Cool Links; thanks for sharing those as I truly enjoy this stuff!!! [tup] [tup] [tup] [tup]
I don’t know how this slipped my mind, but the Cripple Creek and Victor narrow gauge railroad in Cripple Creek, Co. operates a German 60 centimeter steam locomotive on their tourist line, at least they did the last time I was out there several years ago. I belive it’s an industrial locomotive and not a “Feldbahn” type, but it’s pretty close it you want to get the idea. Also, there’s a fascinating museum in town located in the old Midland Terminal Railroad station. It’s a museum of local history, and they have a three-dimensional glass map of one of the gold mines that was done around the turn of the 20th Century. My brother, who’s a civil engineer by education and training, was utterly amazed by it, as was I. Well worth a visit before or after you ride the train.
54light15 wrote:[#offtopic].
"…Sam, you might be interested to know that there are two new anthologies of Bill Mauldin’s cartoons, one has all of his military cartoons, the other has his postwar stuff…"
Thanks! I’ll go looking for it! It is a shame that there seems to be no latter day equivalent for Bill Mauldin, and the stories he told about ordinary combat soldiers.
as to the second part of the post: "…Try any good comic shop. Anyway, on the subject of 600 mm railways, there is what I can only call a “club layout” in central Germany where there is a 2 km oval of track used to run a collection of 600mm equipment.
The story is, a man restored a locomotive and had nowhere to run it so he bought a piece of property and built a line, complete with a yard, workshop and so forth. Plus a pub! I’ll try to find out exactly where from the tour company if anyone is interested. They did some fine work and had a pretty large collection of rolling stock…"
and interestingly, I found and posted a YouTube.com video of the Somme Valley 600mm (former military supply railway in France, from WWI). posted elsewhere on this Thread.
And (sheesh) this Wikipedia site: "The Froissy Dompierre Light Railway"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Froissy_Dompierre_Light_Railway
Per Samp1943’s comment that “it is a shame there seems to be no latter day equivalent for Bill Mauldin…” As an admirer of Sgt. Mauldins work for 40-plus years, let me say this. Bill Mauldin was a genius. HE wouldn’t have thought so, but assuredly that’s what he was, not just for his “Willie and Joe” cartoons from the war, but for his political cartoons as well. Someone like him only comes along, if we’re lucky, maybe once in a century. Think Thomas Nast in the 19th Century.
Secondly, Bill Mauldins brand of sly insubordination just wouldn’t be tolerated in todays military. It darn near wasn’t tolerated during World War Two, except for the fact he had some VERY high brass like generals Eisenhower and Bradley looking out for him. Ike and Omar knew that the GI’s of WW2 were “citizen-soldiers”, not professionals, and who really didn’t want to be where they were, and Mauldin’s cartoons were a good safety valve for their frustrations.
By the way, I read Bill Maudin’s “Up Front” when I was in high school and loved it, but I REALLY didn’t appreciate it until I spent some time in the military myself. Like I said, the man was a genius.
I’ve got my dad’s copy of “Up Front”, plus a well worn copy of “Mud, Mules & Mountains”, which was published during the Italian campaign. My dad was an artilleryman in the 45th Division. SOLDIERS magazine did a piece on a REFORGER exercise that Bill Mauldin observed. He wrote and illustrated a companion article in that issue. I still have that somewhere in a box. See if you can also find a copy of “The Brass Ring”, one of his last works.
As far as 600mm being too narrow, it’s so close to 2-foot gauge that several tourist operations in this country have industrial 0-4-0 locomotives. The other common European narrow gauge was 1000 mm (or meter gauge, if you prefer). When I was on my first tour of Germany back in 1978-80, my girlfriend introduced me to what was left of the Hartsfeld Bahn, which ran from Aalen to Dillingen, IIRC. Will have to do some research on that one. But my point is that it was just one of many meter gauge lines. There was one that was active on my first tour, but when I went back for my second tour in 1984-86, it had been abandoned and torn up. They used to move standard gauge cars on “rollbocks”, a narrow gauge chassis that supported the entire standard gauge wagon. Several lines in the former East Germany still exist today, but pretty much all of the West German lines were gone by the time I was there. One exception I rode was the Zugspitzbahn, but then again, it had no competition for its purpose.
Get a copy if you can of Mauldin’s postwar memoir, “Back Home.” I got the impression that the U.S. was a very angry place after the war and that Joe McCarthy was only going with the flow.
The Harz mountains narrow gauge system is over 100 kms of meter gauge track with lots of steam happening. Mostly 2-10-2Ts built in the 50s and some wonderful 0-4-4-0T Mallets that are 100 years old. If you like steam and narrow gauge, Eastern Germany is the place to be! There’s at least 10 lines running today and the Harz hauls standard gauge cars on narrow wagons and the equipment used for this purpose are all almost new and state-of-the-art. What a place!
Thanks for the tip on “Back Home.” I shall try to find a copy. And you are absolutely correct about the lines in the Harz Mountains. Unfortunately, the last time I was there, travel in the east was forbidden. Gotta save my money and go back sometime.
