"So close, only the paycheck is missing."
Nov 19 2011
Newsletters, November 2011 Comments Off
Binding of Diesel Era magazines is complete. Binding of Model Railroader magazines is complete.
I will be taking inventory of some magazines which were donated to the VRA recently to see if there are any which can be used to expand our collection.
I have ordered binders from Railpace . I will be putting Railpace magazines in binders next.
Nov 18 2011
Meeting minutes, Newsletters, November 2011 Comments Off
Date: November 17, 2011 Location: Saint Clement's Church, Hawthorne, NJ Call to order: 7:17pm Minutes Recorded by: Matt Phalon, Secretary
President's report: (KC Smith) Full slate of officers to vote for. Change is good. Move in a new direction, or where ever the new board decides to move. We are still here, can always be reached.
Vice President's Report: Charles Smith: No report.
Treasurer: Voted to move $5k back to JKW at October Board Meeting. Savings $2600, checking $6000. Not counting Santa train income. Motion made by Charles Smith to accept report, seconded by Carolyn Hoffman.
Secretary: August 2011 minutes distributed. Motion by Paul Trabert to accept report, seconded by Steve Gerritsen.
Santa Train – Matt Phalon Date: December 3, 2011 Location: Wayne-Route 23 Transit Center Times: 9:30am, 12 noon, 2:3pm
Committee: Chairman: Matt Phalon Crew Caller: Betsy Newbury Character Coordinator: Kevin Rebner Signs/Banners/Ticketing: Charles Smith Internet Advertising: KC Smith Other Assistants: Frank Ball, Carolyn Hoffman, Justin Kerstner, Steve Gerritsen and Andre Rebner.
Update: All train crew and parking lot crew is filled as well as all characters and helpers thanks to the hard work of Kevin Rebner and Betsy Newbury. At time of meeting, we are still in need of two Santas. Please contact Kevin Rebner or Matt Phalon if you know of someone to play Santa. Station office hours for ticketing at Tuesday from 6-8pm and Sunday from 12-2pm. Please contact Matt Phalon or Charles Smith if you are able to be at the station on either of those days. Matt is usually there on Tuesdays and Charles on Sundays, and Justin and Carolyn have also assisted in covering station hours. To those interested in learning what it takes to run excursions, please come and work with us during office hours at the station. Any and all are welcomed to do so, and the extra help is greatly appreciated.
Hawthorne Station – Frank Ball: Roof is on the top of the building. Gables/end pieces haven't been done yet. Going to get price for cedar shake shingle. Asked contractor to deliver material a few days in advance so we can paint it. Gingerbread is going to be replaced. Look at gutters in the spring.
Pavers – Charles Smith: Place order on Monday for bricks and pavers after double checking all orders for spelling.
Yard Sale - Carol Smith: Thanks to everyone who helped. Raised ~$1700. Still have a few things to sell (eBay?) Got a lot of donations from VRA members and Hawthorne community. And we sold the dragon head!!
Benches – Frank Ball: Price tomorrow (11/18). Go ahead to get three benches made. Benches are going to be 6 feet wide.
Landscaping - Kevin Smith: Fertilized grass. Mulch in the spring. Fertilize shrubs now and again in March. Replace mulch by street side of station with rock from the paths on the former station site. Kevin will look at different suppliers for pricings and possible donation.
Motor Car Trips - KC Smith: Successful run on Stourbridge and M&NJ. Southern Division trip only ran to Snufftown Road. Chris Vitz got into an accident and totaled his car while trying to deliver sandwiches to Sparta. VRA offered to pay 25% to NYSW (due to only running 25% of the trip) and the NYSW waived the fee completely.
Newsletter – Matt Phalon & Mike Goralski: More pictures, more article submissions MUST be sent in. All articles are due on the 1st of the month (February, May, August, November).
