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Weekly News August 27, 2018Description
South of Pittsburgh, 1930s: Seven times between 1934 and 1942, I was privileged to attend the Grand American Trapshooting tournament at Vandalia, Ohio, with my father, although in 1934 it was for only one day. We would always drive from home, and except for the last two years of this time period, there was no Pennsylvania Turnpike. Each way the trip took two days, and my dad’s favorite stopping places were the George Washington Hotel in Washington, Pennsylvania, or the famous old spa at Bedford Springs, about 180 miles from Yorklyn. Bedford Springs was a sprawling frame resort from the early 19th century (President Buchanan called it the “summer White House”), and even though it was on its “last legs” in the 1930s, it was an experience to stay there. The dining room was formal with full-course dinners complemented by a small musical group, including a violinist. Our bedrooms, complete with small porches and makeshift private baths, were in one of the wings, 500 feet or so from the lobby. (After World War II, the Bedford Springs property was leased to G. Bland Hoke, former manager of the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C., and upgraded to a first-class resort. The Glidden Tours of 1948 and 1951 stayed two nights each at Bedford Springs, and the participants were treated royally. Falling again into disrepair, Bedford Springs was closed and its buildings shuttered in the late 1980s, only to be bought by Washington (DC) interests and reopened as a deluxe Marriott Resort.)
In 1934, my father engaged Joe Stoeckle of the Wilmington Packard agency to accompany him, and they left in time for the big “shoot” in our 1932 Packard Model 904 straight eight, seven passenger sedan. It was arranged that Uncle Bassett and Aunt Mary Ferguson would leave Auburn Heights several days later in my dad’s ‘32 Model 902 club sedan, his “everyday” car. My mother and I would be passengers, along with the Fergusons’ son Gene who was starting his sophomore year at Carnegie Tech in Pittsburgh. The first day, we drove the Lincoln Highway to Pittsburgh, over several Allegheny Mountain ridges, going up in high gear and down in second gear to cool the engine and protect the brakes. Uncle Bassett handled this very well. Staying one night at the Schenley Hotel and dropping off Gene at Carnegie, the four of us proceeded to Dayton, Ohio (ten miles from the shooting grounds) via Washington (PA) and the old National Road (U.S. Route 40) through Wheeling, Zanesville, Columbus, and Springfield. I remember crossing the Ohio River at Wheeling, with all the signs facing us on the other side reading “Sohio.” This confused me as I knew we were going to Ohio, but I had never heard of Sohio. Soon, I learned that this stood for Standard Oil of Ohio, and filling stations of this brand were everywhere. We stopped for lunch at a small restaurant on the main street in Cambridge, Ohio, and they had two prices for full-course lunches: 25 cents and 35 cents. Probably chicken croquets or a stuffed pepper would have been at the lower rate, more expensive meats were the higher. The next day, my dad showed the Fergusons the shooting grounds, and then they headed east toward home in his club sedan. One day later, my parents, Joe Stoeckle, and I headed for the Century of Progress Exposition in Chicago in the “big car.”
Except for 1937 when we didn’t go, and 1941 when we stopped at the end of our long western trip, Clarence Walker (1875-1964), a longtime Wilmington trapshooting friend of my father, accompanied us. We kidded him mercilessly, and he thrived on it. Ralph Willis, a well-known shooter from Penns Grove, also accompanied us in 1940 and 1942. Except for 1936, all these trips were made in our ‘37 Packard Twelve, still in our collection.
My dad avoided going through cities at all cost, and Pittsburgh was no exception. We would get on the Lincoln Highway east of Lancaster (PA) and follow it at least to Bedford and sometimes beyond. Several ridges of the Alleghenies had to be crossed. Sometimes we got off Route 30 just west of Bedford onto Route 31, which was a slow but hard-surfaced road that ran west through Somerset, Donegal, Mount Pleasant, West Newton, Monongahela, and joined U.S. 40 at Washington. I remember stopping for ice cream at Somerset on a very hot day in 1936. Other times, we continued from Bedford west on U.S. 30 to Ligonier, before heading south to pick up 31 at Donegal. West Newton was in a deep valley with high ridges to cross on both sides. Harry Doernte, a trapshooter who attended the shoot at Yorklyn annually, lived there. A lot of trapshooters lived in the area south of Pittsburgh, and they formed a Western Pennsylvania Trapshooters’ League, with several gun clubs like Uniontown and Washington participating. As a side note, baseball great Stan Musial came from this area, as did Hollywood actress Shirley Jones. Where we crossed the Monongahela River at the town by the same name, heavy steam tug boats were pushing their barges loaded with West Virginia soft coal toward Pittsburgh’s steel mills. West of Washington (often the next day), we would be stopped at the West Virginia State Line, and a polite man would ask whether we were carrying any fresh vegetables, flowers, or produce. Sometimes he looked inside the car or opened the trunk. This was the “Japanese Beetle” man, who was trying to prevent beetles from crossing the state line. After 5 minutes or so, we were on our way again. This practice lasted for several years before World War II.
