Op 'Till You Drop! Or, How a Bunch of Deadheads Rode the L

David Writes....

There's really nothing more I can add from what Frank and Randall have already written, other than the fact that I also operated all day on Sunday, and did not get back to St. Louis until 10:30 pm Sunday night, hence the explanation for part of the title of the post.

The best thing I noticed about both days is that we had what appeared to be very good crowds, judging from the cars in the parking lot, and on the train/streetcar. Based on punching tickets on Saturday, we had lots of paying visitors, in addition to the usual gaggle of members that congregate on special weekends. As previously mentioned, we had very good loadings for most of the trips, and the passengers seemed to enjoy themselves. Over the course of the weekend, I had six or seven people introduce themselves as readers of the blog. It was nice to have our total readership accounted for in a single day. I also noticed a lot of families taking advantage of the picnic grounds at IRM, which is good. One family even rode the streetcar on Sunday over to Electric Park to picnic, in the grand streetcar tradition.

Here I am on Saturday, taking a quick break at the end of the day, before we put the cars up for the day. 

The night ride on the wooden L train was fun, and well-attended by the Car Department regulars.  Chris Buck mentioned that with all the people on the train in uniform, it looked like a Deadhead run.  I never realized that many people at IRM liked Jerry Garcia.  You learn something every day!

Here we see Charlie Strong and Frank. taking a ride.

Here we see Joe Stupar and the lovely Gwyn Stupar, enjoying themselves.

On Sunday, I operated CTA streetcar 3142. The Green Hornet was also out, doing line training, and helping take in the crowds that were vesting the property that day. Blog reader, college student, and amateur artist Zach Ehlers was out both days. He rode around and around and around the streetcar line with me on Saturday. Also, on Sunday, I used my CSL run number disc on the 3142. If you see the number 6 in photos, you know it was me.

Even though it was Museum Showcase weekend, there was plenty of other work going on at IRM. Bob Kutella and his crew were showing off the Great Western Plow, and selling tickets so people could watch the wings unfold. The Track Department was out in full force, doing inspection work on Saturday, rebuilding a track cart on Sunday.

The weather was great, along with two days of safe operations.  What more could one ask for?

If anyone has a photo of me operating the streetcar on Sunday, please contact me at david dot wilkins at charter dot net.  Thanks!