Newspapers / The Charlotte Observer (Charlotte, … / July 23, 1911, edition 1 / Page 14
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4 JIMMIE - VANDIVER t3^eomvmit^HTEO )3n RAILROADER IMMIE VAXPn t'R. the son of rich hut honest parents, came to us trom a dilierent sourcc than we were accustomed to at Damascus Junction. And perhaps that i> one ot the rea>on> that our opinion of him had to l)e revis'd >o radKallv in the end. Generally the niA rocraii- reached u? after somewhat lengthy terms as fourth assistant station agents at 1 odunk Corner? or similar places where the\ na been allowed to sweep the depot, ma^e out reports, smash trunks, load chicken-crate>. and talk to the engineer on number Mxteen. In the midst of these privileges they managed to pick up a fair idea of telegraphy and rail roading. and after being duly frightened t " death and e.xamined by Bancroft, the chiel iespatcher. they rose at once to the im- ^oiing ranli of night operator at various little “o. s.” towers along the road. But Jimmie was no common clay. He de- icended from the vestibule of a Pullman and v^ith all the insignia of scholastic life still upon him—trousers at hali'-mast. pipe in aiouth. little rah-rah cap clinging pre cariously to the northeast corner of his head, ind his whole personality radiating that 'plendid cock-sureness that comes only of a brand new diploma..framed and reposing 'yTi the bottom of one's trunk. “Stubby fiU'tivan. who was hanging around waiting iL quarrel \vith McKelly about the coal they had been getting lately, caught sight 5! jimmie as he was sending his card in to Bancroft. ‘God help that if its e\er raught out on the vard after dark I” said spoke stubby fervently to'hiraself, and he voiced — :he ?entiments of others. About ten minutes was all it required the chief to persuade Jimmie that o i9n She had married James, senior, on the correct guess that he would become a richer man than his nearest rival, and she always or ' ±t General Manager was really giving sat- ■ sfaction, that the Superintendent was a "nan of family and needed his job, and that :he Master of Trains was kin to the P^esi- -.icnt and couldn’t be removed without fric- don. However, if- Mr. \ andiver still .granted to become a railroad man, he had i letter from Mr. McKelly (who had for merly worked on a section with Jimmie’s father) suggesting that Dan Reagan, agent li Winchester, needed a helper around the station and that it would be a great chance for Jimmie to learn the rudiments of rail roading. It was a bitter pill for Vandiver, junior, who it seems had been of much consequence at college, but he swallowed it I? HEV. VOIJ fellows! the BUILDtNrr’-:; ALL OX FIRE ities he was remo\ ed to Winchester, where he succeeded his old instructor, Dan Rea gan. Here he began to make use of his college education. In some manner known only to himself he employed his calculus in selling coupon tickets, geometry in boosting the weights on salt, hides and butter, and Latin in talking to the guineas on the dou ble-tracking work. Old George Amhorn, while oiling around one day, was heard grumbling to himself about the sad estate to which railroading had fallen, with es- light and' practically everything was run ning on schedule. Seventy-six, a through freight, southbound, would be a little late getting out of Eighteenth Street because of waiting for three cars of dressed beef com ing in from Chicago over the O. & C., but’ working, he would provide for her against third Seventy-five later on. At two o’clock Jimmie w^as almost alone in the dimly lighted building. In the ofl&ce with him was only Petey Ferguson, who copied on that trick, and “the Fathead,”* staying Then the sounder went dead while the relay spoke on in a sort of brazen w’hisper. This meant that the lire had reached the local batteries in the next room. “Thank heaven, the main line is still Jimmie muttered to himself, and hair of the two men, and the thick anid smoke w’as slowdy suffocating the rie?- patcher. “The air's better down where he is,” thought Jimmie dully, looking down the prostrate form of the other. His watch told him that Seventy-six was four minutes of his former employment on the section as “when Mr. Vandiver w*as con nected with the W. G. S. System. Some responsible position in the ^Iaintenance of Way Department, you know.” In the months that followed we heard httle more from Jimmie, except that we knew' he was good-naturedly enduring merciless chaffing and snubbing and had forgotten so much nonsense that he was really getting into a position tc n some thing useful. -And in less than a year a new Jimmie, though he still clung to his pipe and his explosive socks and neckties, came up to be examined