all the recent talk about axle journals etc. got me to thinking about journal brass. they are quite heavy and back when scrap brass was only 35-50 cents a lb. there was a big market for the stolen items. of course, by the time the price got over a dollar, there wasn’t much of it around account of everything being roller bearings.
inside pilferage was a big problem for the railroads and i remember when the car foreman had the shop guys weld up a heavy barrel with a hinged lid that locked down with a chain and padlock. scrap brasses were inserted through a slot like in a mail box and since he had access to the only key, he thought the problem was solved. of course all the car knockers had access to a cutting torch so that idea didn’t work out so well.
every year when the coal miners took their two week vacations around the 4th of July, the railroad would send a whole squad of cinder dicks down to southern Illinois to guard the empty hoppers that were laid up for that period. the local inhabitants would raid them for the brasses and steal a fortune. the cars were usually hit while stored on remote sidings out in the countryside.
it won’t hurt to tell you how to do it now since there are none available out there like in the friction bearing days. this works best on empty cars. you need a fulcrum point like a tie stub or concrete block and about an 8 foot hardwood 4x4. lift the box lid, one guy pries under the truck sideframe below the journal box enough to lift the sideframe (strength is not an issue but being morbidly obese is an advantage) and the other slips out the wedge and brass. large channel locks or tongs are recommended since only a fool would risk his fingers inside the box while his buddy hangs on the end of the 4x4. just remember, never steal more than you can carry. the damned things are heavy and a good man has a hard time toting more than one at a time through the weeds.
by
I never considered people stealing the brass journal bearings
I do remember reading, I think in Botkin’s ‘A Treasury of Railroad Folklore’ (he wrote several such books many decades ago, on different aspects such as Southern Folklore, Mississippi Folklore, Western Folklore etc), that hobos and the like often used to steal the waste from the journals, since these oil-soaked cloth & rags were great for starting and keeping camp-fires going. Those relating this story (I believe Botkin culled the stories in his books from many different sources) claimed always to leave enough waste/packing to prevent problems, but they may have been, well, covering their…butts. Stil a magnitude of difference from stealing waste packing and from stealing the bearings themselves.
Theres been trouble in WA state and other places probably with folks stealing the wire from underground transmission and communication lines. Copper was high. I don’t know about now. I know aluminum has dropped to about 10 cents a pound now. BILL
copper was scaring 3 bucks a lb. a few months ago around here. now it is down to about 2. the old trick when there were still a bunch of lines on the telegraph poles was to cut it down with a tree trimmer. of course, the thieves had to find a scrap buyer who was not exactly “washed in the blood of the lamb” to sell the stolen metal to. and, he would want it below market price becuase it was hot.
chutton01 metioned the hobos. i never saw them as much of a problem. we used to give them a sandwich and a few smokes and put them on a deadhead caboose for Avon although i think most of them bailed off when the train stopped at Mattoon to change crews.
unless, of course, they were illegal imigrants. then we turned them in for the INS bounty. i have long forgotten but it used to be about 5 or 10 bucks ahead. hell, you could make an extra day’s pay every night shaking down a delivery from the Cotton Belt. we would take them over to Captain Garcia at the Fairmont City police department since he spoke fluent Spanish. they thought they were going to the welcome center.
grizlump
Same in Maine. Many contractors were out big bucks due to these thefts, not to mention the effect on construction schedules while replacement materials were ordered. One big worry was people stealing ground wires from electrical substations; no one got fried doing this - YET [xx(]