Volume 65 – Issue 8 August 1, 2025
Is it hot enough? A special thank you to everyone that has come out to run our trains this past month in the Bonsal heat. I just returned from a family trip to Alpine Texas, and while it was 103 out there, it’s a lot more challenging in the North Carolina humidity. While there, I was able to catch Amtrak’s Sunset Ltd coming through the desert in Alpine and almost asked the conductor if he had been a friend of Tim’s. I am always amazed at how far and wide he was known. This brings me to my first item. We have now viewed the volume of items that will be donated to NCRM from Tim’s estate. There is a lot as one might imagine, and it all will need to be moved this month. Tammy, Tim’s sister, has helped us a great deal by boxing and placing into tubs the items that will go to us. We will soon be coordinating a move to Bonsal. Look for an announcement for a few hands to help with the loading and unloading. What is not being donated to NCRM will be auctioned by the family. The date will be posted once it is announced. We will once again host a wedding party on the New Hope Valley Railway. On Saturday, August 30th a special charter is scheduled to take place at 2:00pm. A usual crew call will be announced in advance and volunteers will be needed. Special charters such as this are an important source of revenue for the museum. Other charters will be coming up in September. Check out the Telegrapher for a list of upcoming ride days. [print the last page and put it on your fridge. – ed]
Recently, Marco Zarate announced the removal of the first scrap metal container from Bonsal. This drive collected 12,480 pounds of unused metal that had been laying around for quite some time (in some cases decades). Efforts were made to mark the items to be saved, because as we know, track materials are rusty by their nature and old engine 17 parts are needed for patterns. A big thank you to Marco for organizing this drive and contributing to the appearance of the museum for our visitors. Thankyou’s also go out to everyone that either helped with the cleanup effort, or marked material to keep. Elections are coming! Even though we just had special elections, they are coming up again. In keeping with our staggered Board of Director terms, in September it will soon be time to vote for 3 regular board seats. Look for candidate announcements and ballots to come out in September. If elections are coming up, that means Halloween can’t be far behind. The summer is moving fast and it will soon be time to think about Halloween decorating once again. Finally, writing a regular column for the Telegrapher every month finds me digging for topics and ideas to highlight. There is a lot of good work that takes place every week around the museum. I would like to use this space to highlight events, projects and the people that make them happen. If you have something you would like me to call out, please send me an email. If you are a committee chair and don’t have enough material for an article but would like me to highlight a project, please let me know and I am happy to include it.
That’s all for now. Stay safe, I’ll see you at your museum!
-John
John Morck President, NCRM
Get to Know a Member
by Tom Hutchinson
Name: John Cummings
How long have you been a member? Since May 2024
Where are you originally from? Woodstock, Illinois
What is your job in real life? Shop Foreman for the oldest and largest municipal equipment dealer in the Carolinas, Amick Equipment. Where do you live now (City & State only)? Burlington, NC
Family? Son, almost 18 years old. How did you become interested in trains? I grew up 10 miles from the largest train museum in the United States, the Illinois Railway Museum (Union, IL). I wore my dad out as a kid going pretty much every weekend. It was much different back in the late 70’s, early 80’s. I remember cab rides in Frisco 1630 and J. Neil’s Lumber 5 and shoveling coal not very well at 10 years old. I’m also a rabid collector of HO scale late steam, early diesel years Chicago and North Western Equipment.
How did you find about NHVR? My sister lived about 2 miles from the NHVR for a little while, and she told me about it. I finally came down last May for the 40th anniversary and wound up talking to Mike MacLean. He persuaded me to become a volunteer.
What is your favorite activity at the New Hope Valley Railway? That’s a tough question. I haven’t done anything so far that I haven’t enjoyed. Being brakeman on the ghost train has been the most fun. It’s a long day that starts out pretty hectic, then we get to just kickback and enjoy the day. Then there’s the mad rush to get everything and everyone picked back up and put away. I am looking forward to more work days on 17 and seeing that operate.
If you do not receive the operating crew calls, please contact the crew callerby clicking this link if you are interested in participating in train operations! We need all the help we can get to keep the trains running safely.