preparatory to graduation as a full-fledged operator. Bancroft re membered the cap and the previous cut of his pants and made it a stiff one, but Jimmie passed with flying colors. The second day after found Wm in^talled as agent at Knob Rocks where he was monarch of a ten-by- pecial mention of “ that young pup down at 'after hours to memorize the rules, was in a Winchester. Xext thing,*’ he continued, corner droning over his book. t« “they’ll be requirin’ M.A.’s for wdpers, Ph.D.’s to tiro engines, and the -whole damned alphabet before a man can run one.” It developed afterward that Jimmie had sprung a French adjective on George. But the boy, who was now’ quite an operator, could not content himself with way-stations. Barely two years in the business, he already had his heart set on a despatcher’s chair at Damascus Junction. From time to time he made known his am bitions, but Bancroft only said wait awhile, or recommended Mrs. Winthrow’s Soothing Syrup. Finally, however, the day came when Jimmie received summons to come up to headquarters, and leaving a relief agent in charge, he went. “So you’re the youngster that wants to be a despatcher?” was the chief’s greeting when the operator was seated at the corner of his desk. “Yes, sir,” said Jimmie. ' “M-hmmm—” and for three solid minutes Bancroft gazed at the aspirant’s brilliant tie and said nothing, while Jimmie twisted uncomfortably and grew red. At length he went on in the slow^ soft voice that held all the biting sarcasm of which the dried-up little chief was capable. “Want to be a despatcher, eh? Ever hear of ‘ the human element’?” Jimmie had not. “Well, that’s what the newspapers will call you w’hen you go wrong some night and send a train to the scrap-heap and its crew or passengers to the cemetery. You prob ably don’t know that folks haunt you after you’vr killed them. But they do. . . . And you rise up in your bed shrieking from the dream where you’ve seen all over again the two trains hit and heard the crash, the roar of the steam, and the screams. You see them crawling out of the wreckage and the cold white faces of the dead in the moon light. “You don’t remember Terrell; he was be fore your day. Good man once, but his nerve’s gone now and he sees things. Gave a lap order along about daylight one morn ing. In God’s mercy they saw each other on the straight track in time, but Terrell isn’t a despatcher any more. Works a way wire for the Western Union at sixty a month. Then there was Bill Anglin— Bill’s grave is the third from the gate on the right as you go in up there on the hill. He used to be a despatcher here. Shot him self out under the coal chutes one Christma? Eve night after he found he’d miscalculated. They do that sometimes, you know; not often, but the price is so high when they do. At best it’s their peace of mind; at worst their lives or their reason. “Still w'ant to be a despatcher?” In the next room was the North End despatcher, while down below were the ticket agent and a few baggagemen, some of them napping during the dullest hour of the night. Except for a half dozen through freight and passen ger trains the Clinch River Division slept, snatching a few hours’ uneasy slumber be fore waking to the turmoil and fierce struggle of another day. In one of the dark and silent offices in the third story a rat stole timidly out from his hole, scurried across the room, and took refuge in an unemptied waste-basket. On the second floor, at the far end of the long building, Jimmie called for some belated “o. s’s” and entered them on his sheet. The Fathead yawned sleepily, rubbed his eyes, and went home. Quiet, broken only by the ticking of the clock and the muffled chattering of a sounder in the next room, settled down over the big depot. Overhead his ratship made a hasty exit from the waste-basket. A faint odor of burning paper arose, and then a tiny tongue of flame ran up the ceiled wall beside the basket. Another followed, and another. The dry varnished wood smoked, then caught fire and burned on unnoticed. Soon the heat about the window cracked the glass and it fell tinkling outward, admitting more air. The flames ate through a parti tion, shot up into the attic, and roared along under the metal roof. Just as Jim^ mie began to feel an imusual warmth in the room and catch a slight whiff of burning wood an engine in the yards set up a frantic whistling. Others took it up. The hoarse voice of the shop whistle boomed out the fire alarm. Downstairs a telephone bell rang insistently, shrilling high above the clamor without. Glancing out of the win dow, Jimmie saw a glowing flickering light on the long lines of freight cars standing on the tracks below'. At the same instant the