Ride the rails at least once in your life

Young people today, when you make up your bucket list, be sure to put in a train ride.

Transportation by train is a rarity today, and only on occasion do you stumble on a coal-fired engine.

I was a “gandy dancer” for the Northern Pacific Railroad during my high school career, working from 7-4 on Saturdays as part of their section crew.

My fascination with steam locomotives didn’t start then. I remember that, as a kid, whenever a train went through Palouse we would be down by the tracks to watch it. Sometimes the engineer would wave at us, making our day, and sometimes he would blow the train whistle to really make our day.

As soon as I was old enough, I applied and was accepted to work part time for the NP crew.

We would meet in front of the Main Street tavern about 6:30 in the morning on Saturdays to be picked up by our foreman, Bill Fisher.

Working on the NP was Fisher’s first job, and he completed and was honored for 50 years on the job. He knew every rail, rail plate, and tie in the line from Palouse to Farmington.

A gandy dancer is not a soft-shoe performer. By no means.

It simply meant that you tamped ties and did other mundane chores on a railroad crew.

We would head out in the morning to level track, determined by someone who had ridden the rails detecting low spots.

We would take a 95-pound jack and raise the rails, then tamp the gravel under the ties to raise the level. Pity the poor guy who got stuck dragging the jack around.

That’s where I learned about “feigned work.” That’s when you appeared to other people that you were working but you really were not.

That went on a lot.

Sometimes foreman Bill would tell us to take our brush hooks out and clear the brush on corners so the engineer could see the track ahead.

When working on the track and it was time for the train to come by, we would put a “torpedo” on the track to alert the engineer to slow down. If you put two torpedos on, it would alert the engineer that he should stop the train.

Other duties included the repair of track and, in the case of a derailment, rebuilding the track.

There was no “feigned work” then. Then we grabbed rail tongs and carried the rail to where we installed them on the ties. Rails were made for specific places, just the right amount of curve, or for that matter, straight.

If cars were off the track, the railroad would send in equipment to lift them back onto the track.

Also, while in high school, we would ride the train to some of the nearby towns during basketball season. The NP line had a train going and coming back that fit the basketball game schedule in such places as Garfield, Oaksdale and Rosalia.

My friend Joe Emerson’s mother was the telegrapher for the NP at Palouse, so we were at the depot for hours on end.

Now back to the “bucket list.” You really need to take a train trip, sometime in your life. Forget, for once, air travel or taking your car.

Gone is the elegant service associated with trains, but the ride is worth the trouble.

And gandy dancing is sort of out now; they have powered equipment to do the job. But I think you will agree that the clack, clack of the train will ever be in your memory.