Before the Interstate connection was built between the Pennsylvania Turnpike at New Stanton and Washington (PA), the 120 miles from Bedford to Washington (PA) was slow going, but it was certainly not monotonous. As we returned from the Grand American in 1939 and 1940, we could see evidence of the building of the Pennsylvania Turnpike, especially on the mountainsides between Bedford and Breezewood. The original section of this road, 168 miles from Middlesex (Carlisle) to Irwin, 20 miles southeast of Pittsburgh, opened on Labor Day, 1940, so in 1941 and 1942, we used it from its eastern terminus at Middlesex to Donegal, where we got off on the familiar Route 31 to proceed through the region south of Pittsburgh.
In 2005, Ruth and I spent the better part of three days south of Pittsburgh, but we included the Horseshoe Curve, the Allegheny Portage Railroad, and Fort Necessity where a young George Washington surrendered the fort to the French in 1754.
Work Report
The Tuesday, August 21work session was attended by 8 people: Steve Bryce, Bob Jordan, Bob Koury, Stan Lakey, Brent McDougall, Bill Schepper, Mike Todd and Ted Kamen, supervisor.
• Work continued on the electric trains and a section of 027-gauge track was borrowed to use for making a new engine(locomotive) tester.
• The forks were cleaned on the 76.
• The brakes were adjusted on the 725.
• The pump rod cover was moved on the 740 allowing the right support/stabilizer rod from the engine to the rear axle to be unscrewed.
The Wednesday afternoon work session was attended by: Jerry Lucas, Dave Leon, Stan Lakey, Larry Tennity and Bill Schwoebel as supervisor. Work included:
• A new pilot screw pin was made for the H-5 Stanley pilot and installed, was heated and pilot lit, nice blue flame, so the car was fired up and driven off the property, pilot flame did not blow out.
• An attempt was made to lower the Model 735 Stanley’s water automatic about one inch so the water level in the boiler when running would be at a lower height, but a brass street ELL flare fitting broke off the rear end of the automatic. The automatic was removed and taken to the shop to try to remove the broken off street ell. An easy-out tool will be needed for this job if anybody knows where they are?
• The vaporizer cable was removed from the Model 725 and cleaned, forks cleaned (one down pipe was choked up). One cap screw on the right top down pipe was stripped when removed, threads chased and it screwed back in OK. Fuel run through vaporizer followed by compressed air, cleaned cable reinstalled in vaporizer so burner should be ready to attempt a fire up.
• Steam cylinder oil pipe from oil pump check to steam pipe got a new fitting installed at the steam pipe end on the Model 740 Stanley.
• Steam cylinder oil was added to the engine case of the Model 87 Stanley because some was lost during the car’s use during the Eastern Steam Car Tour.
On Thursday, August 23, the following attended the work session: Dave Leon, Larry Tennity, and Stan Lakey supervising, and the following tasks were performed:
• A broken fitting was removed from the Boiler Automatic on the Model 735.
• On the Model 725, the bonnet flap insulation was replaced, the oil pump was inspected, and the rear end was jacked up enabling the rear wheel to be turned to try to find the noise from the oil pump gear box. We could not hear the the reported clunking noise. We will try to fire it up and run it with the wheel jacked up to try to duplicate the noise.
• We attempted to remove the right stabilizer rod on the Model 740. We cleaned and sprayed the threads with penetrating oil on the end that connects with the axle to allow the nut to be moved towards the steam case allowing the bar to move back so that it can be disconnected from the steam case.
AVRR Report: Volunteers: Mike Ciosek, Bob Koury, Brent McDougall, Dave Moorhead
• Installed new trucks on business car and cleaned it up car, now ready for Steamin Day
• Started building 10-foot sections of track
• Constructed a small wooden retaining wall on double track section between the station and tunnel to prevent dirt from rolling down on track.
• Installed a drain under the double track section between the station and tunnel to channel water away from track
• Started cleaning and preparing maroon car for painting the undercarriage and roof end pieces.
• Dropped off two trucks at machinist in New Jersey to bore out journal boxes for new wheels and axles.
• Dropped off two freight-style trucks so machinist can install new bolster pins
