high ceilings, wide hallways and a sort of grand staircase leading ti the second floor. Hoever the penury of the depression and exigencies of the war had taken their toll. The exterior stone was grimy and the Victorian style interior woodwork was in need of refinishing. As I entered the Research and Development department on the third floor I noticed the old brown battleship linoleum, which like that in the old U.of Man junior division had patches on top of patches. Desks and other furnishings were similarly old and worn. However, I was to discover that these funishings belied the dybamic and interesting work which was being done here by as varied and knowledgable group of people as you would meet anywhere, from Fairweather himself down through Bill Kingston whose dad had been a V.P., Bill Mallory who had tramped through the snow on Major Charles' survey team building the Hudson Bay Railway, eccentric old "doc" in the lab, who could invent almost anything and back up to guys like Bob Bandeen whjo later worked up to President and Jim Macdonald who later left to work with Penn-Central through its collapse and ended up with the C.P.R.! This is just a sample, I haven't mentioned Bill Moffatt who had commanded a corvette during the war and Wilf Sergeant who had come to Canada and CN after learning his trade with the London Transport system in Britain.

I was first introduced to "Mac" the Chief Clerk, to Utley the Office Engineer and to P.L. Mathewson, Chief of Research in whose group I was to work. I was assigned a desk in the "bull pen" at the rear of the office where there was Bill Cyr, who later became Chief of Motive Power and Car, Lorne Hewson, who followed me as General Supt. of Transportation in Moncton, and later headed a team to do a large a large scale study of the Brazilian Railway system, and the afore-mentionded Wilf Sergeant who Superintended the startup of the "GO" communter trains in Toronto. All were college graduates like myself, except for Hewson who had worked his way up from a telegraph operator to Chief Dispatcher of a Division in Western Canada.

In that first afternoon I was ushere into the large corner office which was the abode of the Vice-President, Mr. Starr W. Fairweather himself, who wanted to meet the "young newcomer from Winnipeg". This office was still furnished in its original Victorian style, with high beamed ceilings etc.. Of particular note was the green tiled fire place where a glowing coal fire in the grate helped ward off the February chill. Also of note was a pendulum style railway wall clock which differed from the regular issue in that it emitted a loud click at the end of each minute. This was no doubt helpful in reminding the Head and any visitor of the passage of precious time! Fairweather himself was a fairly ordinary looking man, then about 60, with a round face and mostly bald. He was of short rotund stature and wore a salt and pepper suit. His most notable features were his steady eyes, bushy eyebrows and large protruding ears which reminded me of Navy radar arrays; I soon formed the opinion that between the eyes and the ears very little was missed. He had originally worked on bridge inspection for the Halifax and Southwestern (being originally from Sandy Cove in Nova Scotia), investigation of the Quebec Bridge disaster and other special projects. His most notable achievement was his appearance before the Duff Commision in the 1930's which had the task of discovering whether CN should be amalgamated with CP. Among other things Fairweather was able to show that the accusation of CN's having invaded CP's territory on the prairies was wrong and that in fact the reverse was true. His work was the key thing in saving C.N. as a separate railway and led to the defeat of R.B. Bennett's conservative government who favored C.P.; The liberals under McKenzie King won handily with the rallying cry of "competition ever, amalgamation never!"

My first task in the Department related to matters concerning Canadian National Telegraphs which was then an important subsidiary supplying all of the railway's communication needs as well as long distance phone and telegraph services to the public. Fairweather, who was a power behind the scene in CN was chairman of the budget committee and he was concerned that CNT was putting in heavy capital A.F.E.'s (Authorizations for Expenditure) for pole line renewals.

Such line replacements were done with creosoted poles and an estimated life of 30 to 40 years. In his far-sghted way he was doubtful the lines would be useful that long as Radio communication was developing rapidly. How right he was when you consider that pole lines along various lines were being abandoned within 20 years! Train radio, microwave and fibre optic cable underground have since the 1970's served all needs and as a railway traveller to-day you can only see the remnants of pole lines lying in the ditch!

