A Winter's Tale -- December 1942

Tales From The Grizzly

 A Winter’s Tale – December 1942

The call came at 05:30 a.m. on a frigid dark Saturday morning in December 1942; with 14-year-old call-boy Rupert Abergaster pounding on the front door of Hamish Quinbar McGeachy’s house on Railway Avenue in Geiranger, calling from outside the front door that an engine crew was urgently needed.

“Would Mr. McGeachy please hurry, Mr. Malspike is in a rage down at the yard office. There’s a hot-shot freight that’s supposed to come through here early this morning and they need another pusher. I’ll wait for you”. Rufous Malspike was the District Superintendent.

Wearily the 45-year-old McGeachy pulled himself out of bed and groped for his bib overalls, wool socks and high boots and put them on in the dark so as not to disturb his wife Leticia. He had tumbled into bed with his long johns on, so there was no need to search for them. Leticia merely mumbled goodnight and fall back to sleep. Hamish had only got to bed at midnight, having assisted a heavy westbound freight down from Nigel, Alberta, on the Continental Divide just two hours earlier. There had only been time to gulp some cold beef stew that Leticia had left on the table, before he hit the pillow. McGeachy had made five pusher assists up to Nigel and returns back to Geiranger on Friday before booking off at the Geiranger yard office. His assigned engine, 2-10-2 “Santa Fe” type GNR  No. 5802, had been left in the hands of Horace Palfreyman, a nineteen year old hostler, for some much needed servicing.

These were difficult times for the railway and the train crews. Many scheduled and unscheduled heavy freight movements, both eastbound and westbound, were needed as part of the war effort, but at the same time able-bodied men were being drawn away into the armed forces, many of them with the technical skills and knowledge required to keep the trains running. Young lads like Rupert Abergaster, and young women like Rupert’s 18 year-old sister Rhonda, were joining the workforce in numbers to replace departing men. Rhonda was an engine wiper at the Geiranger roundhouse, along with four other young women. Six young lads in their late teens worked under the direction of the few grizzled old hands remaining, as apprentice pipe fitters, mechanics and hostlers, servicing and turning around the much used and abused pusher engines as they arrived at the engine terminal.

Geiranger, British Columbia, located in the Running Bear Pass in the Rockies, was then a “pusher” station, providing extra engines to help trains on the grades on either side of Geiranger - 2% to 3.5 % grades up to Nigel, 11 track-miles  to the east, and Byng, 17 track-miles to the west. The majority of the Grizzly Northern’s mainline engines were Baldwin or Canadian Foundry 2-8-0 “Consolidations” and Baldwin 2-10-0 “Russian Decapods”, built  during or immediately after WWI. These engines were overworked and underpowered for the heavy freight trains needed to meet wartime demands. As a result trains were usually headed by two Consolidations or two “Russians”, and frequently had a third engine working mid train or a fourth pushing at the rear. To cope with the increased loads and reduce the number of engines and crews needed, two heavy 2-10-2 Santa Fe types, built by American Locomotive Company in 1923, had been bought and positioned at Geiranger in 1941. They were usually used as head end pushers.

Putting on his striped cap, heavy Mackinaw and gauntlet gloves, Hamish stepped out on the veranda into the blowing snow and asked Rupert if he had knocked up Sam Scroggins at the YMCA. The “Y” was on VanDonkers Street, across from the yard offices. Sam was McGeachy’s regular partner and one of the best firemen on the Grizzly Northern. He was a string bean of a man, but could shovel several tons of coal an hour on the hard working Consolidations and Russians, which were not equipped with mechanical stokers. Rupert said that he had found Sam on his bunk in the YMCA bunkhouse dormitory, sleeping on top of the blankets, still wearing  his overalls and boots. Rupert had been able to shake Sam somewhat awake and had left him there while he went to rouse Hamish.

