In the mid 1950s, near the end of steam on the Grand Trunk Western Railroad, a young C. F. Martin was working the engineer's extra board out of Milwaukee Junction in Detroit. On the date of our story, he had been called to work Trains 586 and 585, commonly referred to as "The Mt. Clemens Switch Run". This assignment went on duty at Milwaukee Junction at 6:30 a.m., picked up a train at East Yard, ran to Mt. Clemens where it spent the entire day switching local industries, and then returned to the initial terminal within the 16-hour day. This job worked six days each week, Monday through Saturday.

Normal motive power on the assignment was generally one of the road's little 2600-class Consolidations, of which the railroad still rostered 15. These 2-8-0s were built in two groups by Alco, in 1907 and 1911.

The 2679 was the regular engine assigned to this job. The crew would run the engine headed backward out the 19 miles to Mt. Clemens and return facing forward, as there were no turning facilities along this position of the Mt. Clemens Subdivision. For this reason alone, many enginemen and young head brakemen did not care to work this local, because starting right from the beginning of the day, the wind would blow over the full pile of coal in the tender and no matter how well the fireman wetted down the coal, the headend crew would be covered with coal dust by the time they reached Mt. Clemens. (Incidentally, GTW enginemen were not known for wearing goggles as they did on many roads; but on "The Mt. Clemens Switch Run" they were a necessity.)

On this particular day, the crew was completing its last few moves before leaving the Mt. Clemens Sugar Factory located near the mouth of the Clinton River. All that remained was to put 14 cars together, "get their air", and run the three and one-haft miles back on the Serfridge Field Air Force Base spur to the Mt. Clemens Subdivision main line. Once back in Mt. Clemens, they would pick up their "glory" (cars that previously had been left in the "water plug", a track located across from the freight house) for Detroit. All of this work should consume about two and one-half hours; and they still had four hours left to work.

It was late fall or early winter, and it had already been dark for several hours. When Conductor Neil Greiner explained to Engineer Martin what they were going to do, C. F. got belligerent and stated in no uncertain terms that the little 1911 Alco Consolidation, the 2679, would not be able to pull 14 cars, mostly loads, out of the sugar mill and up the grade to Gratiot Avenue! The two men - both young railroaders and World War II veterans - argued, yelled, and screamed; but it was quite apparent that Mr. Martin had his mind made up. There was no way he would be able to drag 14 cars plus the caboose up that hill! (Keep in mind that in steam days it was a well known fact that one engineman could get far greater performance out of a locomotive than could another.)

Following their discussion, they put the train together and coupled the air. When Conductor Greiner reached the caboose, he swung Engineer Martin a great big "highball" with his lantern. C.F. acknowledged with two short toots on the whistle and widened on the 2679's throttle. Half his fire shot right up the stack, and the train began to move. The sound was terrific! The slack ran out and the cab leaped ahead; they were on their way.

About halfway up the hill, their speed slowed and shortly they stopped. ......
C. F. whistled four short toots, a call for signals or instructions.

Conductor Greiner grabbed his lantern and swung down off the back of the caboose. As he walked toward the locomotive he swung his lantern as though he was mad... in great big arcs! When he reached the front of the caboose he stood still; but continued swinging the lantern as if he was still walking. After about 30 seconds, he stepped in between the rear freight car and the caboose, closed the angle cock, and "pulled the pin". Conductor Greiner then stepped back out to the side of the train and gave Engineer Martin another great big "highball!".

Once again C. F. responded with "two quick shorts" on the whistle, widened on the throttle, and pulled what he thought was about half of that train right out of there.

Upon reaching the main line, Conductor Greiner walked up to the head end. As Neil reached the engine, Mr. Martin leaned down from the cab window, puffed his chest out and said, "See, I told you this old piece of junk would never pull all of these heavy loads up Gratiot Hill"

Conductor Greiner responded. "Yah, C. F., you were right. Now cut off and go back and get the caboose!"

Charles H. Geletzke Jr. - Temperance, Michigan

Reprinted with permission from Vintage Rails No..2, Winter 1996. For subscription information, call 1-800-210-2211.

This all started when member Harold Frye sent me a copy of the preceding story, saying he thought the members of MTM would like to read a story about the track that we now own. I thought it was a great idea, so I contacted the author, Chuck Geletzke, who is still an engineer for the GTW-CN, working out of Port Huron. He said that it was alright with him, although he had sold the rights to Vintage Rails, and figured I had better contact them.

