Train Trips, by Phillip Hoyle

As a child I liked to go to Coronado Park on South Washington Street to ride the miniature train. It puffed around the perimeter of the park back then and to me seemed as real as could be, an adventure of movement, a fascination with technology, a feeling of the wind on one’s face while traveling at imagined breakneck speed. I’m sure I thought of bandits or Indians like in some western movies I had seen. Of course the kiddy train was tiny compared with the big black steam engines that pulled box cars, fuel cars, grain cars, and the like. It was tiny compared with the big Union Pacific passenger trains that came into our station at Junction City, Kansas.

I also recall sitting on a large train at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo up above Colorado Springs, a train that for years took passengers from the zoo to the Shrine to the Sun higher upon the mountain. To four-year-old me it seemed gigantic but still would have looked puny next to the Union Pacific trains back home. I was decked out in my western wear at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. Back home I would simply be a little boy, but even at home the railroad loomed large. My grade-school best friend’s father was an oil man on the Union Pacific and greeted and lubricated all the trains on his daily shifts. I fantasized taking a trip by train, a real one that led to something new.

One Sunday morning many, many years later, a Sunday morning that turned traumatic for our mid-Missouri congregation, I heard a train whistle blow as if to call me away.  That morning the senior minister Jack McInnis died. He and I had worked with the church for seven years. My only thought was to get on that train and get out of there. I did so two years later when I booked a seat on the Southwest Chief to Albuquerque. But first I caught a ride on the Amtrak that stopped at Jefferson City on its way to Kansas City. There I ran around for a day with a dear friend to say goodbye.  

Finally, I got on the big train to make my way west. At KC Union Station there was a long delay. We waited and waited for the very late train. When we boarded, I got comfortable and waited for the train to start moving. No go! I got out a book to read. (On trips I’m always prepared to read.) I made my way through several chapters. Still the train sat in the dark rail yard. Finally after three hours more the train took off. There had been engine trouble. No quick fixes were available and no extra engines could be substituted unless the train had been sitting on the track at Chicago or Emeryville (near San Francisco)! We made our way across the Great Plains at night.

Before I fell asleep I thought of my Great Grandfather, Frederick Schmedemann, a German immigrant who in the late 1860s worked for the Union Pacific as its crews laid the first track across Kansas. He cooked for the crew and during that time met William Cody who was supplying meat for the workers at the expense of the vast and rapidly dwindling buffalo population after which he was named. The family story says Buffalo Bill was so pleased with the meal my great granddad prepared, he gave him a gold piece. By the time I came along, though, there had been way too many depressions in the US economy. The gold piece probably went towards improving the farm or paid some doctor for caring for a family member with the flu. Who knows? I never saw it, never heard any subsequent stories about it. Maybe it was lost on a bet or paid for the first year’s coverage when crop insurance first was introduced. There were such stories about those later days on the farm, but no gold piece.

As the sun came up in mid-Kansas that summer morning through the window I watched rabbits, deer, and groups of domesticated cattle (no buffalo herds of course) and thought more about my great grandfather, his new life in America, and the new life I was hoping to begin in Albuquerque. Finally, I got a little breakfast, after which I returned to my novel.

I felt sorry for elders on that trip and for parents with little children. But when compared with wagon train travel down the Santa Fe Trail, this mode of transportation was a breeze.  That afternoon, when we were starting up Raton Pass, the train slowed to a stop and began backing up. The engineer announced that a switch had failed. They would change it by hand to get us on the sidetrack where we would be safe from the train hurtling down the pass towards us now. When that train sped safely by, we still didn’t move. The engineer said a computer engineer was on his way from La Junta, Co, to fix the problem with the switch. I chose this time to clean up and shave so I’d look good for my family. Finally, finally, finally we pulled into the Albuquerque station where my family met me and drove me to our new apartment. The reunion was grand, and a couple of days later I began a new job in that fair city.

© 22 July 2014 

About the Author 

 Phillip Hoyle lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE program “Telling Your Story.”

He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com