door was flung open by the North End despatcher. “Hey, you fellows!” he shouted. “ The building’s all on fire. Get out quick before the stairs go!” But Jimmie refused to be excited. Such emotion had no place in the traditions of his craft. He was a despatcher now and he proposed to act according to his own no tions of one. “Get the files and the typewriters out,” he said to the.loyal Petey, w*ho still stayed by for orders. “Then come back after the quad, instrimients if you can.” “B-but ain’t y-you going, too?” “ Not now,” snapped Jimmie. “ I’ve got an order to give Seventy-six at Nortondale or there’ll be a head-on. Hustle those files now!” The mad whirring clatter of gongs and the sound of galloping hoofs on frozen And Jimmie, all unshaken, declared that ground came up faintly from below as the he did. “All right, my boy,” replied the chief. “I’ve been watching you pretty closely and I reckon there’s good stuff in you. Any how, we’ll see. You can begin ‘copying’ here to-morrow night and it w’on't be long before you’ll have a chance at a train-sheet. There’s a bunch of promotions ahead that’s going to make some vacancies around here.” Thus came Jimmie Vandiver, A. B., Freshw'ater University, ’08, to the dingy old headquarters building at Damascus Junc tion where he was weighed in the balance and found not wanting in a w-ay that still forms the theme for the stove committee at the roundhouse w'hen college men are "in anywise under discussion. Never since he led the rooting on the football field had Jimmie worked as he did now' night after night in his new place. Always the sounders clicked and sputtered and, unless he w’as busy copying orders on the train wire, one office was no sooner ladder tracks, bumped into long strings of through “sending” to him than another cars, and bore them out of danger withe]'”'" began. Before long the third trick des- ing bells and great puffing and whistling. w'ee hours of the m.orning while he stole downstairs for hot coffee w’ith his lunch. And at such times Jimmie strove to appear nonchalant while feeling a vast elation. Once he sent an order that was correct in all its details and he began to be very sure of his ability to handle the division when the like the man that he afterwards proved to be under all the tinsel on top and said he ■would take the job Jimmie’s father was dead and his real trouble was his mother. third trick despatcher on the South End, tw'elve depot and literally “the whole working from midnight to eight a. m. works”—operator, ticket agent, baggage- After an hour in which all had gone well master, and porter rolled into one. ^^on on his first night he had gained almost the Knob Rocks oroved too tmall for his abil- confidence of an old-timer. The traflSc was long-delayed promotions should finally be ing w^ater from hose on wires that might be bulletined. Come they did, at last, and crossed with others of a fatal voltage. Johnson, first trick despatcher, went to “Keep it up, keep it up!” prayed Jmimie, Clinch River as chief, Vinson, second trick, and even as he spoke the glass in the tran- got a much-desired berth in the passenger spm cracked with the heat and the stran- department, and Jimmie ^found himself gling smoke came drifting in. There w'ere SWITCH ENGINES EOHE LONG STRINGS OF CAES GUT OF DANGER despatcher, all alone in the upper part of the depot, began calling Nortondale. The fire had caught him with an uncompleted order out that made it imperative for him to reach Number Seventy-six with a second order at that point. But the Nortondale operator, usually prompt to answer, seemed to have left his key for the time being. The perspiration dripped from Jimmie’s forehead as he called, “ND, ND, ND, DI/’ The ceiling was beginning to smoke. Again and again he clicked off the “9” of the despatcher’s call, but from “ND” there came no answer. “I ain’t coming back any more,” panted Petey on his third trip with the type writers. “It’s too hot. You better come on out while you can.” “In a minute,” replied Jimmie, and,he went on calling. Firebrands sailed l^azing across the yards, 4riven by the wind that had sprung up. Switch engines shot up and down the ^ ^ ^ patcher w^as leaving him at the sheet in the the glare he saw a lineman on top of a tele- pole in front of the depot pouring water on it from buckets w’hich were being passed up to him by comrades. On their efforts depended the safety of the wires. With a sinking sensation he remembered that the . city firemen would let the poles bum dow'n rather than run the risk of throw- only a few minutes left, not time enough for him to make a dash for the South Tower in the yards and reach it before Seventy-six was due at Nortondale. “ND, ND, ND, DI, 9, he cafied. he dropped face downward on the floor to get one great precious breath of clean air before bending over the key again. Out side the linemen were forced to abandon th» pole and they fled hurriedly, leaving it *0 its fate. Almost instantly :he .