Fairweather and Mathieson knew I had been working for MPC, which of course had many pole lines. What they wanted me to find out was whether there was an economical way to "stub" existing pole lines. Stubbing means replacing only the rotten portion in the ground with new wood extending far enough above ground to enable the existing pole to be attached to it. So it was out to the Oskelaneo subdivision, Herve to Seneterre by track motor car with a CNT supervisor to see if stubbing would be the answer rather than complete replacement of the poles. CNT had of course done some stubbing in the past with galvanized forged steel bands and bolts. I recalled from MPC that we had developed the use of strip steel banding used for strapping loads onto pallets which was much cheaper and easier to apply with a special hand operated tightener and band cutter. We erected some poles for testing in the wye near the Don River in Toronto and by setting up a means of pulling the poles at the top proved that the banding had adequate strength.

CNT people were also toying with the idea of using ACSR (Aluminum Cable Steel Reinforced) for their telegraph lines instead of copper. Not only is ACSR cheaper than copper, but it is stronger, thus permitting longer spans beween poles. As MPC had made extensive use of ACSR for their rural power lines I was able to assure CNT that it was a viable way to go. Both the stubbing and ACSR were adopted as standards where appropriate and saved millions of dollars in reconstruction costs during what remained of the pole line era.

The thought that pole lines were on the way out was reinforced by two other communication projects I was assigned to. The first was testing available radios based on yard locomotives in Turcot Yard together with portable sets to be used by ground personnel involved in the switching operations. The yardmaster in his office also had a desk set so he could talk to the various yard engine crews. Again, I was chosen because I had been involved in the MPC's design and implementation of a radio system between fixed stations at Winnipeg, Portage and Brandon. This was partly justified because it gave them communication capability when power and telephone lines were downed during storms.

Yard radio had been tried earlier on steam locomotives, but by 1954 Turcot had been converted to diesel (partly as a smoke elimination measure so near the city centre). So we equipped the 15 engines with radio and provided portables. We logged all calls in order to determine what savings there might be in the operation of the yard. Truthfully, the economic results were inconclusive; crews were suspicious of the new means and in some cases would run the locomotive to the nearest shanty where they could use the regular telephone. Also the company was faced with a demand by the yard enginemen in the U.S. for an extra dollar a day to use the radio and it was a concern to CN that Canadian Unions would want the same. Not all problems in life can be overcome by technology alone! However, the new medium was not to be denied, and though I did not participate directly beyond the Turcot trial it is a fact that better equipment with light weight "walkie talkies" led to installations in toher yards. The dollar a day issue was negotiated out of the way. Eventually road locomotives and cabooses, dispatching offices, wayside stations and track gangs were equipped, all of which helped lead to the demise of the pole lines which had served us for over 80 years.

The second interesting communication job to which I was assigned was the preparation of a joint CN/CP bid for the first Trans-Canada television channel. We knew we were bidding against Bell Canada who were anxious to snatch TV away from the railways, who handled most of the newspaper services and radio programming on their pole lines and already had TV on a micro-wave link between Toronto, London and Windsor, Ont.. I was the leader of the Working Committee on a study comissioned by John White and George Pescud. General Managers respectively of CN and CP Telegraphs. We found that we could build a trans-Canada microwave and come in just under A.T.&T.'s $25 per circuit mile rate which they charged in the U.S.. Fairweather and the two G.M.s reviewed my report and said we must have "worked like beavers" to finish it on time and that the report "carried conviction".

They decided to quote the A.T.& T. rate believing it would not be politic for Bell to undercut their parent company's rate. But they did undercut it, coming up with a quotation of $22 per circuit mile which was enough to get them the contract, so Bell and their Trans-Canada Telephone association got to build a microwave system to handle not only TV, but most of their long distance business, some of which had been handled up to then by the pole lines of the two railways. However, communication traffic was growing by leaps and bounds and CN\CP eventually built their own trans-continental microwave to handle such things as needs in the Maritimes and the French TV network. As we will learn later in this chronicle, when CN installed its all -inclusive computer based, on- line real- time Traffic Reporting and Control System (TRACS) in the 1970's their microwave was the communications backbone for the 300,000 circuit miles of data circuits that it entailed!

