21 Years On The Erie Railroad

I do believe that railroaders are some of the finest story-tellers on earth. Railroading was an exciting occupation, sometimes dangerous, sometimes humorous, but always interesting.

An old-time Railway Express man once told be this one, and he swore at the time that it was true. Names have been eliminated to protect any remaining relatives.

This story happened around the time of World War I. There is a small town just a few miles west of Greenville, PA named Shenango. Shenango at that time was a very busy place; in fact, it was busier than its larger neighbor Greenville. The main reason for this was that Shenango was a railroad hub. The Erie Railroad, the Bessemer & Lake Erie Railroad, and the Pennsylvania Railroad all entered Shenango, and shared a large passenger station there.

The station agent at Shenango was, to put it mildly, not a very nice person. At the time of this story there were many immigrants moving through the area on the various passenger trains of the three railroads. All the trains stopped at Shenango to discharge or pick up passengers, and the station agent had a little business going on the side. He would brew up a large batch of tea, pour this tea into beverage bottles, jam corks deep into the necks of the bottles, and sell the tea as beer to the passengers passing through. He made sure that he didn't sell to any of the passengers that were going to spend some time at the station; just to the ones who might get off to stretch or pick up some tobacco, etc. By the time the unfortunates discovered that the beer had turned into tea, the trains were on their ways to Chicago or Jersey City or Pittsburgh.

The station agent was not very well-liked by anyone, due to his temper and self-importance. My friend, the story-teller, and a friend of his once got even with the agent. They had unloaded a calf in a large crate from one of the late evening trains just after the station had closed for the night. The crate was open on one end, with just some wire keeping the calf from escaping through that end. The two men parked the baggage truck containing the calf and the crate in front of the agent's office door, with the open end right next to the door, locked the wheels of the baggage truck, and went home after a hard day's labors. On arriving at work the next morning, the agent was greeted by the crate, the calf, and a large pile of manure.