This information came from a series of interviews I was able to have with the last living Fireman from the C&S Narrow Gauge, Doug Shnarbush. I spent a lot of time with him in the early 80's. He worked only on the "West End", between Como and Leadville, and he worked the extra board as a fireman from 1927 to the end of mainline operations in April 1937.
Interestingly, Doug was firing #73 during the 1936 wreck discussed earlier in this thread, and was the reason #537 big-holed the train before reaching the torn up trackage.
One of the most unexpected things he ever told me was this business of having to bore flues. I asked him about this several times and his answers were always consistant.
The C&S usually ran freights of between 15 and 20 cars using a road engine and three helpers. It took each train two full days to travel between Denver to Leadville, with an overnight stay in Como each way.
Because of the number of engines involved with each operation, and maximum tonnage on every one, progress was slow. Each water stop required to water 4 engines, and even when moving the speed was not more than around 10 mph.
The engines were small, and depending on the way the engineer would use the Johnson Bar, the fire would often either pull off the grates or drop cinders into the flues, and once that started, the problem would only get worse. Another factor was the quality of Coal. As has been discussed here before, whenever the C&S sent Trinidad Coal (not often, but occasionally) up to the narrow gauge, there was always a lot of slack, and the stuff wouldn't draft well, and it clinkered all the time.
At any rate, it was a time honored tradition on the old South Park, undoubtably back to the days of Mason Bogies, that the flues had to be bored frequently. Sometimes they had to do it at water stops.
There was no rest for fireman on the old C&S.
For more info, check on the history of #74 at Bill White's RGS Technical Page at the link below. I have included a lot of the information from old Doug in there as related to firing on the C&S.
You'll also learn some other stuff about the freight operations that made this outfit unique.
Matthew and others, please don't be shy about asking any questions at all. It's important for a lot of us increasingly grizzled old veterans to remember that there are many others who are interested in learning this stuff so they can carry the information forward. As stated, how else can you learn but to ask, and how can we who might have information you seek provide it if you don't?
Thanks,
Mike Trent