10.4, SHIFTING FROM COMMUNICATIONS TO TRANSPORTATION

As time and work moved on in Research and Development I realized I was being slanted towards a full-time job in C.N. Communications and I realized that CNT's head office people in Toronto were starting to look at me in this light. When the subject was broached to me by Pete Mathewson, Chief of Research I said "no" pointing out that I had left a power company to work for the railroad and did not want to make communications my permanent career. Thankfully he and Fairweather listened and I soon found myself getting projects other than those related to communications

The first task of this nature was a study regarding baggage tractors for Central Station. It was triggered by an A.F.E. asking for $300,000 to provide extra ventilation to the platform area as the plan for the new Queen Elizabeth Hotel would cover some of the pen air trackage. The existing tractors for the handling of baggage, mail and express were gasoline driven and one did not want the exhaust to leak up into the new hotel! Fairweather asked if electric traction would work and how much it would cost. It proved to be an interesting question and an interesting study.

As to whether the electric tractors would work I was able to borrow one from an interested supplier and demonstrated it could pull the desired 7 or 8 loaded baggage trucks up the ramps from the subtrack working level up to the platform level and to the station concourse level. The astounding thing I discovered from looking into the costs was that the operating costs of the electric tractors were enough lower than for the existing gasoline units that the capital cost could be carried by the savings. The reasons were that electricity in Montreal was very cheap at 1 cent per killowatt-hour and the maintenance costs of gasoline engines with their clutches, cooling and ignition systems and many moving parts were much higher than for simple electric motors and batteries. So an A.F.E. was approved to buy electric tractors rather than provide additional ventilation! Last time I was in Montreal (1998) a few of the tractors were still in service handling baggage for the VIA passenger trains. Express and Mail has long vanished from our passenger trains but some is still handled in freight trains by container and trailer.

The next assignment had to do with evaluating some design details for the proposed order for more than 300 new passenger cars to replace a fleet ravaged by age and by wartime traffic. One was a decision as to whether to go for 4-wheel new design trucks rather than the traditonal 6-wheel trucks. We were able to prove that the new specially sprung trucks would ride as smoothely as the 6-wheel trucks and would be lighter in weight so they were adopted.

Another feature we were asked to examine was the value of Edison (nickel-iron) batteries for the cars versus traditional lead-acid. In this case we had to go for the heavier weight lead-acid with 7 years life compared with the Edison which had up to 20 years of life. The reason was that the latter were much more expensive such that we could not only afford replacement of the lead-acid every 7 years but could pay for the fuel costs of moving the greater weight. So it is with life, we can not make decisions in any matter without reveiwing the factors affecting them. Again it is interesting to mention that at the present time (end of 1998) only a few of these cars remain in VIA service, but many are still alive and well in services like the B.C. Rail Royal Hudson tourist train and they are the backbone of the Rocky Mountaineer seasonal services!

Fairweather's main tool was of course economic analysis and he always made sure we learned the ins and outs of this so-called "gloomy science" which I did not find gloomy at all but terrifically exciting as I learned to apply it to the various projects I worked on. About the final one I did in R&D is worth mentioning here and that was the case of the railway's loss of new automobile traffic to highway truckers.

The railways were all using what were called Automobile Cars to move this traffic. They were simply large cube boxcars with wide double doors and internal racks called Evans loaders which enabled automobiles to be stacked so as to get four of them in one railway car. This was o.k. up until the highway truckers got two-level long trailers which enabled them to handle up to 12 autos in a single load and undercut the railways' costs and rates so that the latter were only handling about 10% of the available traffic. We first tried building a longer automobile car that would handle 6 autos but we still couldn't get much more of the traffic. Next came a design which would handle 8 autos with two levels of end ramp loading. These made our costs about equal to those of the trucker, so that although we could get more traffic we were not able to make a profit on it. Moreover, we were still not as convenient for delivery direct to the dealer. About this time we were overtaken by an open type triple decker designed by Southern Pacific in conjunction with General Motors which could handle 15 autos. This got our costs down to 35% below the truckers and enabled North American railroads to capture 50% of the available traffic.

