Somewhere in the transition between relay logic switchgear and the Hall of Railroad Technology this got discussion got more difficult to follow and I am not certain Sandy Mitchell and I are talking about quite the same thing here.

There are a number of people, participants in RYPN, several railroad employees, officers of historical groups, present and former employees of the locomotive builders, volunteers at museums, staff at some of the larger museums, who regularly seek and exchange information and support each others efforts through a very informal e-mail network. They work well together to do many of the kinds of things Sandy is describing, it just isn't visible at RYPN nor does it need to be. Doing it this way removes it from the distractions and battles of discussing the technical issues in internet discussion groups. One recent joint effort by a half dozen regulars on this forum supported troubleshooting needs for two 65 year old locomotives that needed particular tasks completed to allow them to make several scheduled fantrips.

This was done quietly and privately because it could be done relatively quickly and efficiently that way. None of it needed to involve other organizations or internet discussion, and I mention it just as an example of things going on behind the scenes to address known needs for information and technical support. Yes, information is being saved and we do have some idea of "who has what" technical information and is willing to get it copied and distributed when there is a need. Yes, some of us have a rough idea of "who has what" old equipment and parts, and try to guide those seeking parts to the appropriate sellers, that has been going on for many years now.

Could any of the people presently helping specific organizations with individual problems in this way afford to do this kind of thing full time as a voluntary service for every museum and tourist railroad in the United States?

I doubt it.

PC

A resource like this that operates basically in "secret," with no accessible knowledge of what is available or who has what, is not an information archive. It's a hoard.

These collectors can certainly say they helped "X" number of projects. But for every project they may have helped, we have no idea how many more have gone wanting for lack of knowledge that this resource exists, or a lack of ability to properly contact anyone who knows who has what.

Now, I full well know the problem of random, open accessibility. There has to be a way to 1) properly make available actual practical information ("Anybody know what pressure we're supposed to have in these fuel injectors?") while 2) still being able to deflect "time-wasters" to more appropriate information resources ("I just bought this builder's plate; where do I find a photo of the loco?" or "where do I find a roster of all Limas built?")

This, mind you, would be a perfect role of a revived "L&RP" website: a "FAQ" guiding the most frequent railfan/foamer questions to resources like roster/diesel-spotter sites, libraries with the appropriate books, the books having "all the answers" to particular queries (Koch's "The Shay Locomotive" for Shay questions, for example), the websites for T&H societies/museums for specific railroads, etc.

North America lacks an "official" bibliography for railroad history books like the British have (The Ottley," three volumes on the shelf behind me, with 20,000 listings!). Perhaps a "wiki" bibliography, consolidated from many contributors but conforming to a specific style?



You get what you pay for.
Ideally, someone could make the case for a grant, to be administered or jointly provided by any/many of the entities previously mentioned, for an administrative director, to be overseen bysome committee or BOD (NRHS? R&LHS? some RYPN board? Input from TRAIN or Kalmbach, or even Simmons-Boardman?) Possible internships, provided by the likes of Kalmbach, universities with museum studies programs, and/or TRAIN?

Heck, I'd apply for Kalmbach's preservation grant to cover this kind of thing, except there are too many unanswered ambiguities involved at the moment.

Part of the problem is that we need to be able to promote railway preservation with commercial-style and commercial-type promotion and public relations. This cannot be procured reliably on a volunteer basis.

The Tourist Railway Association tried to do something along these lines years ago. John Bush and Rick Burchett both wanted to create a discussion forum for the membership.

The forum was to be moderated, open only to TRAIN members, with the exception of one or two "Where can I ride a steam train?" categories for the public to use, and real names were to be used.

As webmaster, I set the whole Framework up. There is a discussion forum and a photo gallery, in place and operational. We publicized it in several issues of TRAINline and asked for members and discussions.

The intent was that you'd post a question saying "I need a..." and another operation would reply "We have a couple surplus...." or questions on operation and repair and maintenance etc.

The fellows at the Strasburg shops gave it a real good try. They posted info, updates on projects, photos. Again and again they posted stuff, sent me photos. They got very little response in return. A few other folks joined. Very few posted much at all.

There are two problems with an effort like that:

1) Reaching "critical mass" is very difficult. A forum where nobody posts won't attract new members, so nobody posts, so no new members, so nobody posts, so no... <infinite loop detected, execution halted>

2) The folks who know the most about doing this kind of stuff are busy DOING IT! They don't have time to sit around in forums talking about what they did and how to do it. They don't spend a lot of sitting in front of a monitor.

No matter what flavor this eventually ends up being, the basic problem is the same. The fellow most qualified to write your article on replacing staybolts is probably too busy replacing staybolts...

- Bob

Very well stated, Bob.

PC

AMEN,Bob!!

