B&M RR EMP.MAG.,F38:DEADLY NEW ENGLAND 1938 HURRICANE.STOP ALL TRAIN OPERATIONS!

Description

Your bid is for the Fall 1938 issue of the BOSTON AND MAINE RAILROAD EMPLOYEES' MAGAZINE. This is one of 284 different issues published by the railroad from 1924 to 1960 and contains an unusual 40 pages with 32 being the norm. All are digest-sized
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with small variations, and this issue measures 15.5 by 23.3 cm. Of all 284 issues, I believe this one to be the most informative and important. The Hurricane of 1938 was simply the most destructive event ever to strike New England in recorded history and the B&M railroad had no more immunity, nor defenses, than anyone else. Both in terms of loss of human life and economic damage, no New England storm has come close to matching this sneak attack by Mother Nature. As it happened, my father was employed on the summit of Massachusetts’s highest peak as an officer of the Civil Conservation Corp on 21 September 1938. My mother was 7 months pregnant with her first child and lived in a rented house high on the Mohawk Trail in North Adams. After the storm, it took my father and his crew two full days of hard work to chop their way down Mt. Greylock. It is truly an ill wind that benefits no one and my family actually benefited from the storm. Not so the B&M RR. When the storm struck North Adams on 21 Sept., electric motors were busy escorting about 1,000 eastbound loads thru the Hoosac Tunnel daily, plus 6 psgr trains in each direction, plus extras. Boston issued an order to: STOP ALL TRAIN OPERATIONS system wide on that fateful day and it was not until 23 October that anything resembling normal operations returned to North Adams. The cover scan you see below is Negus Mt. in Rowe, Massachusetts, and the rails at the bottom are the Fitchburg Div. Main Line about 10 miles east of North Adams Depot. This 40-page issue is not ALL about the Hurricane, but about evenly divided between that subject and the usual monthly news. Including the cover, there are 28 storm-related photos, many half-page in size, ..... and some rival the cover for incredibility. Pages 14 & 15 shows before and after photos of Wendell, Massachusetts, about 16.5 miles east of Greenfield on the railroad's principle revenue producing line, and these are shown to you below. Also shown is the mess in the centerfold as Rowe's Negus Mountain flowed into the Deerfield River in a landslide that took a freight train with it. The traffic manager at U.S. Steel Subsidiaries writes a long letter to President French congratulating him on the work of his employees during the crises. Guy Watson is appointed engineer of track and "Charlie" Came is the new Portland Div. Super. With the Boston and Maine Family" covers 11 pages with its always fascinating insight on what real railroad people were doing 70 years ago, and includes 18 photos. This magazine is in excellent, museum-quality condition, very clean, with slight staple rust and light spine wear. Only one available.
Your satisfaction guaranteed. Please see my other eBay auctions for more rare and scarce railroad paper. I provide personal service without silly eBay games like waiting for payment before shipping, mandated payment methods, clumsy communications and charging for return shipping. Please check my feedback and DSR's. Everything I sell is POSTPAID USA, so the winning bid is what you pay, plus eBay’s state tax if applicable, unless you want special services. I normally ship first day after auction ends IF I have a payment plan & a proper shipping address, or you are a recent previous buyer. Thank you for reading. Alden Dreyer, 91 Reynolds Road, Shelburne MA 01370-9649. Copyright by AHD August 2021.