Rupert Abergaster and Hamish McGeachy trudged through the rapidly falling blowing snow, down

Railway Avenue

and along VanDonkers. They picked up Sam Scroggins at the YMCA bunkhouse, as well as several thermoses of coffee and packages of fried egg and bacon sandwiches in the Y’s coffee shop (open around the clock as part of the war effort), before crossing to the yard offices. Rupert was happy to head for the warmth of the Dispatcher’s office and await his next orders for a crew call there. The outside temperature had been plus 35 degrees F the evening before, caused by a very warm but brief chinook, and had plummeted to minus 10 degrees F overnight as the chinook died away.

Stepping into the District Superintendent’s yard office, and its gas-lit warmth, Hamish and Sam found Rufous Malspike furiously pacing up and down, hurling invective at the unfortunate telegrapher, Bertie Ironfist. Thirty minutes ago Bertie had handed Rufous Malspike a telegram, which Bertie said had just arrived, although this was not quite true.

The telegram read:

“23:30 18 December 1942 Kamloops Stop Rufous Malspike District Superintendent Geiranger Stop Most urgent you expedite freight Extra 25 East Stop Consist includes urgently needed war effort cargo diverted via GNR due to blocked CPR mainline Stop Extra Number 25 East expected arrival Geiranger 05:00 20 December 1942 Stop Special Government agents on board have full authority Security Code X Stop Ensure pusher engine  available Stop Acknowledge message Stop Isambard Dunstan Neuville President Stop”

The unfortunate Bertie avoided offering an clear explanation as to why the telegram had not been delivered to Malspike hours earlier. The reason was that the first message arrived as Bertie, who had been on duty for 16 hours, had slept like a log in his swivel chair, with his dog Fergus asleep in his lap. Dafyd Abergaster, the Station Master had staggered off home some four hours before, he too having worked for 16 hours. Bertie and Fergus had been soothed to sleep by the warmth of the office pot-bellied stove and the Seth Thomas clock ticking on the wall, oblivious to the clicking of the telegraph key as the Kamloops telegrapher attempted to contact him. It was Fergus, needing to answer a call of nature, who had awakened Bertie as Kamloops again tried to contact him. Bertie hurriedly responded and took down the delayed message, but dithered for several minutes before working up the courage to crank the telephone and rouse Rufous Malspike at his home on Glacier Street, 15 minutes away at a quick walk.

Extra 25 East rolled into Geiranger late, at 06:30 am as Hamish and Sam arrived at Malspike’s yard office. The train was a consist of four CPR steel “through-baggage” cars, with the windows barred and blacked out and the doors heavily sealed, with a Grizzly Northern caboose bringing up the rear. Hamish recognized that the baggage cars were CPR cars previously used in silk train service in the 20’s and early 30’s.

Extra 25 East had been delayed on the 3% grades between Big Horn, Dolally and Pushkin Creek. It was headed by a pusher  2-8-0 Consolidation, GNR No. 3959, ahead of a second 2-8-0, CPR No. 3953. Both engines were normally reliable performers, however 3959, due for a major overhaul in the Kamloops shops, had been badly leaking steam in several places and was not able to keep the boiler pressure at 190 lbs. No. 3953 had sprung several stay bolts and had started leaking too. It had also been losing traction on the snow-slicked rails, some overworked hostler having failed to fill the sand dome during a fast turn-around at Kamloops. Only through some clever work on the part of the two engine crews had they been able to get Extra 25 East up the 3% grades at a grueling 5 miles per hour. Neither engine was fit to continue heading eastwards with the train.

Rufous Malarky Malspike, to give him his full name, was a short rotund 45-year-old hard-boiled Scottish-born railroader, known for his hot temper and his loud, rude and Scottish accented vocal outbursts when pressured by events, even minor ones. This was certainly a major event, given the GNR president’s telegram, the arrival at short notice of the priority freight and the failing engines. Whirling around as Hamish and Sam entered the yard office, he bellowed, “McGeachy take 5802 and get that damn train up to Nigel, a relief engine from Clinemore will take over there. 3953 and 3959 are coming off”, gesturing towards Extra 25 East and it’s two wheezing engines. “The Kamloops crews are booking off, Danny McGrew is your conductor, Mike Yuhaz and Frenchy Gendron are your brakemen. No talking to the passengers in the van and no questions, do you ken laddie?”. McGeachy quickly acknowledged that he did “ken”.

