One time, Charlie LeMasters, Chuck Guthries, the brakeman, and I had a 1200 going west. At Rockwood the usual practice was for the brakeman to get up on the tank and take water while the fireman would take sand. By doing that, we avoided getting water and sand off the P&LE. After the brakeman got finished we would pull her up and get coal. We would have to push the slide back over the stoker auger in the tender and raise the gate. On that particular morning it was cold. The frost was all over everything. The chain at the coal chute gate went around a two-foot diameter pully that controlled the gate. I was cold, so I jerked on the chain, spun the pully and filled the tender up real fast. When I pulled the chain the other way to shut off the coal it came off the pully and wrapped around the shaft. I just buried that old 1200 in coal! To make things worse, we were scheduled for a meet there. There wasn't too much coal on the east bound track, so we were able to shovel the coal off so it wouldn't interfere with the opposing train. To get the engine out we shoveled coal out from under the engine and tender wheels until we could move ahead a couple of feet. We then shoveled more coal out and moved it ahead again. We finally got the engine out from under that pile of coal, but we had to shovel coal for hours! I was scared. I thought that I would catch hell! The road foreman, Fred Dotson, didn't say anything to me, but Dixon, the assistant road foreman kind of got ticked.
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This book, complied by the Western Maryland Historical Society, is a collection of interviews of 29 employee who worked for the Western Maryland . The occupations of the individuals are diverse and cover positions of both labor and management: Maintenance (1), Engineman (14), WM Police (1), Brakeman (1), Clerk (1), Baltimore District Sales Manager (1), Roundhouse Foreman (1), Foreman of Wharves (1), Conductor (4), President (1), Vice President – Operations (1), Trackman (1), and Fireman (1). The book is oversized and the interviews vary in length from 6 to 9 pages.
While the interview form is the same for each individual (introduction, brief life history with a lead to the how and why of seeking WM employment, WM training, and memorable experiences) there is extreme diversity with respect to each of the individual stories including those within the same occupation. . Each interview is illustrated with one or two pertinent photos. The book is well written and edited and is an excellent single book introduction to first person accounts of railroad life. See Common Knowledge for an example of the writing style. (Text Length - 176 pages, Total Length - 176 pages.) (Book Dimensions inches LxWxH - 8.75 x .625 x 11.25) (