Hoein' the Short Rows Page: 24
xvi, 240 p. : ill., ports. ; 24 cm.View a full description of this book.
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like striking a brick wall. Many ribs were taped by doctors,
and many were the bruises suffered before the company finally
provided specially designed cabooses to cope with this.
Early steam engines were built with long levers called
Johnson bars right in front of the engineer's seat. The lever
connected to the reversing mechanism which also determined
the degree of tractive power applied. It was necessary to stand
to move it. An engineman wanting to move forward pulling
moderate tonnage would move the lever along its forward arc
to a point about midway the arc. If more tonnage were to be
moved or a grade to be pulled, he would place it farther down.
He got more pull this way, and less speed. Raising the lever as
the train pulled more easily gave more speed. Then he was
"hooking them up." The lever was the "strong arm," and after
technology replaced the Johnson bar with a small lever which
pivoted along a notch quadrant placed handily at the hog-
head's side, the name "strong arm" transferred to the new
device. When the hogger was gathering running speed quickly,
or trying to maintain speed on a grade, he would notch the
lever down a bit and widen out on the throttle. Then the
exhaust became sharper and louder, and it was said that "he's
knocking the stack off her." Pulling a grade on slick rail could
cause the drivers to spin and the engine to "fall" down unless
the rails were sanded. The engineer released sand which
flowed through tubes from the sand box down around the
drivers to just a couple of inches above the rail. The sand
would flow right on the rail ahead of the surface of the driver
so long as the wind was not too strong. In order to maintain
comfort for passengers, passenger engineers would keep the
cars stretched by braking against power, that is, breaking
against steam. Such a stop is a "passenger train stop." Freight
engineers weren't usually so careful.
An engineer was "cannonballing," or "stonewalling,"
when he was working his engine unnecessarily hard, knocking
the stack off to no purpose. This wastes fuel and water and
makes an engineer unpopular with the fireman because his
workload is increased. Firemen lacking the know-how of24 * ODEN
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Hoein' the Short Rows (Book)
Volume of Texas folklore, including folk arts and crafts, lime production, oil and petroleum, information about cockfighting, folk poetry, mysticism and other stories. The index begins on page 231.
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Texas Folklore Society. Hoein' the Short Rows, book, 1987; Dallas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc38855/m1/42/: accessed May 22, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Press.