Patricia Lynn, my baby sister, sweeter sibling and run-a-round buddy for more than sixty years, sent the question from the kitchen. “When did railroads get started?” I recalled that Papa, our father, Louie Marshall, forty three year veteran conductor, was born in 1887. His father had been an engineer, also on the Illinois Central, southern division. In the back of my woefully dilapidated mental warehouse I came up with an answer, “Somewhere in the mid 1800’s”.
Now, that was close enough for me to give her an answer, but not close enough to satisfy my wondering wisdom as to how close had I come? Off to the library! Usually, off to the library is no problem, except this time we are on vacation, Fairfield Bay, near the ‘backwoods’ of Arkansas. That’s a long way from where my library card has visiting privileges.
Arriving at the library, I ask for directions to the railroad yards (section). Not sure that I expected an area teeming with engines black with soot of wood or coal. Finding few offerings, I turned to leave and discovered some tables with books for sale.
I surveyed the assortment of ‘coffee table books’ scattered about, and in the midst of the muddle lies the answer to the search! A gently worn cover touted a collection of yesteryear pictures of wood and steam powered locomotives.
Picking one of the books up, I find a wonderland of wonderful gigantic smoke belching locomotives pulling long lines of colorful cars across landscapes dotted with lakes and snow covered peaks. There was page after page of metal behemoths moving man westward from homes and business in the east, the land of early American settlers. In this particular book I find the answer to Patricia Lynns' question and so much more.
The four buck book is a wealth of knowledge surrounding the advent of coast to coast travel in the comfort of the Pullman sleeper. The book, like many of its inhabitants, now lies sleeping, silently, covered by a clutter of other publications, on the coffee table in Sisters’ den. Hopefully, one day, a grandchild will pick up this volume of my grandfathers era and maybe, just maybe, ask a key question which will open the doors to an oral history of prior generations and days lost to calendars in trash barrels. The memory of coal smoke on my nostrils and the shrill of a steam whistle across the Muddy Mississippi River Delta still lingers in the ‘favorites’ section of my heart, my mind and my soul.
A Pleasing Aroma