JKW Fund – KC Smith: Scranton train show-did not go due to snow storm. Jersey Central show is Sunday, March 4th at Mother Seton High School. Frank proposes to use one of the new display cases as a consignment case to sell stuff from members and have 10% of sale donated to VRA.
JKW Library - Paul Trabert: See report sent to Newsletter.
URHS Report - KC Smith: Building foundation has begun. Star Trak hopes to have the building up by the end of 2011. Swap Reading trucks with roller bearing trucks and donate current trucks under RDG to Whippany. CMSL is working to expand to Winslow Jct. URHS has been offered the first trip down to Winslow Jct. EastRAIL may return in 2012 in a substantial auditorium in north Jersey. URHS has come to the conclusion that a single site for a state museum will not happen, and take existing museums and tourist operations and make an umbrella group that cross promotes all of the museums and the places in the URHS. It is currently a work in progress. Equipment owned by URHS would be turned over to individual museums but still under the umbrella of the Heritage Museum.
Motor Cars - Steve Gerritsen: URHS car has nothing going on. MT-19 is getting new fuel filter and fuel lines. Woodings may have slight issues. Dave is keeping it for the winter and working on it. Brush car, A5, has a fuel tank on it and a fuel line. Mower deck needs to be retro fit for it. 40B is getting done this spring; getting prepped for paint during the winter and painted in the spring. Two cars bought from the M&NJ; A car needs a strip down and and rebuild. Bruch car is friken awesome; hand pump hydraulics, huge sickle bars, reporting marks were found, motor needs to be rebuild, sickle bar needs to be redone, has hydraulic turntable. Containers will be rearranged in Boonton for better access.
Election Nominations - KC Smith:
President: Steve Gerritsen Vice President: Charles Smith, Justin Kerstner Treasuerer: Andrea Rebner Secretary: Carolyn Hoffman Director: Mike O'Toole, Matt Phalon, Kevin Smith
Each nominee must write a paragraph about why they feel they are fit for the position.
Displays – Steve Gerritsen: Come up with schedule for displays and open houses. Come up with themes for displays.
Andrea – VRA joined Chamber of Commerce. Proposing to have banner made with VRA name on it.
——NEW BUSINESS—–
Hawthorne Tree Lighting: VRA is going to be part of the Trolley bus tour around Hawthorne on December 2nd. Mrs. Claus and and Elf will be at the station for it. Carolyn Hoffman will be down on the Saturday after Thanksgiving to decorate more and is looking for people to help. Frank brought lights and a tree to put in the station. Frank Ball has also brought a train set to setup. Tree lighting is at 6:00pm preceded by a parade. Give away coloring books and mini candy canes. Start setting up at 4pm.
Easter Train - KC Smith: Hamptonburg Caboose Museum is looking to raise money to restore the caboose and the Middletown & New Jersey is looking for help to put M&NJ 44-tonner, #1 back in service. Sunday trip will run out of Middletown, NY and run east over Moodna Viaduct and back. This is a completely new market and both M&NJ and Hamtonburg have agreed to put out signs and banners–including one on an M&NJ locomotive. The profits from the Sunday train will be split between the two. For the volunteers, we will get picked up around Hawthorne/Radburn and ride up to Middletown.
Toys 4 Tots – Carolyn Hoffman: new site http://toysfortotsnj.com/ Running Saturday on NYS&W and Sunday on Morristown & Erie. Kevin Phalon agreed to be official photographer. Two teams of 3 or 4 people to work the ground on Saturday.
Adjournment: 9:03pm (Entertainment start)
Nov 15 2011
Newsletters, November 2011, Santa Train Comments Off
This year’s Santa train will take place on December 3rd out of the Wayne-Route 23 Transit Center with an 8-car train and will run, like in year’s past, at 9:30am, 12 noon, and 2:30pm and run west to Dover and back. Along the way, we will be passing the West Boonton Yard, the restoration site for the United Railroad Historical Society of New Jersey.
