A little color at HVRM for Memorial Day weekend 5-23-15

Folks -

Arrived at the museum to find that Bob Barcus had had three bright red "KEEP OFF TRACKS" signs made for the split rail fence

across from the North Judson depot.   Bob used the drill press in the Shop to drill holes in the signs, then removed the old signs

(no longer readable) and screwed the new signs into the wood rails in the fence.  I held the signs in place.  This is the kind of job

I like; Bob did all the work!  Photo of one of the signs included with this report.  Hopefully these new signs will keep visitors from

the dangerous practice of wandering onto the tracks to take pictures.

Gave Bob a box of Operation Lifesaver coffee mugs, donated by member Joe Gasiorek.  Bob will add these to the various items

being sold in the museums gift shop.  Thanks to Joe for this gift which will hopefully bring in a few extra bucks to HVRM. 

While down at the Shop building, I noticed Fred Boyer cleaning the sides of C&EI tool car #A-1054.

Threw another bunch of extra day lilies from home (Betty said we had too many) into the East flower bed at the museum.  The

three different color irises in the bed are currently blooming (see second photo).

Spent the rest of the day, scraping peeling paint, wire brushing the metal and then priming that part of the passenger coach below

the windows.  Cool weather and rain, stopped this job last fall, and now I'm going to paint this part of the car with Pullman Green

paint the next time I'm at Hoosier Valley.  The results of todays effort is shown in the third photo, which was taken from the manlift

after I had finished for the day.

Not sure what else was going on at the museum today.  Cory Bennett was running the Payloader.  Operating crew for the two runs

included Steve Henrichs at the throttle of GE #11 with Doug Kosloske as fireman/instructor; Joe Kingsbury and Randall Downs

as car hosts and Bob Albert as Conductor.  There were also some guest engineers in the morning, but not sure how many.

Enjoy the long holiday weekend everyone!

Les

     

 

    

Perfect weather (at last) at HVRM 5/2/15

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Greetings -

Beautiful day at Hoosier Valley today to greet the first regularly scheduled passenger runs.  Temps in the 70's and sunny all day!

Day started out with Guest Engineers.  New schedule of two trains (down from three last year) with the English Lake departure at

12:30 p.m. and the La Crosse departure at 2:00 p.m.  Due to the tie replacement ongoing, trains were held to 10 miles per hour

between the depot and English Lake resulting in longer runs.  Then there was a sticking brake on the 12:30 train, meaning a later

departure for the second train which did not leave North Judson until 2:30.  The departure of the La Crosse train from the depot is

shown in the first photo.  Don't know the figures, but both trains seemed to have a decent amount of riders.  John Kimsey was the

engineer and John DeGan was fireman, Bjarne Henderson and Doug Kosloske were conductors with car hosts Bill Dauber and

Randall Downs. 

One always ongoing job at HVRM is cutting grass.  Bing Risley was doing it this morning and Joe Kingsbury (see second photo)

this afternoon. 

I managed to get some primer on the one wall of Mulberry Street watchman's shanty and the lid of the coal bin. Still have to put on 

some Bonzai tint (light green) after we get some new gallons from Sherwin-Williams.

Big news of the day was that the house and garage on Pleasant Street, that the museum had acquired some time ago, were torn

down today.  The last photo shows Cory Bennett, Bob Albert (with shovel), John LaOrange (up on the peak) and Dave Cook, taking

off roof shingles from the collapsed house.  I joined them for a while this afternoon.  Good day to work up a sweat! 

Bruce Fingerhut reported to me that he had planted 40 white pines out at the rest park on the biking/hiking/walking trail at SR 10/39

and CR 250W.  A welcome addition to the spot that I (unofficially) think of as "Wayside Glen" as the railroad name.

Enjoy the week everyone! 

Steve