Malspike liked to use the term “van” rather than “caboose” as he considered caboose to be an Americanism.  Hamish and Sam, who couldn’t have cared less as to whether it was a “van” or a “caboose” were only to happy to flee the yard office and head to the engine terminal.

No. 3953 and No. 3959 were uncoupled from Extra Number 25 East and the two engines limped to the engine terminal. The Kamloops crews wearily staggered off to the YMCA bunkhouse. The “passengers” climbed down from the caboose; four unshaven men in trench coats, wearing big slouch-brimmed fedoras, incomprehensibly in view of the darkness – aviator sunglasses, and carrying Thompson submachine guns. Two of the men walked to the yard office while the other two patrolled each side of the train, then quickly retreated to the warm caboose. The first two “passengers” spent some time huddled in the yard office with Malspike, giving instructions to Bertie for a telegram, before they too returned to the caboose, giving Hamish and Sam a suspicious look-over as they passed by. Hamish thought the big one looked like Sydney Greenstreet and the little guy like Peter Lorre, from the “Maltese Falcon”, which Hamish had recently seen in Clinemore. Hamish speculated to Sam that the baggage cars must be carrying gold bullion in view of all the security measures.

Hamish and Sam found No. 5802 standing on a ready track next to the turntable, gently hissing steam in the minus 10 degrees F temperature. No. 5802 was the second 2-10-2 assigned to Geiranger for pusher service. Its two compound air compressors gave an occasional thump-thump; a gentle hissing came from a variety of sources. A thick layer of hoarfrost covered surfaces exposed to the leaking steam. No. 5802 had been standing outside since early Friday evening and had accumulated a heavy load of wet snow on the engine and tender before the big temperature drop. Usually the engine would have been in the roundhouse given the weather conditions, but all 12 stalls were occupied.

Clambering up into the cab of the big engine the two men set about getting ready to move.  Horace Palfreyman had banked the fire before leaving No. 5802 on the ready track but the boiler pressure had dropped to 150 lbs overnight, so it was time to quickly build up the fire and get the pressure up to 190. None of the Grizzly Northern’s engines were fitted with enclosed vestibule cabs, the only protection against the wintery blasts at the rear of the cab being the canvas curtains. Hamish pulled the canvas curtain closed on his side, cleared crusted snow from his forward and side windows, turned on the dynamo to power the cab lights and headlight, and checked pressure gauges. Sam likewise closed the curtain and cleaned windows on his side, read the water gauges and shoveled coal from the tender into the firebox. After building up the fire bed to a nice bright even level, he turned on the steam to the stoker engine.

To Sam’s surprise the stoker engine and auger refused to start, groaning loudly – no coal sprayed into the firebox, clearly something was amiss. Sam found that the coal in the tender was reluctant to feed into the auger tray. Snow accumulated on the coal load had melted and run down into the front end of the tray and frozen there. Cursing a blue streak, Sam grabbed a long crow bar from the tool box and with his shovel, pushed his way through the curtains, opened the coal bunker doors and climbed into the tender bunker. Within several minutes  he had pried several hundred pounds of coal loose and shoveled it onto the cab deck. Sam furiously scooped the coal into the firebox, artfully placing each scoop where it was most needed. Having built up the fire enough for the moment, he returned to breaking coal loose in the auger tray and by working the stoker engine in forward and reverse directions got the auger operating. Coal now blew onto the fire bed as quickly as the auger deposited it on the distribution plate.