Just to give you a taste of what will be waiting for you:
Holy cow! I’ll bring the cheese! As for people in Hamburg, I spent my time down south in Schwaebisch Gmuend and Augsburg. We enjoyed what we refered to as Bavarian sunshine.
Bavarian sunshine! Awesome stuff, especially at the Lowenbrau beer hall. I could go for a Mas right now! Sorry to get off topic but beer and steam go together like steam and beer!
According to Fred Westing ( The locomotives that Baldwin Built ) The Eddystone works started building two foot guage trench locomotives for the British and French as early as late 1914. The French ordered a double ended Peshot type 0-4-4-0 and the British specified a ten wheeler. Both types were tank locomotives. After the U.S. entered the war the Government ordere up a large batch of standard guage 2-8-0s based on locomotives being supplied to the British at the time. These became the famous Pershing engines. Westing specifies that they were shipped structurally complete and on their wheels except for the headlight, smokestack and cab which were added when the engines were set up for running at St. Nazaire. At peak production these engines were being turned out at the rate of 300 a month. During World War II the design became the basis for the G.I. 2-8-0. Baldwin narrow guage trench engines built for the U.S. government included 2-6-2s and some of these were still in use on domestic military posts, notably Fort Dix, during WWII.
Per 54light15’s comment about the US being an angry place after the war, I think a frustrated place would be closer to the mark. You see, patience has never been an American strong suit, we tend to want what we want NOW and don’t like waiting for it. It takes time for things to return to normal after a cataclysm like WW2, and the people of the time didn’t seem to realize that. There’s an old cowboy saying: “There’s gonna be a lot of torn up ground after a herd’s stampeded.” Folks would do well to remember that.
Besides Bill Mauldins “Back Home” an excellent history of the immediate postwar years can be found in a book called “The GI War” by Ralph G. Martin. It’s been out of print for a number of years but it’s a superb history of the war and its aftermath from the GI’s point of view. Be on the lookout for it and grab it if you can find it!
Firelock, I think you’re right. One of Mauldin’s cartoons show Willie and Joe visiting a friend in a hospital with both of his legs in casts. He says, “How’s things outside, boys? Am I still a war hero or a drain on the taxpayers?”
Bingo! And to swerve us back to the main topic: We all refer to the WW2 generation as “The Greatest Generation”. Know who THEY consider the greatest generation to be?. The Doughboys of World War One. I should know, I’ve met and talked to quite a few of them over the years.
The Turks with German partners built military railways in the Holy Land in WWI. a;; 600mm gauge, with German steam locomotives. They also used the Hijaz Railway for military purposes. The Germans had an air base (yes WWI “airoplanes”) at Afulla, a still existing, now mostly Israeli Jewish, town about half way between the Sea of Galilee (Lake Tiberius) and Haifa, the latter then being quite a cosmopolitan city as the region’s major ship port. The German airmen liked to take their pass or leave time to sample varous pleasures in Haifa, not necessaly limited to the excellent beach. For transportaton to and from, they mounted a regular aircraft engine and propeller on a 4-wheel gondola car and with enough gasoline used propeller driven rail transportation to and from their vacation spot until the front collapsed and the British took over. This line was slightly different than meter gauge, the same as Jordan’s Railways today.
To DaveK: Thanks for the story about that German propeller driven gondola. I’m a student of the First World War, especially the aviation history, and this is the first I’ve heard of it. I wonder if any of those Germans aviators were involved in the “RailZeppelin” project later on?
A propeller driven rail car? I would imagine that there would have been a few adult beverages enjoyed by the passengers while riding it. I wonder if T.E. Lawrence ever attacked it as he did the Hedjaz railway which is still abandoned in Saudi Arabia.
Folks:
While on the subject of WWI and things railroading and military, I’d offer up this link to a discussion around here in July of 2010; Some of the newerr members may not have seen it, but it covers an aspect of American WWI history that is seldom mentioned these days. I hope some will find it of interest and in line with this Thread as well.
link: http://cs.trains.com/TRCCS/forums/p/193887/2116648.aspx#2116648
Covers the 40 hommes& 8 Chevaux Boxcars of WWI, and the resultant American Friendship Train,[ put together from and idea by columnist Drew Pearson]; and the Response to it from Europe.
This link is one that may also interest those who are following large bore artillery weapons of WWI;
http://freepages.military.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cacunithistories/Railway%20Artillery.html
Somewhere in 1927 or 1928, Popular Science carried an article on the deployment of the 14 inch naval rifles on the Baldwin built rail mounts. The issue(s) in question is(are) available on Google Books.
- Erik
Lawrence of Arabia did not have to attack Affula. When the German’s learned that Jerusalem had been suffended by the Turks to the British (General Allenby, and there is a Tel Aviv avenue named for him today) they vacated in a hurry. The Turks left leaving the workers orders to blow up everything, which they did not do. The Jewish and Arab employees of the rail line offered to keep their jobs and became employees of the British! But then one less sympathetic British officer had them all put in prison until the war was over. There is talk now and some engineering done about rebuilding this line in standard gauge and giving Jordan access to Haifa port.