September like it should be at HVRM 9-29-12

Greetings -   Had one of those great early autumn days at Hoosier Valley today.  Mostly sunny with a nice light breeze and temps in the low 70's.  EL bay window caboose # C345, which was recently repainted by Eagle Scout Paul Henderson with some help from his family, was coupled on to the rear end of the train to La Crosse today.  Fred Boyer, Doug Kosloske and John DeGan, wiped down the cars interior.  In honor of the Erie Lackawanna Historical Society visit to HVRM as part of their Annual Convention being held this weekend in Valparaiso, Indiana, the La Crosse train was scheduled out at 10:00 a.m. instead of its normal mid-afternoon departure.  Before and after the train, the EL members roamed around the museum, including time spent in Grasselli Tower.  Steve Newland was on hand in the tower to answer questions.  Bob Jachim preformed docent duties in the Shop, including a lot of questions on the museums C&O 2-8-4.   Speaking of Grasselli, Steve Henrichs started the priming of the wood gutters and roof overhand on the north side of the tower.   After the morning departure of the train to La Crosse, I started in on painting a couple of boards on the new "porch" off of the depot platform using orange paint for visibility and safety.   Meanwhile, the track gang tackled the important Shop lead switch located just west of Mulberry Street.  New ties were installed and one of the rails was "turned around" to get the worn side to the outside and the unworn side toward the switch points.  Gang consisted of Dave Cook, John LaOrange, Cory Bennett, Mark Knebel and Matt Lasayko.   Matt completed restoration of the Erie block occupancy indicator for use by motor cars and put it on display in the depot.   Apparently many of the covered hopper cars that arrived for storage, have already moved back out.  There are some remaining, but I am not sure of the exact figure.    I had to leave early today due to a family committment, chugging out of the museum around 2:00 p.m. after the afternoon train to English Lake had departed.   Enjoy the week folks.  The upcoming weather is supposed to be nice.     Les