^ames caught it and mounted hish through the cross-arms. Jimmie w'atched burn, fas cinated. Unless Nortondale answered nov/ before the copper wires fused and parted no earthly power could save the two trains. His very impoteaice w^as an agony. The utter helplessness of him! He could only call—call until the circuit failed* or the fire drove him out scorched and blinded and choking. A huge rage seized on every fiber of him and for one insane frenzied moment he cursed all things—the relentless flames that tortured him more and more, the unre sponsive wire, the linemen who had deserted the pole, and most bitterly of all the operator at “ ND.” But with that moment there dis appeared forever the last vestige of the cal low immature boy and in his place stood Jimmie Vandiver, Railroader and Man. He swung the water-cooler above his head ind the heavenly coolness that poured over ’lim calmed and strengthened him. With a new^ r.pirit he took up once more his heart breaking task. . Then, with grimly set jaw, lie called the South Tower. Six times he sounded it, but the operator did not hear him, so once more he pinned his faith on Nortondale, the only other office that could help him. An outer window' crashed in and a fire man and the end of a ladder appeared framed in the casing. “ Come out, you fool!” bellowed the man, but Jimmie merely lifted his smoke-red- dened eyes a second without ever ceasing to call Nortondale. The would-be rescuer seized him roughly and made to drag him forward. “Hands off!” snarled Jimmie. “I’ve got to catch a train down the line.” • “You’ll be catchin’ trains in helj in one minute more if you don’t come away,” shouted the fireman in his ear, making an other effort to drag him toward the window. With one smashing blow between the eyes that broke a bone in his left hand Jimmie dropped the maii to the floor, and continued to call. The crackle of the flames now almost drowned out the faint click of the wadely-playing armature of the relay. The heat was scorching the very overdue at Ncitcn'Ll: ci.J he wondered il she had run pci. l. If so, all his bitter fight had been in vain. His flesh seemed shriv eling up and cracking apart in the awful heat, but until the train was reported hv there was a hope, and he must stand by it His mind went back to a mile race of hi' college days when his lungs were fairl}' burst ing within him and he had forced himself over the last hundred yards to victory by will power alone w'hile something in his recline brain repeated like an automaton, “One more step—one more step.” So now in the same way, dazed and but half-conscious, he held himself at the key with, “One more call —one more call.” The whole world seemed one vast agony in w-hich wires, traix? flames,, responsibilities, hopes, fears, and misery of soul and body blended and merged into a formless WTithing horror from which for eons yet to come he could never escape. And just beside him a fiend hammered a huge brazen gong that seemed to boom nut ceaselessly, “Call ND.” At last, alter countless centuries, the circuit broke and “ I, ND, I” answered him. “Is 76 by?” asked the despatcher. “Not y——” “Hold her,” he «ent, but got no further. With a roar the fire burst through the inner wall, which tottered and fell, and Jimmie barely, had time to seize the train-sheet and drop to the floor before a wave of flame swept the room. How' he reached the window and the ladder, with the sheet unde'' his arm and dragging the slightly revived fireman with him, no one ever quite kne\^. least of all Jimmie himself. But the watchers below’ saw him pause on the ledge and heave the other man on to the ladder, where he slid down until caught by the hands that awaited him. Then Jimmie, hi? clothing smoldering; hair, eyebrows, an ■ eyelashes singed almost entirely off, and his left hand hanging useless, scuttled pain fully down the ladder. For a moment he drank in great breaths of the cold keen air, then he started for the South Tower. “Hold on there, man; you’re hurt:” called McKelly after him. “Hurt nothing!” responded the dc'- patcher over his shoulder as he staggered along the tracks. “I’ve got to get to the South Tower before Ninety-one wants orders at Bristolville.” And then Jimmie disgraced himself in his own eyes forevermore by fainting.
The Charlotte Observer (Charlotte, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
July 23, 1911, edition 1
14
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