Re: Durango - January 29-February 15, 1952

It is interesting that there were no engineers promoted between 1926 and 1946. Guys who hired on in the the mid 1920's spent 20 years on the deck shoveling coal. There were no firemen fired between 1929 and 1937.

Between Oct. 1917 and Oct 1929 there were over 170 fireman hired on the lines west from Alamosa. All were undoubtedly cut off in the depression and some went on to other work. Of those 170+, 12 stuck it out to get promoted in 1946-48.

Working out of Durango was never easy. Not only was there less opportunity for work compared to Alamosa, but there were always a large group of old heads working there keeping the younger guys working part time on the extra board. It wasn't until the old guys started retiring in the mid-late 1950's that the younger men started getting regular work.
Jim Pearce - who was the bottom of the Durango board in 1952 said he worked very sporadicly in the 1950's. Once the old guys started to go in the late 50's he suddenly got regualar work -even though he was promoted in 1955.

Jim also made the comment that the old guys working there when he hired out wouldn't let thier firemen run. These old fossils had been parked on the right hand seatbox for so long, they weren't moving for ANYONE. So the result was all the Durango firemen promoted in the 1946-55 era had very little running experience when they got promoted. He said this practice continued with many of the 46-48 ment who never let thier fireman run. One of the reasons for this was the up and down profile of the Durango-Chama run. Eldon Morgan said a lot of the the East end engineers let thier firemen run - downhill. There are many miles of continuous downhill running on the east end, where as the west end had more ups and downs. Eldon also made the comment that the engineers on the east end were generally younger than the west end hoggers. The old heads out of Alamosa all worked the SG lines leaving the younger heads to run the NG, and the younger guys were the ones who let thier firemen run.