In the meantime Hamish, having noted what was happening, clambered down with a lantern to do a walk around inspection of the engine and to check whether Horace Palfreyman had filled the connecting rod oil pots. Thankfully he found all was well. Back up in the cab 15 minutes later Hamish found Sam carefully nursing the fire and steam pressure climbing nicely. Head-end brakeman Mike Yuhaz  joined them in the cab. The temperature in the cab climbed from just above freezing to a more workable plus 60 F as the boiler backhead temperature increased and intense heat blasted into the cab. Another 15 minutes and the boiler pressure had climbed to 180 lbs, allowing Hamish to move the engine to the mainline and back up to the train. Mike Yuhaz quickly completed the coupling operations.

The five crew members gathered in the yard office to check their time pieces again and complete paperwork. Hamish, Sam and Mike returned to the cab of No. 5802, while Danny McGrew and Frenchy Gendron trudged through the snow to the caboose. Rufous Malspike continued to fulminate at the further delays in getting the train underway and had Bertie Ironfist sending minute by minute  messages to senior management as to why Extra 25 East hadn’t yet moved from Geiranger.

The first hint of daylight over the mountains occurred at 07:00 a.m. as the clouds moved eastwards and the blowing snow began to clear.  Hamish completed charging the train’s air lines and gave two short blasts of the whistle to alert the rear end crew that they were ready to move. Danny McGrew acknowledged and gave a go-ahead signal using the air-line pressure release valve. Hamish released the engine’s brakes, then the train brakes and eased the throttle open, taking out the coupler slack gradually. In sub zero temperatures metal becomes brittle and Hamish didn’t want to risk breaking a coupler. The engine’s 56-inch diameter drivers slipped momentarily on the snow clad track, causing a short burst of staccato chuffs, then grabbed as he released a shot of sand. Slowly, at last Extra 25 East got underway, at 07:30 a.m., just as the sun was rising over the Chapel Crags.

Hamish eased the train out of the yard, opening up the throttle and maintaining long cut-off as they met the first steep grade immediately east of the yard limit. The train gathered momentum and within a few minutes he had it moving at 12 miles per hour, a speed that he tried to maintain as the grade increased to 2.5 % then 3 %. They climbed along the Running Bear river towards the lower spiral tunnel, with light snow obscuring the mountains on either side of the valley. Ten minutes later they crossed over the Running Bear river, which in spring would be a raging torrent but was now a mere trickle emitting clouds of foggy mist that condensed on the rocks and the towering Douglas firs nearby. In another five minutes the portal to the lower spiral loomed out of the mist; a mixture of smoke and wet steam from earlier trains still leaking from the tunnel mouth.

Before entering the tunnel the engine crew grabbed clean cotton waste from the storage box to use as face masks. Within seconds the cab temperature shot up to 120 degrees F and the cab filled with acrid exhaust smoke and steam. The hammering staccato of the exhaust was deafening.

The lower spiral, lying under the flank of Mount Mousehole (locally pronounced muzzle), is just over 2,900 feet long and the train, now moving at 10 miles per hour, emerged from the tunnel some 3 minutes after entering it 50 feet below. The crew threw open the windows and the cab roof hatch to let in a rush of much needed fresh cold air as the train moved across the valley towards the upper spiral. The crew again grabbed for their improvised face masks as the engine plunged into the upper tunnel under the edge of Mount Tintagel. Windows and roof hatches were again thrown open as they blasted out of the 3,300 foot long upper spiral 4 minutes later and another 56 feet higher. The train reached the siding at Yee Haw, just after 08:30 am, where a west bound freight sat waiting for them to pass.

The west bound freight was headed by two 2-8-0 Consolidations out of Rocky Mountain House. Hamish recognized both crews, who were leaning out of their cab windows as they passed. He gave two short toots of 5802’s whistle as an acknowledgement and set the bell ringing to alert the other train’s rear end crew. Ten minutes later he whistled for the 1,000 foot long snow shed just before Grouse siding. They continued on the climb on Trencrom Hill, now moving at only 8 miles per hour. Fifteen minutes later they steamed into Nigel, on Wapiti Lake, just east of the Continental Divide.

