About the Author J. D. Santucci (a.k.a. "Tuch") began his railroading career in 1978 as a trainman on the Missouri Pacific. After a round of lay-offs in 1985, Tuch embarked on a railroad odyssey, working in many different situations for different roads. This column tries to explain some of the nuts and bolts of the job and also demonstrates what we have to deal with on a regular basis within and without the industry. Tuch currently works through freights out of Chicago for Canadian National/Illinois Central. ©1999, 2003-2007 JD Santucci. Logo ©2002 The Railroad Network. By J.D. Santucci

March 28, 2006
We’re back!

Well it’s been awhile since I’ve been able to crank out one these little dissertations. With the new baby and a pretty steady diet of twelve hour days, there hasn’t been much time to do much of anything besides work, do a little around the house and take care of the new baby. I’ve finally managed to scrounge some time together here and there to finally put today’s column together.

Before we get started though, the beautiful bride and I want to thank all of you for the well wishes for the beautiful bride, first when she was hospitalized and of course for all the congratulatory wishes sent along after the baby was born. We received literally hundreds of notes from folks all along the HTOTHI network. We were quite moved by the outpouring of well wishes from so many of you. I have saved them all and eventually will put them in a scrapbook. Our little Gianna is global.

And speaking of the baby, she is doing quite well. The doctor is pleased with her progress as she is putting on weight and length having already undergone several growth spurts. And she is an active little one, the legs and arms seem to always be moving, even when she sleeps. And just like most babies, she has not yet distinguished the difference between day and night. Like her daddy, she seems to like to stay up late.

The update on the book goes like this; the publisher has all but the very last chapter. He is presently editing the work. I will have the final chapter to him soon; I decided it needed a rewrite as I was not pleased with it as I had it written. Once he finishes his editing and I revue the finished copy and approve it, the manuscript should be ready for the presses. If all goes according to the plan we’ve developed, the book should be on the market in October of this year. More updates as they occur.

And now, on with the show.

As I’ve stated more often than I can remember, the rail industry is made up of quite a diverse group of people. Seemingly, it is a more diverse group than anywhere else I have ever worked prior to my entering the rail industry in 1978. And that diversity brings forth some interesting, unusual and downright strange characters whom I’ve work with over the years. We’ll discuss several more of these folks this time and following with my practice, there will be no names, railroads or locations divulged to protect the guilty and keep me from getting sued.

Being that we had our baby in February, the decision to mention the first character was inspired by this event. Canadian National was quite cooperative with allowing me so much time off for the week leading up the birth and the days immediately after the birth. I then took vacation the following week. Most railroads do tend to go along with the program under such events without any issues or hassles. The least of my concerns was losing out on some earnings while I was off. There is more to life than some extra cash.

Our first character didn’t share this philosophy with me. He had a wife with child and her period of confinement came due. The blessed event occurred one evening when he was working. His wife contacted the railroad to get word to him that her time had come and that she was going to the hospital. When he received word of this, he simply shrugged it off and decided he was going to stay on the job.

Most railroad collective bargaining agreements have a rule that if you should have to leave on your own accord, such as being sick or personal issue in four hours or less of on duty time, you only get four hours pay. If you work four hours and one minute or more, you get a full day’s pay. This guy did not want to surrender the full day or the likely overtime he was going to make. I guess he felt it was far more important to make as much money as he could as opposed to being there for the birth of his child. A Trainmaster had to order this guy to leave work and go to the hospital. This guy was not too pleased.

This same guy, years later, developed a health condition that resulted in his medical disqualification from service. This meant he could no longer work owing to the problem as it could and possibly would prevent him from being able to work safely. Once notified of this disqualification, he opted to maneuver his way around the order. He attempted to mark up for work at another terminal on his seniority district. I guess he figured he was only disqualified at one of the terminals and not another. Unfortunately for him, this was not the case. They told him he was disqualified system wide and not just the terminal where he had been working for years.

On the subject of money before everything else, also known as greed, I knew a few old heads that had an idea deeply rooted in their heads that their employer was going to offer severance pay, known on the railroad as a buyout for the short timers (those close to pension age) at their terminal. For several years the buyout possibility was the main focal point of these employees. Nobody could convince them otherwise. As a result, they opted to pass on retirement when they reached their pension age and continued to work. It was their firm belief that the company would be offering them the buyout at any time. They both worked well past retirement, one going three years and the other going five years beyond pension age in the hopes of getting the parting gift. The money never came. Eventually, after realizing that the hoped for buyout was not forthcoming, one by one they retired sacrificing part of their golden years in pursuit of a financial dream.

