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29

The big lot of New York Central 3-powers, 42 in all, were going through the shop in the last half of 1930 but I don't recall that I had anything to do with them. Jay Walker was still in Erie and he handled them I believe. However, I did follow the DL&W 3-powers through quite thoroughly along with Sam Riegel & Co. and was quite familiar with them by the time I went to Hoboken in early October. Which reminds me of a story Bob Williamson told me about Charlie Williams, who attended the Erie tests of the sample DL&W multiple-unit cars for the suburban electrification. The pair of cars was run all day long more or less continuously on our test track and it was pretty boring for everybody. So, to enliven the situation a bit, they brought some hooch aboard so Charlie could have a drink. The upshot of this was that Charlie got plastered and at the conclusion of the test that evening, they brought Charlie some sort of certification to sign indicating he was satisfied with what had been done and Charlie simply waved them away with the almost incoherent statement, "I approve ever'thing. To hell with it! I approve ever'thing." No evil resulted apparently because the cars were very successful. Incidentally, these were the tests that Rog Casler and some of his WABCO associates came to Erie to witness.

I said Charlie Williams was a character and the above reminds me of an experience I was to have with him. I once accompanied him to a night spot in Scranton where he walked on his hands around the tops of the partitions separating the booths, much to the surprise and embarrassment of some of the guests.

In my June 10th diary, I write "Am doing some business with my old college lecturer, Harte Cooke, of MacIntosh & Seymour in connection with the New York Central 900 hp oil-electric locomotive and their new 300 hp solid injection locomotive engine." Just what my "business" with Mr. Cooke was, I don't know. This was the locomotive whose acceptance tests I attended in April in New York, being the 2 - D - 2 which Alco built for passenger service on the Putnam Division which ran through John D. Rockefeller's estate at Pocantico Hills, and which had the big M&S engine. Quoting from the December 1970 TRAINS article: "(It) was powered by a massive McIntosh & Seymour V-12 with 14x18-inch cylinders and a weight of 90 pounds per horsepower. This air-injected monster rumbled along at a leisurely 310 rpm--and that was top speed, not idle. ... By 1933, it had permanently expired and later was returned to Alco, where it no doubt quickly got the torch." At this point in 1930, Alco had purchased McIntosh & Seymour and I presume were developing the 600 hp engine that they were soon to put into their "high hood" switcher. What the 300 hp engine was, I don't know. I remember visiting Auburn in 1927, I believe, to shoot trouble on a 300 hp, air-injection engine, 250 rpm, on a Lehigh Valley switcher operating in Auburn as I recall it. It was enormous for the puny output it produced. Times were to change.