No. 3950, a GNR 2-8-0 Consolidation based in Rocky Mountain House, sat on the siding waiting to relieve 5802. It would be easy work for the single Consolidation and its crew on the 125 mile down-hill run from Nigel to “Rocky”. Hamish recognized 3950’s crew; Phineas Farthing, engineer, Fernie Raker, fireman, and Charlie Washhouse, conductor. Hamish didn’t recognize the two brakeman, who looked like they should still have been in school. Hamish and Phineas had had gone to high school together in Clinemore.

The Geiranger crew moved 5802 to a siding as the Rocky crew moved 3950 into place at the head of the train. Meanwhile, the four “passengers” had come forward from the caboose and were conferring with two equally sinister looking men who had appeared from the Nigel station office. These two new men had obviously been outfitted by the same agency as the original four -  trench coats, slouch fedoras, sunglasses, and not least, submachine guns. To Hamish all that was needed was for Humphrey Bogart to appear and join the Greenstreet and Lorre look-a-likes. One of the men gave a highball signal to the Rocky crew as they walked back and boarded the caboose. Extra 25 East  began to roll eastwards again.

As the train disappeared Hamish walked over to the station office to find out what was going on. There he found Baldrick Bugbrooke, the station master, and Forbus Keyman, the telegraph operator, both evidently relieved to see the train and the special agents gone. “What’s this all about Baldie?” Hamish asked. Baldrick Roddis Bugbrooke was a notorious blabbermouth and also usually well informed; however Bugbrooke had received a severe warning from the security agents to keep his mouth shut. He only managed to croak out “Hamish, I’m not supposed to know and if I tell you they’ll shoot me, so I’ll have to tell you after the war’s over, it’s top secret”. Hamish was too tired to pursue the matter and was only too happy to see the last of the mystery train. Shortly afterwards the Geiranger crew reversed 5802 on the Nigel wye, took on water from the tower, and running light headed back down to Geiranger, where yet another pusher assignment awaited them, but certainly not with the tensions  experienced with Extra 25 East earlier that day.

Baldrick Bugbrooke did tell Hamish McGeachy about the mystery train, at a retirement party for Hamish and Sam in Clinemore in 1962. “Hamish, do you remember that day back in ’42, just before Christmas, when you hauled that mysterious consist up from Geiranger? It was supposed to be carrying barrels of stuff called “Heavy Illirium”, for use in a secret bomb. We found out later that was a fake load, to draw the attention of spies away from the real shipment. The real stuff went through on the CPR main line the same morning, as part of a troop train”.

“Well now,” said Hamish, turning to Sam Scroggins, “Sam, we were an important part in a secret weapons program - and I thought we were moving western gold reserves away from a possible Jap attack! Now that’s worth another pint from that crate of Cougar that good old Isambard shipped up from Kamloops.” Cougar Strong Ale, with its 7% alcohol content was a wartime scarcity. Sam heartily agreed, and they and their friends sat back and wiled away the rest of the day trading yarns until the last bottle of Cougar was gone.

THE END

Cast of Characters:

Hamish Quinbar McGeachy – Engineer, Geiranger

Leticia McGeachy – Hamish McGeachy’s wife, Geiranger

Sam Scroggins – Fireman, Geiranger

Danny McGrew – Conductor, Geiranger

Mike Yuhaz – Head-end Brakeman, Geiranger

Frenchy Gendron – Brakeman, Geiranger

Rufous Malarky Malspike – District Superintendent, Geiranger

Bertie Ironfist – Telegrapher, Geiranger

Fergus – Bertie’s dog, Geiranger

Horace Palfreyman – Engine Hostler, Geiranger

Dafyd Abergaster – Station Master, Geiranger

Rupert Abergaster – Crew Call-boy, Geiranger

Rhonda Abergaster – Engine Wiper, Geiranger

Phineas Farthing – Engineer, Rocky Mountain House

Fernie Raker – Fireman, Rocky Mountain House

Charlie Washhouse – Conductor, Rocky Mountain House

Baldrick Bugbrooke – Station Master, Nigel

Forbus Keyman – Telegrapher, Nigel

Isambard Dunstan Neuville – President and General Manager, GNRy, Kamloops