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21 them, [[underlined]]Charlie Whitehead[[/underlinedd]], and since we did get acquainted with him, I'll cover him briefly now. Charlie had been brought in by Andy Stevenson to help straighten out the "steam locomotive mess." Later I was brought in to straighten out the "small locomotive mess." From this it may be seen that the locomotive situation was messy in general. Charlie Whitehead was a high caliber individual and vice president of sales for General Steel Castings in St.Louis, also known as Commonwealth Steel. General Steel had a virtual monopoly on steam locomotive frame castings and also made tender bed castings and truck castings of all kinds. We bought complicated truck castings from them for our large electric locomotives. They collaborated with the locomotive mechanical designers during the preparation of drawings and would simply place one of their draftsmen-designers in the builder's plant during the design stage. In their position as one of the locomotive industry's most prominent suppliers, they were in a good position to understand the locomotive business and Charlie Whitehead was a good man to ask for help. Moreover, Charlie had been brought up in the railroad business, his father having been president of the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad. I don't know what Charlie's title was if he had one at all, but he was supposed to be the master mind running the section under Charlie Creasser and he came in in June. There's quite a bit in my diary about Charlie in the second half of 1942. He had one fault. When he got drunk, which wasn't entirely unusual, he got mean and wanted to fight and be violent. So that had to be kept in mind when you were out with him under drinking conditions. Afterward he'd be most penitent but then the trouble had been done. Charlie was a good guy otherwise as far as I know. He eventually became president of General Steel. Nor would the story be complete without some mention of the girls in the section. Hanly's secretary, and later, Charlie Creasser's, was [[underlined]]Edith Sandler[[/underlined]]. Poor Edith had not been blessed in either face or body, being short, stocky and very homely; but she was generally pleasant enough to deal with. By far the prettiest one of the crew was Kathryn Garin, who took care of the bull pen and was a real beauty from Minnesota; she was sometimes referred to as "Pretty Kitty" and she was all of that and then some. At the same time, she was a very genuine, natural, straight girl. She married an Army man and wound up in Germany after the war and for several years she sent me a Christmas card from over there. [[underlined]]Ullaine Sullivan[[/underlined]] ^[[of Montana]] was the "keeper of the records" and I can't remember anything about her but I do recall that the records were in one hell of a mess along with locomotives. [[underlined]]Dorothy Fairbank[[/underlined]] was a plain, square-face little girl from the Wyoming badlands who'd come to the capital for work and adventure. She was earnest and she tried very hard but at typing and shorthand she was sadly wanting, so much so that I really felt awfully sorry for her at times. However, there was a hidden gem of a secretary in the
