Taxes, Trains and Transportation Tours

I have been away too long, involved with other writing projects. Of course, this is also tax season. I am happy to report that my train #1040 left the station on time. I hope yours did too.

The museum’s quarterly newsletter is in the mail, sporting a new name and look. Tell us what you think of the name, Revolutions, and the newsletter. If you don’t receive it and want to, call 342-5670 or e-mail info@vmt.org.

This issue features Bev Fitzpatrick’s new column, View from the Cab, news of recent and upcoming events, and photos of the Advance Auto Gallery and the A 1218 in the snow. You will also find a picture of the “lost locomotives” on the Virginia Scrap Iron and Metal property.

Speaking of the auto gallery, its grand opening is May 1 from 5-7:30 pm. That exhibit also includes From Mud to Mobility, a review of the past 100 years of VDOT.

Just days before that event, on April 26, is a rail tour. Sponsored jointly by VMT, the N&W Historical Society, the Roanoke Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society and the O. Winston Link Museum, the tour will focus on little known rails from this area’s past. They include the Valley Railroad, the narrow gauge link from the Ore Mines in South Roanoke and the N&W lines near Shaffers Crossing. The tour will be offered twice, at 9 am and again at 1 pm, departing from the Link Museum. For details, please call VMT at 342-5670.

Drop by BB&T this month or next. You can do some banking and get a taste of “VMT on location.” The museum will have displays in several branches including the J 611 tapestry, brochures, images from our collection, gift shop items and membership info. Bank employees will take membership orders and gift shop purchases. BB&T locations featured in April are Towers, Tanglewood, Oak Grove and Main. Consider it a new kind of branch line railroading. Shucks, BB&T even sounds like the name of a railroad.

Finally, thank you for sharing some of your valuable time by reading the blog. I also appreciate your comments, including those that disagree with me or criticize VMT. Your views are important to us and we learn from them. If you ever have comments about the blog that you would rather share privately, you can e-mail me at info@vmt.org.

Happy trails to you this weekend.

The farmer and his sons

There is an old story about a farmer and his sons. On his death bed, he called his sons to him and told them that there was a great fortune buried beneath his fields. After his death, the sons took up their shovels and spades and dug over the farmer's fields looking for the buried fortune. They found nothing. They did not understand what their father had told them until the fields rewarded the sons' labor with an abundant crop later that year.

This week, the prizes of our collection -- N&W's #611 and #1218 -- are down at Norfolk Southern's East End Shops for the 125th anniversary celebration of Norfolk Southern/Norfolk & Western. Further, your Virginia Museum of Transportation is co-sponsoring and hosting a lecture and book signing by Rush Loving, Jr., author of The Men Who Loved Trains in November. Our co-sponsors include the O. Winston Link Museum, the C&O Historical Society, the N&W Historical Society, and the Roanoke and Blue Ridge Chapters of the National Railroad Historical Society. These two things couldn't be less related, save for one important element. -- collaboration.

Will we see any money or additional foot traffic from having our two most famous locomotives off-site? No, quite the contrary, really. Will the book signing be a profitable experience for us or any of our co-sponsors? At least not monetarily, no.

Wick Moorman, Chairman of Norfolk Southern said not once, not twice, but thrice in a speech that the N&W Class Y6 #2156 which currently resides in St. Louis, Missouri should be brought home to Roanoke to stand next to its cousins, #611 and #1218. Think a bit of the sight that yet may be, those three steam engines -- A, and J, and Y -- all in one place again.

What greater fortune could there be beneath this field? And who better to work the field than we, the sons of the railroad?