Dear Pioneer,
Ha! That was a bit of a gambit on the part of Mr. Paley. You’re right, he would have been perfectly suited to a position at Burlington. I’ve often wondered if engines on other railroads had the same sort of relationship with their marketing departments as we did with ours. I’ve never heard a Santa Fe engine accused of being ‘slick’ or ‘glib’, but I know we got that a time or two while in service. It’s funny, we never considered ourselves luxury engines, but the way some of the other trains talked about us, you’d think we were pulling gold cars and not silver ones!
Wholeheartedly agree that what ought to be inside should stay inside, whether that be people or engines. I’ve not been under-roof here except for a few hours for maintenance, but our barns are indeed quite cozy from what I’ve heard! They just finished the new electric carbarn in Yard #3 back in April and so far there’s been nothing but praise from everyone being stored there. It was pretty funny; since the barn didn’t have any electricity yet, they had Tuskegee 101 do the shunting! There were a great many snide comments made about how the place was brand new yet it still somehow smelled of old smoke, but it was all in good fun.
Each department here tries to store their most vulnerable and esteemed equipment first, to keep the most delicate ones from being damaged entirely beyond repair. Aside from the fact that there’s not really a full-fledged diesel department to build us one, that’s why me and the Goddesses have been kept outside on the wye. A little rain and wind won’t do us any harm at the moment and I haven’t been here long enough to have earned a spot otherwise. I’m not too worried though. There’s plenty of room and motivation to go around. There’s already plans for the next barn.
It always manages to slip my mind that your articulation meant your service life was different from mine in a basic, mechanical sense. I didn’t spend much time in a roundhouse myself (we were almost always on assignment or on our way to an assignment or waiting around to be assigned) but those moments of downtime under a roof, in the company of other engines, without cars to attend to… It was nice in its way, but it could devolve into arguments and sulking as quickly as any regular trainyard. Sometimes quicker! I promise, you weren’t missing much. You’re right, a yard can be just as companionable as a roundhouse or barn, and my train agrees. You can see who’s coming and going better out here.
And there was quite a bit of coming and going to observe! After a lot of hard work by volunteers and crew, the Green Hornet completed a successful test run on June 22nd. There was some uncertainty beforehand, as she’d been under maintenance since a brake failure in May, but everything was in fine working order this time. If we hadn’t seen it for ourselves, the cheering from all the onlookers would surely have tipped us off! There’s still work to be done before she’s ready to take passengers, but this is great news for the car department and the rest of the museum. My letter writer says the Green Hornets were iconic to the people of Chicago, and one in operational condition will be of interest to enthusiasts from the whole state, which means more visitors!
And this month, 1630 finally (finally!) finished her restoration! On the 18th she did her test run after coming out of the shop and was pressed into service the day after. She looks magnificent. One of the guys redid all her hand-painted lettering. With that on top of her new number plate and spray-painted gloss finish, she was a sight to behold! It was only somewhat tempered by the fact that she whistled loud enough to wake all the surrounding farms, but I think her celebration was well-deserved. The steam department said her restoration represented around 13,000 hours of work. That’s almost a year and a half! When they said it was probably the largest effort the IRM has undertaken to date, I believe them.
True to her disposition, she’s been working her tender off pulling cars for passengers and practically singing all the while, which is nice because next on the docket is Shay who goes in for some routine maintenance alongside Old Smokey and everything that will go into her restoration as well. The work never ends! At least 1630 is more than happy to pick up the slack.
And as for the biggest news– Hm, how to put this… Well, they’re working on getting me back on the line next! I didn’t want to talk it up too early, but they’re looking into problems with my air brake system and we’ve done several test runs recently that have shown some marked improvement on my prime mover. I know my letter’s getting quite long as it is, so I’ll have more details for you soon, I promise. I don’t mean to keep you in suspense, but it’s been a jam-packed month and a half and I wanted to make sure you and your yard got to hear about it all.
And of course, the faster I can wrap up my letter and get it sent, the sooner I get one back!
Your friend,
Pilot