This year’s committee consists of myself as the Chairman working along side with Charles Smith, KC Smith, Frank Ball, Steve Gerritsen, Betsy Newbury as our Crew Caller and Kevin Rebner as our Character Coordinator being assisted by Andrea Rebner.
Thank you to Charles for heading up our Marketing with putting out a majority of our road signs and banners, KC for taking care of our newspaper and internet advertising, Betsy for getting our crew roster filled up weeks in advance, Kevin for getting our characters in line, and Mike O’Toole for getting our website updated and running. This year, our ticketing office hours are Tuesday 6-8pm and Sunday 12noon-2pm. I encourage you all to join in and help doing our office hours.
This train is shaping up to a great success. At the time of this writing, we are still short two Santa’s. Each Santa will be in charge of two cars in the train, for a total of four Santa’s on the train, and without the Santa’s, we have no Santa train! Please help ask everyone and anyone you know if they would like to be Santa and help put smiles on the faces of over 2,000 people and help make their Christmas a little more special. This train will be here before we know it!
Nov 14 2011
Newsletters, November 2011 Comments Off
We have had one heck of a busy 2011 and don’t see any let up for the remaining two months. Yet to be done are our Santa Train on December 3rd out of Wayne and on December 2nd we have a new addition when we take part in the Borough of Hawthorne’s Santa Parade and Tree Lighting. Both of these projects will be covered in detail elsewhere in this issue.
As for what we have accomplished these last three months I would like to thank and congratulate Chris Vitz and Craig Hartman for running two successful weekends of motorcar trips over the NYSW’s Syracuse line and also on the Stourbridge RR and new trackage now operated by the Middletown and NJ RR out of Campbell Hall NY. Unfortunately the freak snowstorm that hit on October 29th cut short our NYS&W Southern Division trip, which we will reschedule for spring of next year.
Next I want to give a big thank you to everyone who helped make our two-day yard sale to benefit the station a huge success. I want to especially thank my wife, Carol, who took on the chairmanship and did an outstanding job of organizing, publicizing, pricing and overseeing all aspects of the project. We grossed about $1700 in two days and immediately put that money to work by signing a contract to put a new roof on the station.
Speaking of roofs, thanks to Frank Ball’s leadership just three weeks after the yard sale the new roof went on the station and it looks great. We now need to get the wood clapboard and trim on the ends of the building between the upper and lower roof sections replaced. Frank has already reached out to our old friend Ed Newman to get us an estimate. We have decided that a professional should do this work due to the very steep pitch of the roof and the danger in putting volunteers up there to do the work.
Now on to the future. I am happy to report that we are working on a deal that will hopefully see us be able to expand our passenger train operations into New York State. All the details are not yet in place but we are meeting with two groups who want to work with us to run Easter Trains out of the Middletown NY area. We would most likely be giving the profits to two separate railroad preservation projects in that area and hopefully be making some new friends and customers.
As most of you know when I ran for President two years ago I said I would only do it for two years because I personally think it is a bad idea to have the same person in charge for any longer than that. I also said that I would not run for any office after my time as President was up because I am convinced that new blood in leadership roles is very important to allow for the continued existence of any organization. I have been helping to lead the VRA since we started back in 1993 and I think that now is my time to step aside. I want to thank everyone who has helped make the VRA what it is today; if it were not for all of you we could never have done what we have.
Nov 14 2011
Announcements, Newsletters, November 2011 Comments Off
October 1st was the date set for the 2011 version of Hawthorne Day and it looked like Mother Nature was not going to be kind. Not only had it rained for days before which saturated the group, but more rain showers were forecast for the day. But because it was just showers, the town moved forward with the plans and with tents over most of the vendors most would stay dry. As it happened the crowd turned out, and other than lots of mud under our feet the day went pretty well. We brought a motorcar for display, which was a big hit with the kids and kids at heart. We set up our table with our photo board, fliers on the station, motorcars, our group and one highlighting our yard sale the following weekend.
