Two Upcoming EMD Programs

We're happy to have Preston Cook visit Amherst and Palmer this coming week! You may already know that Preston Cook worked for Electro-Motive Division of General Motors as a Field Service Engineer and he presents a spectacular program to railfan groups.

On Tuesday 11 /15, he will be at the Amherst Railway Society meeting to present "What's in Those Covered Wagons?" The program starts at 8PM at the Amherst Middle School. (visit <www.AmherstRail.org>)

Then on Thursday, 11/17, he will be at the Palmer Public Library to present "Inside EMD" This program starts at 6PM in the Library's Community Room. And on your visit, have a look at the growing railroad collections. Members of the Railroad Advisory Board will be there to show you around.

Both programs are free. Refreshments are available. I don't have to tell you where you can have a good dinner before the program in Palmer and watch trains while you eat. Here's your chance to enjoy two great (and free) programs!

See the following for descriptions of both programs:

> http://www.amherstrail.org/meeting2005.11.html
> http://www.AmherstRail.org/Meeting04.05.html
>

I would just like to say thanks to the fine folks at Amherst and Palmer for the tremendous turnout for these two program showings. The Amherst Railway Society and the Palmer Library and town officials did a fine job of getting the word out to their members, friends and neighbors, and both showings were very well attended! Also, thanks to the folks at the Steaming Tender Restaurant (at the Palmer Station) and at Tucker's Hobbies (in Warren) for making program flyers available and notifying their customers and friends about the programs.

Anyone visiting Palmer, please be sure to take a look at the new Palmer Library, it is a beautiful building which has a railroad theme, a railroad research room, and a very nice public meeting area. With the station and the Steaming tender Restaurant close by, Palmer is an ideal location for railroad oriented meetings and conventions.

PC

It was indeed a great pleasure to welcome Preston to the Palmer Public Library. I had never realized the full scope of locomotive production at EMD until this program. It was awesome! Preston brought us from an empty cornfield to a full-production locomotive building facility and back to today where none exists. We were thoroughly absorbed by this program. Preston presented all the facts with a passion and loyalty to one of the greatest locomotive builders. His program condensed many years of keeping railroads on the move.

We are also grateful that Preston was immersed in Palmer's wonderful railroad history as reflected by the restored station and the library. I'm truly sorry if you couldn't attend either program. Maybe we'll entice him to come back soon!

As an added footnote, the Palmer Journal Register, Palmer's weekly newspaper, this week featured the work of a well-known artist, Ruth Sanderson a children's book illustrator. Ruth has just completed a huge mural depicting Palmer's railroad history at Flamingo Motorsports. If you have seen Flamingo near the MassCentral offices, it has the facade and look of a fine Richardson-style station. Depicted in the mural are historically accurate scenes of B&A consolidation 1049, tower 35, and painted stonework imitating the station that looks so real you want to touch it!

We are all being very agressive to highlight Palmer's railroad themes. If you'd like to experience all of this, you're certainly welcome to visit. If you want to discuss any of this with any of us behind the scenes, the folks at the Palmer Public Library can make the right connections!

Phil, thank very much for your comments! The INSIDE EMD plant tour program was a project that took thirty years to put together, and the effort to assemble this unusual presentation turned out to be very worthwhile. It has been a pleasure to share the experience with many railroad enthusiasts in the Northeastern US over the past three years that I have been doing the lectures.

PC

This is a follow-up posting for several forum contributors who asked about any future showings of INSIDE EMD. As I also posted in another discussion string, there are no plans for any additional showings of the program in 2006. It has been shown very extensively in the Northeast US for the last three years, and since all the local groups in my area have seen it (some more than once), requests now are often from very far away and travel distance to showings had been getting quite long. I will unfortunately not have vacation time available in 2006 to devote to long distance presentations, so there will be a temporary retirement of this program. I will be showing several of my newer programs in 2006 to the groups closer to home, including the 470 Railroad Club of Maine, Mass. Bay RRE, B&M Historical Society, and some others where plans are being discussed. The active programs being shown in 2006 include What's In Those Covered Wagons, Diesel Railroad Tugs, EMD Demonstrators and Displays, and a newly completed Railfan PowerPoint Clinic.

INSIDE EMD is still alive and well on my computer and it may be possible to bring the lectures back for special events sometime in the future (2007 or beyond) in situations where this kind of a very technical specialty program is appropriate. It is a very long program (over 400 slides) and it is rather difficult to use for events on weeknight evenings where it causes the meeting to run too late. It was originally designed for showings during afternoon sessions at conventions where there was enough time to work with it, and that is still its best use. My thanks to the many folks who have attended the showings. It was shown over 100 times in three years, and the Amherst Railway Society held the all-time turnout record with about 150 members and guests present for a showing back in 2004.