Railroad Stories
Railroad as School Bus
Did you know that the 110 locomotive and its train carried school children as well as freight? Students who lived along the right-of-way often went home for lunch. As the train returned from their morning run, the engineer kindly stopped and picked up the children and gave them a lift back to school. Of course, kids being kids, they sometimes took the ride for granted. One day the engineer went right past the school and on to his scheduled stop. Needless to say, the kids were late getting back to school. Lesson learned! (McRae, The Cliffside Railroad, Turntable Times (No. 5, May 1998)
Chickens on the Rails
Back in the 1930s, #110 also had trained chickens! The story goes that the fireman saw a bantam chicken with three chicks on the right-of-way just before their Cliffside Junction stop. The train stopped and picked up the chickens and their nest and put them on the tender. After doing this repeatedly, the chicken started to place themselves on the tender whenever they heard the whistle. Then they would get down to scratch and peck for food at the stops or the shop and scurry back to get on board when the whistle blew.
The chickens were even named after some of the local leaders of the community. The railfan chickens were such a hit that the stories live on to this day. A story in Trains magazine about the chickens drew visitors and mail from around the world. ((McRae, The Cliffside Railroad, Turntable Times (No. 5, May 1998). (Photograph courtesy of the Cliffside Historical Society)
For kids and the young at heart
Steam Locomotive 110 is made up of many parts and pieces.
We thought that it might be fun to highlight various parts of the locomotive as it is being put back together. Come back for further updates. OR:
How much do you know about the parts of a steam locomotive and how it runs? Have some fun and learn interesting facts right now!
Watch for more fun activities about once a month right here or sign up for our newsletter for progress updates and activities.
Answers are below. Make an educated guess before you peek!)
1. Look at the picture to the left. Is it called a cow catcher, a pilot, or something else?
2. Why have this part? What does it do?
3. Why would animals be attracted to the railroad tracks?
4. Do modern locomotives have this piece? Do they all look alike?
5. Challenge Question: Who invented this piece and when?
Answers to Quiz 1
1. This part is called a cow catcher, a pilot, or even a cow plow.
2. The cowcatcher is used to remove obstacles from the right-of-way which might otherwise damage or derail the train. Sometimes this can be an animal (even a cow!), wood, or other items.
3. The train would shake the rails enough to germinate seeds, so grasses and flowers would sprout and grow. So some animals would hang out on the tracks to get a meal! In the old days out west, herds of buffalo would sometimes be spooked by the blow of the whistle and start to stampede across the tracks. Fans of the movie "Polar Express" also probably remember the caribou blocking the tracks.
4. All locomotives have something designed to prevent obstacles from damaging the locomotive or the train.
5. Charles Babbage, a British mathematician and inventor, is credited with inventing the cowcatcher in 1838 while working on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway in England. However, it was never constructed, and it is unclear whether later manufacturers used his ideas. He is better known as being the pioneer of the digital computer as well as the creator of the British postal system, reliable actuarial tables, and an early speedometer. Some people credit Lorenzo Davis instead.
References:
Charles Babbage, Pioneer of the Computer. Oxford University Press, pp 142-143.)
Charles Babbage, Encyclopedia Britannica.
Cowcatcher article, Wikipedia and Hyman, A. (1982).
White, J.H. Hubris and the Cowcatcher (2016). Pflugerville, TX: Railroad History, Railway and Locomotive Historical Society (215), 86-91.