My basement has a problem: Me. For years I’ve embraced the role of Archiver in Chief for family materials, amassing more books, letters, photos and ephemera than I can ever hope to properly organize and digest. And as I settle into this latest phase of life, I’m realizing it’s time to take care of jettisoning things before I either earn the label of ‘hoarder’ or worse, leave a pile of stuff for some poor soul to sort through after my demise.
A major home remodel became the great forcing function for curtailing my ‘collector’ tendencies, and the contents of my bottomless-pit garage are now front and center for consideration and disbursement. Case in point: Dozens of books chronicling steam locomotives and railroads in America, the collections of two family members consisting of volumes published between the early 1940s until the late 1980s celebrating the romance and adventure of early train travel. Rail fans are a passionate group, and while I can’t even begin to delve into the various subcultures dedicated to the Iron Horse, I’m fairly confident this collection would qualify as falling somewhere between ‘rail curious’ and ‘firebox fanatic.’
The train fan of note in our family was Alfred Bruce, second husband of my gr-grandmother, Edna. Alfred was a locomotive designer and executive with the American Locomotive Company, and in the early 20th century he helped design some legendary (and huge) steam locomotives. In retirement, he wrote his own book in 1952 chronicling the era, The Steam Locomotive in America: Its Development in the Twentieth Century. His book collection was pretty technical, containing many volumes that track the evolution and arcane details of the steam locomotive, often with personal notes/inscriptions from their authors.
Alfred Bruce died in 1955 at age 76, well before I was born. I wish I’d had a chance to know him, as he seems like a very decent guy who led an interesting life. He and his first wife, Charlotte (Burns), lived in Manhattan and were friends with gr-grandma Edna and her first husband, Thomas Tidball Trapnell. When Tom exited the marriage in the early 1920s, Alfred and Charlotte played an active role in helping to raise my grandfather, Valentine Coles Trapnell. Charlotte died in August, 1939, and a little over a year later, Alfred and Edna married. Alfred was still a VP with the American Locomotive Company, and in addition to the companionship and love he brought to Edna, Alfred also provided financial security that she had lacked most of her life. With no children of his own, Alfred left an estate that left Edna extremely comfortable, which she in turn passed on to my grandfather.
The second batch of train books belonged to my father, Jack Byrne. He was less interested in the specifics of the equipment than in the history and romance of rail travel, especially the narrow gauge roads that coursed through the west in the late 19th century. These smaller lines were part of the history and growth of Santa Cruz, including the South Pacific Coast Railroad, and the ill-fated Ocean Shore Railroad. Dad grew up a block from the western mouth of the Mission Hill tunnel built by the South Pacific Coast in 1875, and was a huge fan of trains and train lore. His office at SRI International was decorated with photos of trains and the long-gone ghost towns in the Santa Cruz mountains, with names such as Alma, Lexington and Wrights.
Dad preferred compelling writing over scholarly research, and had several works by Lucius Beebe, a colorful character who authored dozens of books on the history and joys of train travel. Dad was also an amateur train photographer, and auto vacations often included rest stops that coincided with well-placed vantage points for photographing passing trains. He probably passed a bit of that bug onto me, though growing up in the post-passenger train era left me little to work with, save for the daily stream of antiquated Southern Pacific commuter trains then in their decline on the Peninsula, well before the Caltrain renaissance that would begin in the 1980s and beyond.
Dad’s enthusiasm for trains also found an outlet in model railroading. At some point in the mid 1960s, he got serious about his hobby to the point of taking over the laundry room of our house, constructing a massive fold-down table for his growing collection of HO-gauge model trains. Over the next several years, Christmas and birthday gifts in our home invariably included electric engines, freight and passenger rail cars, and various stations or other models to be assembled and placed along the growing laundry room right of way. The crowning jewel of all of this was a massive, snow-covered mountain and train tunnel constructed almost entirely of chicken wire and plaster-of-paris. Dad’s engineering skills with designing and building from whole cloth were still-evolving at this point, and the snowy mass was notorious for dropping chunks of plaster-of-paris with only the slightest vibrations.
Only in writing this do I recall I still have remnants of Dad’s train collection in my basement. I guess I’ll be getting to those soon!
My own affinity for trains is more modest by comparison, certainly nothing on the order of gr-grandfather Alfred or my father. Our Eichler in Palo Alto was a few blocks from the Peninsula line of the Southern Pacific Railroad, and the sound of a diesel horn and the low rumble of commuter trains and the occasional freight were welcome at all hours of the day or night. On boring afternoons, I might go down to the tracks to watch the trains pass by during rush hour, somewhat in awe at the speed and power of the huge machines. Sadly, the same crossing where I stood in amusement and wonder would go onto become a suicide magnet for a subsequent generation of Palo Alto teenagers, and that legacy leaves me a bit ambivalent about the seeming innocence and pleasure of my memories.
Life is about savoring the moment, and also letting go of the past. I’ve set aside a few choice rail books from the collection to keep, and the rest are awaiting a trip to Goodwill or otherwise. Hopefully some scholar of steam locomotive design or rail history will enjoy them, and my garage (and family) can breathe a little easier now that the Archiver in Chief is letting some stuff go.