Re: Vance Coal Pocket Model

sjh7 Wrote:
=======================================
> Yes - all correct. There were chutes that dropped
> down from the bottom of each door; pulled by a
> chain hanging off of each one, I think.
>
> And the coal was hand-shoveled from low-side gons
> into each chute. Actually, if you climb up behind
> the chutes, there's a siding there (which climbed
> steeply from the right (if you're facing the
> chutes) from a switch down the grade a ways.

I really wonder why that switch wasn't above (to the south) so the grade wouldn't have been so steep.  Was it because the coal came from Hesperus or Perins, and the cars could be switched much more easily by a northbound freight with the switch to the north?

> That siding goes behind the chutes, and there's a
> large open storage bin on the far side. The
> siding goes a few car lengths beyond, so cars
> could be dropped by gavity as each was unloaded.
>
> The main work was filling this storage bin.
> Later, w/ or w/o gons present, coal was then
> shoveled (thrown?) across the tracks and each
> loading bin filled. Must've been a difficult,
> hard, never-ending job.
>
> But then you've got to remember that MOST of the
> tender-loading on the RGS was actually done by
> shoveling directly from a gon (parked beside and
> slightly above the tender), up into the tender.
> So actually, filling the bins was probably
> slightly easier. This gon-to-tender arrangement
> was used at Ridgway and Dolores, and there were
> slightly-elevated spurs at both locations for this
> purpose.
>
> Labor was cheap in those days ...


The sign said workers were paid 15 cents per ton shoveled, IIRC!

- Russ