The result since then has been a perfect example of combining the best features of both modes because the railways are handling the long haul direct from the factory to strategically located storage lots where trucks pick up cars as they are ordered by the dealers in that area and deliver them by a short haul. This program was a great example of the use of economic analysis which was my part of it. Others like Bill Cyr did the design engineering for the various cars we had built. Though the enclosed 6 and 8 car models were removed from the new car trade they have since survived (when re-quipped with passsenger car trucks) to move passengers autos for those who do not wish to drive long distances. The most notable of these services is the AMTRAC service between Washington, D.C. and Orlando, Florida where these cars operate in the regular winter passenger train service. I visited the passenger loading yard near Orlando (in the 1990's) and saw them make up a 40 car train, about half of which was coaches and sleeping cars and the other half was our refurbished auto haulers. As I looked over the scene, (see photo), I had to say to myself many times, Fairweather, if he were alive, would be mighty prould!

As 1954 ended and we entered the New Year of 1955 it had become evident that CN in common with most North American railways was moving toward dieselization. This required quite a bit of Transportation Engineering Work and it was decided to give some of us some training in things like haulage capacity of diesel locomotives, revised running times for trains, lengthening of sidings and running road tests on the new locomotives in various services by using the dynamometer car. It was felt this could best be handled by training enough of us so that each of the regions could have its own Transportation Engineer. Before being sent to the regions we were assigned for training to Alf Street, who was the System Transportation Engineer.

And so I became an Assistant Transportation Engineer, an important step to me in becoming associated with the main railway operations which I looked upon as the main guts of the business. Nor was I long getting into the thick of it. Tests were being set up to have a General Motors set of passenger diesels tested on all three Montreal - Chicago passenger train pairs, including trains 15 and 6, The International Limited, the fastest and most prestigous trains in Canada! Bill Moffatt (who was a Royal Military College graduate and who had commanded a corvette during the war) was in charge of the tests. He showed us how to work out the train tonnage and showed us how the Dynamometer car worked and how to read its charts, mark the passing of the mileposts etc..In the main the charts recorded drawbar pull, speed, throttle position and brake applications. The tests were exciting for me as I could sit my shift at the control desk and feel very special pulling into a station with people looking at us through the windows with our impressive instrument board gleaming in the sun. We also could take turns riding the engine cab to see the road and pass comments to the Engineman. The tests were successful and proved the diesels could do the route faster than a 4-8-4 steam locomotive, mainly because the servicing times at Brockville and Belleville could be eliminated.

I still got to work on ecomomics and costing. The main example was to work with Alf Morin who regularly costed the movement of various types of freight as required, usually in cases calling for new rates. The main one I had to deal with was a unit train movement of potash which was being studied for movement from a proposed mine near Elmsdale N.S. to Dartmouth for shipment by water to U.S. seaboard markets. It was set up on a hook and haul unit train basis with 40 cars per train and one crew could make two roundtrips per day. So far as I know this was the first real unit train operation established on CN if not in all of Canada. While the initial studies were based on steam (Mikado type) power, when the mine started we actually assigned a 1200 hp 4-motor Fairbanks-Morse diesel. This operation still continues to-day, (1998). The most difficult part of costing railway movements is how to assign the fixed charges related to track investment, despatching, station and yard office services.

Time moved quickly and about February 1995 I was appointed to be Regional Transportation Engineer for the Atlantic Region, based in Moncton, N.B. but with territory all the way from Riviere du Loup in Quebec to St. John's Newfoundland! I was really elated, because the Region was very much self-contained with a great deal of autonomy over its widespread operations including such things as its own locomotive and car shops in Moncton for overhaul and heavy repairs. In a subsequent chapter I will write about the highlights of interesting and exciting experiences I had there.