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47

However, the most important assignment we had was the New Haven depot and passenger yard. What made this important was the fact that New Haven was in a very strategic location with regard to the passenger service. First, it was the eastern terminus of the electrification and hence every train coming off of or going onto the electrification required a locomotive change. Secondly, it marked the eastern end of the extensive commuter service into New York City and because of this, many trains had coaches either taken off or added to them at New Haven depending on whether they were eastbound or westbound. Most of the multiple-unit car commuter service terminated at Stamford, service east of Stamford being handled by locomotive-hauled trains. Many diners and grill cars were put on or taken off at New Haven. Through New Haven passed all the Shore Line trains for Boston via Westerly and Providence as well as the summer traffic to the Cape, and also the trains which operated over the Hartford-Springfield line destined for the Berkshires and the White Mountains including the many ski trains. Trains westbound out of New Haven were routed either to Grand Central Terminal or to Penn Terminal in New York, the latter traversing the famed Hell Gate Bridge route--and some of these went on south to Philadelphia and Washington on the Pennsy. The New Haven operated a high class passenger business which they were proud of and guarded carefully; moreover, I believe that in 1934 or soon thereafter, it was profitable. 

So we were part of it for a week or so as I recall. It was fun to participate in moving this great fleet of trains on their way, for we had to work on many of them as they passed through. Our most demanding job was to cut out several coaches from the middle of a long train and then put the train back together again--also the reverse, opening up a long train and putting coaches into the middle of it. A certain amount of time was allowed for this in the schedule and if you failed to do it in that time, you were in the doghouse. A few of the hot shots went through without any change except to get a new locomotive--such trains as the YANKEE CLIPPER, MERCHANTS LIMITED and CONGRESSIONAL LIMITED--but we had a crack at most of them one way or another. I loved the names of many of the trains--MAYFLOWER, CAPE CODDER, PURITAN, NEPTUNE, BAY STATE, BOSTONIAN, COLONIAL, GILT EDGE, FEDERAL EXPRESS, SENATOR, and the OWL. Four years later, I was to ride the front end of most of these trains when we put into service the 0361-0366s, and that was when I REALLY had some thrills. However, in 1934 it was thrill enough to participate in the relatively mundane task of performing a few switching chores on the fleet. Once in awhile we'd have to switch a private car and when this occurred, the conductor was likely to say something like, "In on 2 and get one big one." This meant we should go to track No. 2 in the yard and pick up a private car. Incidentally, this was the yard from which we hauled the 24-coach train in 1931 when Lew Webb was nearly killed.

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