With the help of my son, Rick (see related story), a message was sent to Vintage Rails , and indeed, their Associate Editor, James P. Ziegler, agreed. Thank you, Mr. Ziegler, for your quick response!

There was a picture of the 2679 at Milwaukee Junction - by Ernest L. Kovak - noted engineer/photographer. But, I chose not to copy it, as the quality two times around would have been poor.

This photo was taken about 1 1/2 years ago, and shows Gratiot Hill as seen from Gratiot Avenue (the top" of the the hill). I venture to say that not much has changed since the story took place over 40 years go! Yes, the "hill" sometimes gives us trouble when the rails get wet, or the weeds get mashed and we try to travel on a coat of chlorophyll! The old loading site at the top of the hill kept your train stretched, as you tried to fight gravity to reach the "home" mark. With our new loading site at Joy Park, we don't have to worry about Gratiot Hill, it's level. And yes, the sugarbeet spur is long gone, but the switch is still there. Like the ghost in the window at the Depot Museum, if you stand on Gratiot Hill in the late evening, and listen to a CN train going by in the distance, you can imagine the 2679 puffing up the grade to Gratiot Avenue - think of all that noise! What would our present neighbors think if we did that now?.!?? DF Photo by Dick Fountain.

The mannequin figure is probably vintage 1950's, and was somewhat damaged. Some fingers were broken although still attached, there was a hole in the forehead, the right arm was cracked and held together with masking tape, and in general the surface was marred and scuffed. The pose and impression was supposed to be of a cute summertime beach boy.

Basic repairs were made with epoxy, and the head and hands were repainted with acrylics. Photographs of Edison are all black and white, but it is known that he had vivid blue eyes and blond hair as a young child. His hair in young adulthood appears dark blond or light brown, as far as one can tell from a black and white photograph. He had a cowlick in front. which made his hair fall over his forehead, and his hair did not appear particularly close cropped or recently cut. He had high cheekbones, and smiled with his mouth closed and lower lip raised in a sort of pleased and satisfied expression. In addition to repairs, some minor modification of the face was done to give a stronger resemblance, particularly making the nose larger and less snubbed, and having the hair droop over the forehead.

The one photograph of Edison at the age of 14 was taken in wintertime. He is wearing a knitted scarf around his neck, a heavy jacket and a cap. The statue in Port Huron is modeled after that photograph. Thomas Edison's teenage railroad work as a Train Boy was as a self-employed vendor of newspapers, candy, produce, etc. He rode the train and sold to the rail passengers between Port Huron and Detroit. He did not wear a railroad uniform, and since the Edison family was poor he was not well dressed. The Michigan Transit Museum mannequin is dressed for summertime in cotton shirt, pants, suspenders. There is no cap (because I couldn't find or create one in a short time), but some sort of cap would be appropriate to add later.

The shirt and pants are reproductions of ordinary clothing from the mid-1800's and civil war era. Commercial patterns are available of such clothing taken from historical garments in museums or vintage photographs, and are utilized for theatrical costume design, etc.

The shirt is made from a coarse weave cotton fabric, which looks homespun, but isn't. For authenticity, hand sewing was done on any seam that showed on the outside, and all buttonholes were worked by hand. A typical 3 button shirt of that era had an attached color, and full sleeves with some gathering at the shoulders. There are gussets at the underarm and sides of the neck. Of interest is that all of the pattern pieces are square or oblong -- no curved pieces as in modern patterns, which leave a lot of scrap from the fabric. Thus the older patterns are extremely economical with fabric, and use every bit. Considering the labor to spin and weave fabric this makes perfect sense.

The pants pattern was taken from the trousers of a so-called sack suit of that era. The pants have a button fly and are meant to be worn with suspenders. A lot of sewing by hand was also done on the pants whenever it would show on the outside. To get an appropriate look, the underside of heavy black denim was used as the front of the fabric. The pants, when sewn, were laundered several times to get a worn look.

All of the buttons on the shirt and pants are real antiques. The white shirt buttons are from shell. The pants buttons are of vegatable ivory, a paste composition that predated plastics.

The boots are modifications of shoes bought at a thrift store. A local shoe repairman who works with me on mannequin projects removed modern trim, and then the boots were dyed and scuffed up. Leather shoe laces were cut from a piece of scrap leather. The old style suspenders were purchased from Amazon Dry goods catalog.

Sandra Hamlet (Associate Member 167)
Apri 22, 1998