Rusty Spike Nominations Needed from Members by September 30
Each year, the New Hope Valley Railway awards the Order of the Rusty Spike to individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to our museum. Pursuant to a policy adopted by our Board in 2022, ANY member may nominate an individual for a Rusty Spike. A majority of the Board will then determine by secret ballot who among the nominees should receive the award each year, with a maximum of three Rusty Spikes to be awarded each year. Nominations are due by September 30. To nominate someone for a Rusty Spike, a member needs to prepare a paragraph or two listing the reasons why the nominated individual is deserving of the award and send the nomination to the Chair of the Membership Committee, Tom Hutchinson (or nominations may be placed in an envelope in the Membership Committee mailbox in the dispatcher’s office). If a member wants to nominate someone for a Rusty Spike, but needs help in preparing the written nomination, they may contact a member of the Membership Committee (Tom Hutchinson, Robert Middour or Luke Sullivan) to provide assistance.
The Membership Committee will accumulate all of the nominations received by September 30 and present them to the Board for vote by December 1. Per Boardapproved policy, consideration for a Rusty Spike is normally given to individuals who have been members at least three years, but this requirement may be waived by the Board in exceptional circumstances. Nominations made will be kept confidential and only the Chair of the Membership Committee will know which nominee(s) have received a majority of the Board’s vote until the Rusty Spike is awarded at the annual Membership meeting. Any questions concerning this process should be directed to Tom Hutchinson.
NC State Fair is Approaching – Volunteers Needed
The 2025 North Carolina State Fair will be held from October 16-26, 2025. (For many years, the New Hope Valley Railway has operated a garden railway in the Horticulture section of the fair. Given the timing of the Fair, this is a prime opportunity to advertise our Halloween and Christmas rides which generate a substantial portion of our annual revenue. Volunteers are needed to staff the garden railway again this year. We operate from 9:30 am until 8:30 pm every full day of the fair with two shifts…each 5-6 hours long. You don’t have to have experience with garden railroading to volunteer. Newbies will always be paired with an experienced garden railroad operator, and we also have published helpful hints for volunteers. The primary duty of our volunteers is to interact with the thousands of people who stop by our exhibit…answering questions about our museum and letting them know about the fun they can have on our rides. Pre-printed rack cards are available for volunteers to hand out to visitors. With two volunteers for each shift, there are times for bathroom and food breaks.
In addition to the fun of interacting with our visitors, you get free admission to the Fair and are welcome to roam the fairgrounds before or after your volunteer shift. You will also get a pass on your volunteer day for free parking, a valuable perk. We use a computerized sign-up sheet so that you can see which shifts are available and choose times which fit your schedule (also recognizing that we have Halloween rides during both Saturdays of the Fair).
If you did not volunteer last year and are interested in volunteering this year, or if you have any questions, please contact Tom Hutchinson by mid-August, and you will be added to our email communications regarding our Fair display. If you volunteered last year, Tom will contact you in early August.
Nuclear Fuel Train Videos
by Victor Varney
There are two nice nuclear fuel train videos below. It’s nice to see a close equivalent to our two red cabooses on one nuclear train. There is also a newer version of the escort cabooses lettered DODX801 for your viewing pleasure. There is a link for more info on the Navy’s series of escort vehicles plus another video of 801. Please don’t even ask me if I can get DODX 800 or 801 donated to the NCRM….
https://www.twz.com/39654/wait-this-mysterious-heavily-armored-blue-train-caboose-belongsto-the-navy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAvFmy4859I
NCRM Scrap Metal Drive
by Marco Zarate
We recently rented a 30 cubic yard scrap container to recycle some of the ferrous metal items (containing iron or steel) which have been around the southern portion of Bonsal Yard. Some of these old parts have been stored for years waiting on a call to service which never came. The container was placed in the corner of the yard near the restoration shed currently housing locomotive 17.
In preparation for the scrap drive, we called in members able to determine if metal items in storage were critical to keep (locomotive parts or cores which could be turned in for rebuild) or excess to our needs and thus recyclable. The experts marked those items for retention with yellow spray paint dots. The real work began upon the arrival of the container. Ferrous metals were placed in the container, while other recyclable metals, such as aluminum, copper and stainless steel were segregated and stored separately for later processing.
Harold Boettcher, Velinda Chapman, John Cummings (Backhoe operator), Paul Del Blanco, Paul Giordano, Jim Jatko, Tom Kreuzinger, Calvin Kutner, Mike MacLean, John Morck and Charles Stirewalt did the loading over several days. The final total of steel turned in was 12,480 pounds which brought in over $800! As an additional benefit, the area looks better too.
Who says money doesn’t grow on trees? Sometimes it’s lying on the ground… We will have another scrap drive in the “boneyard” at the far end of our parking lot, behind the reefer and locomotive display, later in the year.
If you are available when the next drive begins, please come out and help us out.