Ross Rowland

My thinking:

If the idea is to create a library of useful information, how about a repository of short papers. At a semiconductor company where I used to work, engineers could submit short "white papers" to a shared, searchable repository. The papers covered solutions to problems that engineers felt could be useful to others in the company. For example, if an engineer found a slick solution to some problem, like how to measure some electrical parameter easily, he/she could write a short "how-to" paper and post it to the archive. The rail preservation community could do the same thing. In a one-page summary, a person could document how some tricky preservation problem was overcome. For example: How missing castings were replicated; how a wooden car was jacked up and leveled; what gold paint was used for lettering; how Pullman green was approximated; etc. A paper could expand on someone else's paper, too. For example, one such paper might begin with, "Paper #10093 described a method of stripping varnish. In this paper, I suggest an alternate method... etc, etc." The good part is that, unlike publishing for a glossy magazine, there would be no pressure on the writer to have perfect grammar or spelling. Also no need for photos, graphic design, or any of that useless showy stuff that just adds hassle, expense, wastes time, and at the end of the day just results in people burning out and giving up. A lot of the posts on this forum would make great short papers of this kind.

Sandy says,
A resource like this that operates basically in "secret," with no accessible knowledge of what is available or who has what, is not an information archive. It's a hoard.


Labeling a successful collaboration of technical knowledge as secretive and as hoarding. What is your problem? Some of the best locomotive technicians in this country, volunteered their time to come up with a workable solution to problems that had to be completed by a deadline and you want to apply derogatory labels. Geez, its no wonder no one wants to post anymore, when the vocal minority would rather be be a critic, than a listener with questions.

My 2 cent's.
Mike Tillger,
a proud member of the secretive hoarding Scranton gang, remember folks I never offered to help anyone connected to Railroad Preservation

Wanna paint me as cynical? Guilty as charged.

But it's a cynicism hard-earned. For every instance where I've dealt with an appeal for historical technical information of the sort being discussed here and found a prompt and informative response for free, there's been another one where the answer was along the lines of "we can sell you the manual for $50/$300" or, more often nothing. And it's not helped by the fact that I just flipped through the estate auction catalog of just such a "hoard" of catalogs, manuals, and the like with books and publications going back to the 1840s.

Do we know who has what? Do we have any way of finding out? I mean, just by logical deduction we can assume if we need some Baldwin information, SMS is the place to go; ditto Whitewater Valley for Lima, and Delaware-Lackawanna (or a couple other places) for Alco information, both printed and "School of Hard Knocks." But F-M? GE road switchers? Oddball brake stands or controllers?

Sure, the "good old boy" network is useful. But what if you're not one of those "old boys"? Suppose your own "walking encyclopedia" drops dead, and you have to "train" a new operations director--an occurrence too common in this field?

I'm not suggesting that every manual, blueprint, and report be put online in Google Books. But this field could use guidance to the fact that TRAIN has a manual library, for example, and that membership has its privileges. Or, lacking that, that there's a huge repository of stuff at Sacramento, St. Louis, or Strasburg. Or, if you're looking for information on military railroads, look at--where? Fort Eustis? Fort Lee?

Is such a directory worthwhile? Of course. Should such a directory be public, or behind a paywall? Why or why not? Discuss.

A related problem I've seen time and time again--and not just in railroads, but everywhere--is that very often the folks that are excellent at a craft, be it machining metal, fixing cars, brewing beer, or writing computer code, are often terrible at communications. They can fix a watch or turn a burl bowl perfectly, but can't write a coherent and grammatically correct paragraph or lecture you on how they did it to save their lives.

But is this to say that there can be NO effort expended to pick the brains of retirees? We've already lost many, many people who have forgotten on a good day more than their replacements will ever hope to learn. Can't we hunt down the retirees, many who (I have found) have extensive collections of useful paperwork, and pick at their brains and archives in a constructive manner? And I'm not just talking technical information, but also railfan and even "foamer" information.

Can I suggest an idea or two? First I think the idea of resurrecting the grand ol' mag is terrific but for all the reasons already outlined would probably die the same painful, slow death as the first one.
Another magazine (my favourite mag) which has gone down this same road is Extra 2200 South. I am sure a chat with the on line publisher would soon tell you the fors and againsts of producing an on-line news magazine for payment (note I didn't say profit!).
I think it would be worth looking towards England for what may be a solution and I have no doubt many people may not approve to begin with, but perhaps after some serious thought the idea may be seen to have some merit. There exists an English publication called Heritage Railway which essentially covers most aspects of rail preservation in the UK as well as briefs on preservation issues worldwide.
There are two options I'd like to submit for your thoughts, firstly it would be to work with the publishers and greatly expand the magazine to include North American issues over, say, a couple of dozen extra pages. Or secondly- and this is my preferred option- basically reproduce L&RP as the second half of the magazine. But it would be printed upside down so if you start the mag at the front you get the English Heritage Railway, and if you flip it over you get L&RP till the middle of the mag. 2 magazines, double the advertising revenue and not a lot more in overheads.