Then there was the guy who went through a bitter divorce after well over thirty years of marriage. His wife was entitled to the tier two of the pension when she reached retirement age. But as part of the settlement, she was also awarded a potion of his tier one retirement payment as well. This guy was furious and vowed that his ex would never see any of his money. So instead of retiring, he continued to work when he reached pension age.

In the time he eared his pension age, his ex wife contracted a terminal disease. His plan was that he would retire after she died. She went on to live for some five plus years after being diagnosed and he worked that same amount of time beyond his pension age until she passed away. He retired shortly after her death. He was sixty-seven and gave away good years of his retirement just to spite his ex-wife. Guess he showed her, huh?

On a slightly different note, there was a guy that was quite the wild one, known to cavort and carry on. He got carried away many times with his cavorting. I guess his plan was to live it up while he could. Somehow, his wife remained with him despite all of his affairs and drinking. Apparently she had a plan of her own. When he retired, she tossed him out of the home but not off the property. He was forced to live in the garage behind his home. I’m sure this wasn’t quite the way he had planned to spend his golden years.

Another fellow was quite the womanizer. Apparently being married was not a valid or legitimate reason to not run around with women other than his wife. He had landed a steady girlfriend on the side. Well one evening this guy gets a call from the Yardmaster on the radio to head home immediately. He was told a replacement had already been called and for him and that he should depart immediately. No other information was conveyed. This guy takes off and zooms right home. He didn’t show the next day leaving for all sorts of speculation that perhaps his wife or one of his children had been injured or was seriously ill.

A few days later when he did return to work, he filled everybody in on what had transpired. He arrived home observing a car in front of his house that he did not recognize. When he walked in, there having coffee with his wife was the girlfriend. This, under no circumstances, is never ever a good thing. He did an about face and was about to head back out the door when his wife instructed him to freeze. It was now time to face the music. I suppose facing the music would be much better than facing his maker, but maybe not.

It seems that the girlfriend wanted to marry this guy and had sought out his wife to request that she divorce him so that they could get married. Maybe facing his maker at that moment might have been a better and perhaps safer proposition. I’ve heard plenty of horror stories about community property settlements and child support.

Somehow, they managed to get through this without getting divorced, but the wife placed him on a very short leash. Undaunted, he found a way to wriggle out from that collar. He started lying to the wife telling her he marked up to a big overtime job. He didn’t really, but she didn’t know, or at least he believed she didn’t know anyway. This allowed him time after work to go out and tomcat around while the wife believed he was actually working. I suppose for him this was a good plan if it didn’t blow up in his face too.

Some people just love playing with fire and gasoline at same time.

Then there was the guy who loved money more than his family. He didn’t mark off for his kids graduations from school, didn’t even take off for his daughter’s wedding. He did attend the wedding itself, but didn’t go to the reception as that would have required that he mark off work. He worked a big money overtime job that worked Saturdays and he was not going to miss out on that big money.

Several guys that knew him well said that his kids hated him and his wife despised him. It was said that she only stayed with him for the money he made. He was quite frugal too and didn’t like to spend money either. It was joked that he had every dime he ever made.

Well, one day this guy has a massive heart attack at work. It was said he was dead before he hit the switching lead he was working upon. He was still several years away from the pension when he passed. It was said that he left behind a big bundle of money for his wife and kids to enjoy.

Another character that was divorced was out and about one evening and met some dolly in a gin joint. He was immediately attracted to her and believed she was attracted to him as well. He was much older than her saying he was old enough to be her grandfather. He asked her out for a date and she agreed. The only problem was she resided in a housing project located in a very high crime neighborhood. The area was so rough that a couple of police officers I used to know told me that it wasn’t safe for people of any ethnic heritage to be there after dark, let alone those that resided there.

Undaunted by such claims or concerns, this guy goes to that neighborhood to pick up this dolly. Upon his arrival, two guys accost him, robbing him of his money, wallet, clothes and his car. His exact account was that they handed him a sock telling him, “Use this to cover your self up old dude.” He was able to flag down the police and they got him out of there and back into some clothing.

After he recounted this story to me, I told him that while it was quite the adventure, it was a really stupid one at that. I also told him there was no way that I would have ever told it to anyone had I been the participant. I wasn’t sure if he was looking for sympathy or what, but he got neither sympathy nor empathy from me. I think it disappointed him that nobody to whom he told this story felt bad about his misfortune that evening. In fact, most everybody told him he was an idiot to go there in the first place and that it was highly probably that this dolly merely set him up for exactly what happened to him that night.

