Hi, All -
With the many changes and frustrations of the past six weeks, some of you are probably
wondering, "why are John Cole, Ernie Robart, Jim Poston, Steve Forney, Roger Hogan, Terry
Ross, Micheal Ripley, Jeff Ellingson, Ed Stabler and Russo Loco going to all this trouble -
and why is Alan Loomis, who is already overly burdened with the aftermath of the Lobato
Trestle fire, putting up with them - much less working so hard to arrange the best possible
celebration on August 27-31?
*
Well, here's one good reason -
The following private message was addressed to me a couple of days ago, but it was really meant for all of the above, as well as for all of the sponsors and donors listed on [
ngdiscussion.net]
:
"---------------------------------
"Hi Russ,
"My father (Art Bain) has received his invitation to the 40th anniversary. He has written a response and was planning to mail it to you when I offered to e-mail it instead, since it would be faster. My Dad has never used a computer in his life and at 87 years of age, he says he never plans too. So, I will copy his hand written letter below.
"Thanks again for including my Dad. I know he really appreciates it.
"Take Care,
"Tim
"---------------------------------
"
Dear Russell,
"
I'm sorry but I will not be able to attend the 40th year celebration. However, I would like to thank the people responsible for making this celebration possible. My son tells me that you are the main driving force behind this event so I really appreciate your efforts to give the original volunteers some kind of recognition for their work some 40 years ago. I strongly feel that if it had not been for the volunteers of 1970, the railroad would have gone to the scrappers.
"
Those were some interesting times. Some of use tried sleeping in the Chama depot at the time but the roof leaked so badly that we might as well have slept outside. Others stayed in the sand house, which was nice because it had the stove. I remember that one of my jobs for a time was moving coal from the back of 483's tender up to the front so the fireman could shovel it into the firebox. That was a very dirty job since the coal at that time was more dust then lumps. But we had to use whatever we had at the time to get the job done. I find it hard to believe that anyone even remembers what we did way back then.
"
I wish you all the best with 40th event and thank you very much for remembering an old guy like me with your invitation.
"
All the best,
"
Art Bain"
"---------------------------------
* Were it not for Alan, the whole idea would never have seen the light of day!
- Russ
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 08/10/2010 10:29PM by Russo Loco.
