As I stated earlier in my Working on the Railroad series, my
railroad career took me to different towns to work. Little did I
know when I hired out that traveling to other locations would be
part of my job, because I specifically hired out as a clerk to
avoid just this. This just goes to prove that the best laid plans
can take a strange turn without you having a lot to do with it.

I don't remember the exact year but the clerks union (BRAC)
merged with the laborers and/or janitor unions and the operators
union. A lot of us weren't too happy about that because the
clerks in these two crafts had a lot of seniority and would be
able to take our jobs - plus those unions didn't have as many
employees as ours. But I guess the people in charge of the unions
figured this would be a great way to create a larger union and
therefore more power when in a bargaining position with the
company.

When I started out with the railroad, as stated previously, I was
on the extra board. The more jobs you learned, the better
chance you had of getting your five days in before the week-end.
Or, at least, that was the theory. A lot of the time it didn't
work out that way.

Most of the jobs that required travel were the Operator jobs.
They were the ones that involved train orders - written
instructions from the dispatcher that would let the train crews
know how to proceed to their destinations. When the unions
merged, of course we were required to learn and work those jobs
also.

I was required to go to Maxton, Wadesboro and Polkton to work
the operator jobs there. At least the distance wasn't too bad to
travel. You got paid extra to go to these locations, so that
helped make up for the extra time spent traveling.

The problem with working these jobs was that once you were
qualified to take train orders the railroad figured you could work
any of the outlying jobs. But all of them worked a little
different. I remember I worked the Polkton office for about two
weeks and was in the dark most of the time. We had to bill cars,
answer phones, etc. just like the regular assigned employee would
do when he was there. Needless to say, this could be kind of
nerve-racking at times.

When taking train orders from the dispatcher, you had to read it
back to him to make sure it was perfect...and you had to spell
out the numbers or proper names. For instance, if you wrote
down train number R485, you had to spell it out...four eight five.
That way the dispatcher would be sure you had it right. Because
if you didn't, you could cause some major trouble giving out a
train order that was not correct.

At these outlying stations like Polkton, most of the time the
trains would not stop to get the orders - instead, you had to tie
them on a string attached to a stick. I remember one time at
Polkton I was standing too near the track when the train came by
and the stick I was holding with orders in it scraped the front
engine. That was a close call!

Now at Maxton, they had a train order stand in front of the
station, so all you had to do was tie the orders to that and the
conductor would stand on the steps of the engine or caboose and
grab the orders as the train pulled by.

I worked with Ronald Ray at Maxton - Lois Wheeler's brother.
He was a very religious man and liked everything done just right.
Ronald got onto me one time when I was running late to get there
and I told him I had to break the 55mph speed limit. He let me
know right quick that wasn't the Christian thing to do. But he
was an inspiration because of his discipline.

That's all the jobs I had to work outside of Hamlet. But this was
about 21 years ago and now the conductors, trainmen and
engineers do a lot of this work that the operators used to do.
Those job duties started to slide over to them around the same
time the clerical jobs were being transferred to Jacksonville.

So, another chapter written of Working on the Railroad - My
Story - and another memory of how it was growing up in
Rockingham, North Carolina - a small textile town in the South in
the '50s, '60s,'70s and '80s.
Working on the Railroad - My
Story - Chapter 6
written by Joel Bailey
April 25, 2009
So, as the Train of Life keeps
chugging along, another page
written of my Memories of....
Rockingham Remembered.