Bolivar Breeze
Thursday, February 17, 1938
Conductor for 55 Years, Jack McLaughlin Has
Traveled 3,200,000 Miles Over P. S. & N. Lines
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Jack McLaughlin of Olean, formerly of Bolivar, holds what is believed to be a unique world’s record for traveling. In 55 years of service as a conductor he rod 3,200,000 miles - equivalent to 120 times around the world - over a railroad that is less than 125 miles long.
Retired on Jan. 1 at the age of 72, by the Pittsburgh, Shawmut & Northern R.R., Mr. McLaughlin now announces his intention of buying his first automobile and learning to drive.
Mr. McLaughin began his railroading career at Friendship at the age of 15 years, starting as a water carrier on the iron gang which laid the first road between Friendship and Bolivar.
This line, called the Friendship Railroad, was built in 1882 by Miner and Wellman, Friendship bankers, to run supplies and equipment into the roaring oil boom towns of Richburg and Bolivar.
Boom Town
Oil had been discovered only a few months when a boom town of several thousand sprang up at Richburg with no means of getting in or out except by tortuous mud roads that wound through the valleys to Portville and Wellsville. The nearest railroad was with the Erie at Friendship 11 miles away and over the steep West Notch hill which made transportation of heavy drilling equipment practically impossible.
So with pioneering courage and an eye to the lush profits through tapping this rich oil country the two Friendship bankers organized a stock company and financed the first railroad into the Allegany oil field. The survey for the narrow gauge railroad which was to climb 70 feet to the mile in wide “S” curves to surmount the 300-foot-high watershed was made by John Peterson, Mr. McLaughlin recalls.
The lad who as a water carrier to the iron gang helped to build he first railroad into the Allegany Oil Field rode over the completed line on the first train as a passenger. It was one of his greatest thrills, he says. Seats were fastened on to flat cars with a canopy fastened overhead. Thus the first passengers rode into Bolivar, shouting, cheering, urging the chugging little engine with its huge funnel smokestack up the steep grade.
First Telegraph Line
That same year Mr. McLaughlin helped put up the first telegraph line between Bolivar and Friendship. Returning to Friendship he worked in the office of W. O. Chapin, first superintendent of the line, until he was 17 years of age. Then he was given a job as brakeman on the line. He was promoted to conductor, a position which he held for 55 years until is retirement.
The Friendship Railroad was later merged with the Olean Railroad, built from Olean to Bolivar to provide an outlet south. This road was called the Allegany Central. This merged with another line to become the Lackawanna and Pittsburgh and through a later consolidation became the Central New York and Western. Soon after 1900 this line was changed to standard gauge and became the Pittsburg, Shawmut & Northern.
Conductor 55 Years
Through every merger and consolidation Mr. McLaughlin remained as conductor, running trains first between Friendship and Bolivar, then Friendship and Olean and later between St. Marys, Pa., and Wayland, a distance of about 125 miles.
This was the farthest distance he ever traveled but he ran trains after day along this line, piling up miles upon miles until the day he retired on full pension he estimated he had traveled 3,200,000 miles.
Mr. McLaughlin was born at Friendship Jan. 1, 1866. He moved to Bolivar in 1898, living here about 18 years before he moved to Olean. He has one son, Frank McLaughlin, who is an extra passenger conductor on the Pennsylvania railroad lines.
Mr. McLaughlin, in spite of his advanced years, enjoys perfect health. He has never been seriously ill.
Accommodating
John McLaughlin was one of the most popular and accommodating conductors in this section, probably in the entire state. He has been known to stop his train far from a station to take on a passenger. Time and again he backed the train to the station for a passenger who has just missed it. He was there in person to see that his passengers were safely on or off the train when it stopped at a station. His motto was: "Safety First.”
Mr. McLaughlin showed his humanitarian side when the flu epidemic took such a toll in this section in 1918 and ’19. Dr. Bacon of Canaseraga, being unable to look after all his patients, dispatched medicine to those living along the Shawmut line outside of Canaseraga. Conductor McLaughlin made the deliveries at Garwood, Swain, Scholes, Birdsall and Angelica. On several occasions he stopped the train and walked to a nearby farm house to deliver medicine to a flu patient.
On two different occasions Mr. McLaughlin, after arriving home at night, hired a taxicab and drove from his home to Ceres, a distance of 11 miles, to check up on some matters. Fortunately he found them all right. Is it any wonder that he was such a great success as a railroad man? Without doubt he would have been just as successful in any other calling.