A girl I used to know told me she once met him at some bar. He was hitting big time on her. When she found out where he worked, she asked him if he knew me. He told her he did and went on to say all sorts of nice things about me even though he really didn’t know me very well at that point in time. She told me he was really quite disgusting.

The occupation of Yardmaster can be quite stressful. Over the years I’ve known several Yardmasters who have lost it as it were. More than one of them has suffered a meltdown while on the job with some interesting results. One of them in particular was really tightly wrapped; too tightly wrapped as a matter of fact. This guy on more than one occasion came unraveled while on the job and on at least on occasion had to been sent off for a little “rest.” Sometimes, when things really became difficult on the job, he would simply remove himself from it all. No, not by walking of the job but instead he would pull out the trusty Bon Ami spray cleaner and rags and begin cleaning up his office. The entire railroad could be grinding to a halt in his yard, but he didn’t care. He went about the business of cleaning up his work space. His answer when questioned about such activities, particularly under such stressful periods? “Sometimes you just gotta clean.”

It was clear that he could easily be rattled and there were some that capitalized on it. When things went wrong, he would act as if you had done it to him on purpose. This would result in his yelling at people on the radio. One morning we were working and in our travels discovered some extra cars in a track. They were not supposed to be there but were there just the same. When the Conductor called this Yardmaster to inform him of these cars, the Yardmaster came unglued. He started screaming and carrying on about how they weren’t supposed to be there.

No kidding.

The Conductor asks him where we should put these extra cars. The now rattled Yardmaster screams back on the radio, “Put those f***ing cars on track five!” The Conductor responds “What was that you said?” Again this Yardmaster screams back, “Put those f***ing cars on track five!” And once again the Conductor taunts him with “Where did you say to put those cars?” And the answer was “Put those f***ing cars on track five!” And now thoroughly enjoying the outburst including one of the seven words you can’t say on radio or television, he asks the Yardmaster, “What track was that?” And the answer was “Five, five, put those f***ing cars on track f***ing five!”

And believe it or not, somehow no officials heard any of this banter and no disciplinary action was taken against this Yardmaster.

And now for something completely different.

Many railroaders have hobbies they can bring to work with them. Several guys I’ve worked with over the years carved wood. They were highly skilled at this hobby. I even had one of them do a carving that I gave to the beautiful bride as a birthday gift one year. Others made cut glass lamps. I write as do some others. When you get some significant down time, you find things to do other than just sit around. In commuter passenger service, there was and is significant down time built into some of the schedules so you had to do something other than watch TV or movies in the crew lounge. The same applies when laying over at the away from home terminal or sitting in the clear waiting on a meet with several trains.

And when caught up in some down time while on duty, you might partake of the hobbies you have. I used to read a great deal while sitting and waiting in the clear for the multiple trains I had to meet. These days though, I write.

Now some folk’s hobbies are quite unusual. Others are downright disgusting. These next two characters have those really disgusting ones, the very same ones made light about on an episode of TV’s Seinfeld. It seems these two liked to engage in self-gratification while stopped and alone in the cab of the engine.

In the case of the first character on one evening he apparently did not do a particularly good job of cleaning up the place when he was finished. When a member of his crew boarded the train, he slipped on something on the floor, fell and sustained a personal injury. His accident report stated that upon entering the cab he “slipped on a silvery white substance on the cab floor.” Ewwwww.

The second character was sitting alone in the cab of his lead unit and the job was stopped for quite some time. The rest of the crew was in the second unit. A company official boarded this guy’s engine thinking that perhaps he was going to find the crew asleep or goofing off; something that would result in their being disciplined for failing to perform their duties in a timely manner. I would have paid $5 to see the look on this officer’s face when he entered the cab and caught this guy in the process. No, I would not have wanted to observe the act, just the look on this guy’s face when he observed the reason for the delay.

Now there is no specific rule in the book stating that such behavior is prohibited. So I don’t believe there could be a charge for his activity. Exactly how does one approach this subject and exactly how would the rule be worded? Even if there was a rule, I’m sure it would have made for quite an unusual and colorful investigation. How exactly would the actions of this employee have been addressed as the charges were read? Can you imagine how much laughing would there have been while attempting to seriously address the charges?

And people wonder why I always carry a package of sanitary wipes with me and wipe the control stand, all the handles, the radio and the head of train device off thoroughly before I make a move with the engine.

And so it goes.

Tuch

Hot Times on the High Iron and the HTOTHI initials, ©2005 by JD Santucci.