North Lawrence, N.Y.
Rutland Station at Malone, N. Y.
[Some of the most interesting articles about old time railroading in northern New York State were written in the 1930s by Watson B. Berry of Potsdam. (1870-1963). He was a native of Lawrence, St. Lawrence County, N.Y., 41 1/2 miles east of Ogdensburg, and had a varied career as a newspaper journalist and attorney. He wrote many articles and short stories for magazines, focusing on life in the North Country of New York State. This one, entitled “Wood-Burners,” was written in 1936 and appeared in several local newspapers. The Ogdensburg & Lake Champlain was opened between Ogdensburg and Malone on September 1, 1850. It became a segment of the Rutland in 1901 and was abandoned between Norwood and Rouse’s Point in 1961. The 26-mile segment between Norwood and Ogdensburg is operated by the New York and Ogdensburg Railway, a subsidiary of the Vermont Rail System. It carries a variety of bulk and non-bulk items and serves the Port of Ogdensburg].
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The wood-burning locomotives and iron rails on that rugged pioneer railroad, the Ogdensburg & Lake Champlain, which ran from Ogdensburg to Rouses Point, on Lake Champlain, disappeared during my boyhood. The seven years from 1879, when the substitution of steel for iron rails began, to 1886, when it had been completed and when coal-burning locomotives had superseded the wood-burners, were packed with thrills for boys who lived at Lawrence, my home town (now North Lawrence). Besides being a wood station, Lawrence was an important live stock shipping point and the site of the last of the rail repair shops maintained at several points for the repair of iron rails.
Ogdensburg & Lake Champlain woodburner “Deer,” built in 1850, with Engineer Emerson Rounds.
We boys of Lawrence found abundant opportunities for “riding on the cars” and picking up a good practical knowledge of railroading first hand. To get to actually know and speak to an engine driver, to ride on the fireman’s seat, was aiming high, but I made it and became a persistent train and engine rider from my tenth to my fifteenth year, when I was packed off to an academy. I have forgotten much of what I learned in the academy, but all that I learned from the trainmen, conductors, firemen and engineer, the rail repair shops and live stock yards has stuck in my memory like a burr.
Of course, I was in a preferred position, for my father and his brothers were late shippers of live stock, besides furnishing a substantial part of the wood used in the locomotives. I remember hearing brother say in the early ’80’s:
“With only thirty-odd engines, the O. & L. C. Bought over 46,000 cords of wood last year. That would make a pile seventy miles long. I hope the road does not turn to coal-burning engines soon, but they are bound to come. Most of the roads are using coal now. They all started with wood-burning engines except the B. & O., and even that road had a few wood-burners.”
“How did you find out about that?”
“From Abraham Klohs, superintendent at Malone. He keeps pretty close track of all that is going on in the railroad world. Some time within the next ten or a dozen years Mr. Averell, the new president, will bring in coal. They can carry it to Ogdensburg by water. Besides, he has a new son-in-law named E. H. Harriman, who, they say, has a lot of up-to-date ideas about railroading. Mr. Averell has got him on as a director of I hope he turns out to be as good a railroad man as the old-timers.”
(That was the first time I heard the name Edward H. Harriman, His directorship of the O. & L.C. must have been one of his earliest, if not indeed his first.)
But I was not concerned with railroad officials. Engineers and conductors were more to my liking. Up to ’83 I had never ridden in a locomotive, except in a switching engine, and that somehow didn’t count. The swell locomotive of the O. & L. C. Was the “W. J. Averell,” named after the road’s president. She was a beauty. She was brass-bound, and her bell shone like silver. Her cow-catcher with its two brass sockets to hold flags, the leather seats in her cab, the big tender piled high with the sweet selling 16-inch blocks of seasoned maple and beech wood from my father’s woods, and last and most important of all, Watson Hunkins, her massive and kindly engineer, were eye-filling and awe-inspiring.
I resolved that I would not only ride in the “Averell,” but it would be something more than what we call a “siding ride.” I would ride to the next station and come home on the local freight. That would be something!
Craftily I followed my campaign. A few days later, when the “Averell” was being refused, or “wooded” as we said, I sidled up to Watson Hunkins, ready to swing up to his thrown.
“Hello, Mr. Hunkins,” I ventured.
“Why, hello.What you doing down here in the wood yard, all dressed up with a new straw hat? And what you got in that basket?”
“Plymouth Rock eggs and some of our Oldenburg apples, the first of the season.’
“I’d like to buy that basket just as it is, but I haven’t any money with me.”
“They ain’t for sale, Mr. Hunkins. I’m going to give them to you.”
“Oho! What you driving at, Wattie?”
I felt that I had hit a bull’s eye. To be addressed by y nickname by Watson Hunkins was almost as good as riding in the “Averell.”
“Well, Mr. Hunkins, I want to ride on the fireman’s seat to the next station, and I want you to fix it so I can come home in the caboose of the local freight.”
Then my heart sank. I got stage fright and was lost ready to run for home. A half-grave, half-humorous look from the great Hunkins’ eye perked me up.
“Here, give me that basket and up you go into the cab. But look here, Wattie, both of us may catch it for this. What do you suppose old man Averell would do to me if he heard of it, and what do you suppose your ma will do if you get home late for supper? They say she doesn’t approve of us railroaders because we cuss and chew tobacco. Well, I’ll have to take my chances with your ma.”
That ride took just fifteen minutes, but every fraction of a second in those few minutes were packed with a thrill. The fireman continuously stoked, a steady stream of wood blocks going into the firebox. The “Averell” was some wood-eater, and I began to understand that 70-mile wood pile my father talked about.
In the years that have passed since then I have ridden countless thousands of miles with the great and the near-great in my capacity as a newspaper man, but my ride in the “Averell’s” cab with my hero Watson Hunkins stands out in memory over them all. At the station Hunkins helped me out of the cab and went in the station for orders. He came out with an order in his hand.
“I’m sorry for you, boy. The local is held up a couple of miles west of here with a hot box or something. You’ll be an hour late getting home, and you’ll get a darned good licking.”
“Well, it was worth it. I’d take a licking any day for such a grand ride.”
“That’s the ticket! But now, come to think of it, I believe I can fix it so you won’t get a licking. Your dad owns those big wood lots so as to furnish wood for the railroad. Well, here’s a little secret that may save him a lot of money. Old Man Averell has bought two Moguls - the biggest sort of engines. They’re coal burners. They are coming from the Rhode Island Locomotive Works in a few weeks. In a year and a half there won’t be a wood-burner left and all the owners will have to depend on maple sugar. Your pa won’t be glad to hear that. Bur he can sell out his wood lots to the speculators and let them do the worrying.”
It was long after dark when I reached the kitchen door. My father and mother were in the dining room waiting for my return. The station agent knew all about my adventure and had told them. To divert attention from my misdemeanor I rushed almost breathlessly into the room.
“They’re going to take off the wood-burners and use coal - two new coal burning engines coming next month and soon they’ll all be burning coal.”
That was real news - big news to my father. He had been a bull on wood lots. He he switched to the bear side, and finding a ready sale for his wood lots, he sold them.
In the summer of 1886 the two Moguls arrived, as predicted by Hunkins. Up to that time we, like all our neighbors, burned wood in our home. In 1887, we, too, switched to coal in the house as did the others. With coal heaters installed we all wondered how we had ever managed to get through those long northern winters on wood. The O. & L. C. Had set the pace and we were glad to follow.