We had lots of very nice comments on the work we did at the station and a few questions on when the pavers would be installed. We also had a number of offers for donations to our yard sale, all of which by the way came through. It was nice to see how many people recognized the work we have done to make the downtown area a little nicer. Andrea, Frank, Matt, Charles and I manned the table and the car and while we did not set out to make any money, we did get a few donations and lots of good will.
Easter Thank You Picnic
Long-delayed because of all the work we have been doing, our Easter Bunny train Thank You Picnic finally happened on Saturday September 10th at the station. We had a very good turnout of people who had volunteered on the train and we had a very good time. We had burgers, dogs and even shrimp on the barbecue, along with assorted salads, drinks, chips, candy, cookies and oh yes, marshmallows, which we found out work very well as projectiles. It’s been a while since we had the chance to just sit back, enjoy each other’s company, have some fun and laugh as hard as we did. Thanks to everyone who came out and a special thanks to everyone who helped set up, cook and make the day a good time.
Hawthorne Tree Lighting – December 2nd
We have been asked to participate in this year Christmas Tree Lighting and Santa Visit in Hawthorne on December 2nd, which is the day before our Santa Trains. The plan is to decorate the station inside and out and open it to the public. Inside we will have Mrs. Santa, who will read Christmas stories to the kids and have an elf hand out candy. In addition we will offer free pictures with the Mrs., which we can e-mail to the parents. We will have an NScale layout inside and a G-Scale layout outside, weather permitting of course. The town will be running a trolley bus which will stop by the station along its route, dropping people off to see what we have to offer. The night will begin for us at about 6 and end around 8:30 and to make it a success we will need a few volunteers to play Mrs. Claus and be an elf. Plus we need people to be there to show people around and run the train sets.
To get the station ready we are going to need to decorate it including a tree inside and icicle lights outside. Who knows, maybe we can even get a tree set up outside. But all that is going to take volunteers. We hope to have it all done by the Sunday before Thanksgiving, so if you would like to help please call the station at 973-238-0555 or write an e-mail and say you want to help.
Nov 14 2011
Motorcar Trips, Newsletters, November 2011 Comments Off
It’s putting things mildly that the fall VRA NYS&W Southern Division speeder run didn’t go quite as planned. With that said, all involved worked in extraordinary circumstances to ensure the safety of all NARCOA participants. I’m proud to have been a part of that team in the capacity as a flagger, and while I hope we don’t have to test our safety skills quite so much next time, I stand behind the work we did that day to get everyone down Sparta Mountain safely.
The first detour train of the day pulls through Sparta Junction as the VRA group waits on a siding before proceeding. This westbound would be the first Metro North detour train of the day, running over the NYS&W from PC Junction to Campbell Hall, NY.
Between directing automobile traffic and helping out in any way possible, the volunteer flaggers, Chris Vitz, Steve Weiss, and Craig Hoffman all made sure things proceeded as best they could. It’s in the thick of it when the truly talented shine, and this was no exception.
Here now, are some photographs that I managed to take on the day of the run.
After taking hours to make it up Sparta Mountain, the decision came over the radio: 'we’re calling the run.' The call was made to turn the cars at Snufftown Road, since it’s the least busy crossing in the area. Here we see trip pilot Steve Weiss look on as a car is turned.
In stark contrast to the photo taken earlier that morning, the second Metro-North detour train (an eastbound this time) moves through a very wintry-looking Sparta Junction area. The motorcars again yield to the train, and are on the Eastern Propane siding waiting for the main to clear and the Form D to be issued.
With everyone safely back down the mountain, Metro North detour trains cleared, and the switches lined and locked, the motorcars make their final move of the day back onto the main. Everyone was eager to get into a warm automobile, if not so eager to drive in the foot of snow Mother Nature graced us with.