Over to you.................

Wes

I don't care if you want to be a cynic, but a least take the time to learn the facts before labeling those who made the effort to provide help as secretive and hoarders. These same people might be the ones to provide you with the answers to your next technical question. Maybe your not getting the good free answers just because of your cynical attitude to most of your postings here on RYPN. Bring on your GE roadswitcher and air brake questions to this board. and stop the drivel, that is what it will take to turn this board back into a more interesting website with useful information and not the argumentative BS that personally turns me off.

Mike Tillger
a proud member of the secretive hoarding Scranton gang,

Alexander D. Mitchell IV wrote:

"Can't we hunt down the retirees, many who (I have found) have extensive collections of useful paperwork, and pick at their brains and archives in a constructive manner?"

If you have found they have extensive collections of useful paperwork, presumably you already know where some of them are. Have you been hoarding that information?

I have been interviewing retirees for 44 years and publishing the information as fast as I can write the articles. But my available time to spend putting it into print is limited.

I have also asked at chapters of our National (So-Called Historical) organizations that are located near equipment builders why they were not doing the same thing, and received some of the most amazing excuses you could ever possibly imagine.

Years ago I suggested one of the people who rode the Alco Black Maria demonstrators in 1945-46 and delivered DL-109s to the New Haven as a speaker at an appropriate venue and was told flatly NO. I was later advised that the suggestion touched off an argument within the group. Some members did not want a knowledgeable non-member (i.e. and "outsider") showing up to undermine their standing as the local experts. That is the kind of politics you run into with some organizations run by cliques that think they are the owners of railroad history.

If there was a retired former training manager from a locomotive builder participating in this forum, I wonder what the outcome would be? Would participants make an effort to listen and learn, or would they just want to argue?

If there was a national information resource set up, I wonder if the Board of Directors would be people who have spent their lives working on locomotives, or the ones that show up with a camera, and want you to stop all the work, and close all the doors so they can take pictures of the locomotive.

PC

Another proud member of the secretive hoarding Scranton Gang.

Good points Preston, but see, that's what I think RYPN.org should offer, the place where we have less of the latter and more of the former. At least in comparison to other internet forums. The photogs have rail photography forums, the railfans have their foamer forums, why can't the staybolt drivers, museum directors, C&O historians and ALCO 251 head gasket replacers have theirs?

TB
Not a member of the secretive hoarding Scranton Gang, but wondering if they take new members?

Tim, First you have to be able to FIND the secretive hoarding Scranton Gang. After all, they are hidden from view.

Gosh I wonder where you would look for them?

PC

Another proud member of the secretive hoarding Scranton Gang.

Because either:
1) we find out about their libraries/collections/etc after they die, and the stuff shows up either as a donation to a library/historical society (well, can be good, if they know what they have) or at the auction house (stuff goes willy-nilly, often to other "hoarders"); or

2) the guy, for whatever reason, doesn't want to talk to outsiders. Either he's afraid that someone will discover, break in and ransack his massive collection, or he thinks "I spent all this money/effort gathering this collection, so it's mine; go get your own collection", or they seem to think that providing access to this stuff will somehow diminish the future value of it. Or who knows what's going through their heads? Maybe it's like the guys that collect comic books sealed in bags in mint condition, never to be read..... (I think, inevitably, there may end up being published a collectible comic book where nobody ever finds out what's inside....)

Now, granted, I can certainly see at least some part of what they're talking about. As I joke, I don't loan out my impossible-to-replace stuff unless I know where to come and break your windshield, but I'll be happy to burn out a photocopier. But I've loaned out lots of it to other groups for display, and am in a copying process for another group to receive a duplicate set of one (one of a kind) scrapbook collection. The Maryland Rail Heritage Library asks that you be a member in good standing of either the Baltimore Chapter NRHS or the Baltimore Streetcar Museum before we loan out materials to take home/to a photo shop, and even then we have to have a duplicate copy if possible. (Of course, we'd make exceptions if someone needs to take drawings out for a large copy for a restoration project, for example. We'll cross that bridge when we get to it, and so far as I know it hasn't happened yet.)

And, yes, there are fans out there that will drop everything and bend over backwards to assist even an innocent or trivial query. I've run into retired officials who had what seemed to be complete timetable collections from a railroad, or the likes of Herb Harwood or Bill Howes, ex-B&O/Chessie officials always eager to help if they can find what you want in their stuff. Tom Taber III has put unbelievable amounts of work into his railroad resource reference books and his "Railroads of Pennsylvania Encyclopedia and Atlas," which he basically sold at cost of printing (and has proven worth every penny).