Nov 14 2011
Announcements, Newsletters, November 2011 Comments Off
Nominations for VRA officers will now be accepted for the upcoming election. Please submit nominations to VRA President KC Smith via email at volunteerra@yahoo.com. If necessary, nominations from the floor will be entertained at the November VRA meeting as well.
Nov 14 2011
Newsletters, November 2011 Comments Off
The VRA Yard Sale raised nearly $1700 for the new station roof.
On October 8th and 9th, the VRA ran its first ever yard sale, inside and outside of the station. During the week before myself, Charles, Andrea, Tina, Carolyn, Frank, KC, John, Matt and Paul helped organize all of the donated items into piles by category and price them. What a huge job, but many hands make little work. Charles also helped by putting up flyers and KC put up signs. Between those, the classified ad and the flyers that were passed out the prior weekend during Hawthorne Day – and the fact that we had great weather – we had a huge turnout. Thanks to all that worked and the many that came to browse our treasures and also to buy, buy, buy (including ourselves).
We made close to $1700! We still have some valuable items such as a set of Mikasa china, a silver tea set, and an antique caned rocking chair that we hope to sell on eBay in the near future. If anyone has experience on selling on eBay, please give me a call. During the clean up, we put many of the leftover items in the basement of the station for a future yard sale, donated stuffed animals to the fire department, some treasures to Andrea’s church for a sale and leftover books to the library.
Thanks aplenty to everyone who stepped up. Please forgive me if I forget anyone. To non-VRA members, thanks to my sister, Patti, for helping display items in the station, making displays for the jewelry and her and her family for making signs.
Thanks to Denise Griffin, a former high school classmate of KC’s and Hawthorne resident, who donated items, also helped spread out things in the station and spent her hard earned cash a number of times during Saturday and Sunday.
Frank Ball and Matt Phalon work the hot dog cart at the VRA yard sale.
To VRA members, Matt, Kevin, Charles, KC, Justin, Steve, Frank, John Kroll for putting up with my ordering them around and lugging many,many boxes of items up and down into the basement and in and out of the station and hauling heavy tables here, there and everywhere. Many thanks to Andrea, for helping sort and price, donating items, asking her church and coordinating the movement of the many tables we used for the sale and being there with suggestions when I needed them. Thanks always to Charles and Frank who are constant helping hands with anything needed.
Thanks to all the helpers who maintained the money table and helped during the sale hours: Joan, Frank, Joe Weber, Andrea, Charles, Craig, KC, John Kroll, Carolyn, Paul, Shirley. And last but not least, thanks to my husband, KC, for keeping me on track and helping me figure out all the stuff I didn’t know and picking up the ‘things’ I dropped. You’re the man.
Nov 14 2011
Newsletters, November 2011, United Railroad Historical Society of NJ Comments Off
Star Trak is continuing to work on our equipment at the Boonton Yard.
The shop building permits have been approved, and the URHS can move forward with construction of the maintenance building.
The URHS is negotiating a swap with the owner of twin NYC dining cars. The cars are currently located in South Carolina. Robert Franzen, the owner of these two dining cars, is looking to swap his two cars for four of the URHS’ green coaches. URHS will be further negotiating during the next couple of weeks.
Nov 12 2011
Announcements, Hawthorne Station, Newsletters, November 2011 Comments Off
Well, it finally happened. On Monday, October 31, 2011, (Halloween) a crew descended bright and early on our beloved station, and began ripping the heck out of the roof. They hacked and pounded, and tore until there was nothing left of it.
Surprise, surprise, upon totally removing the existing shingles, it was discovered that the existing substrate (that’s wood to the uninitiated) was mostly in excellent condition. We needed to replace about twenty square feet of board, but the major portion of the roof was in great shape (and didn’t need any work – hooray!). Not bad for a 117-year-young building. An old unused stack was removed as part of the work, thereby eliminating a potential future leak site. The ‘gingerbread molding’, and spire on the East end were removed and saved for future consideration.
Any future penetrations in the roof could void our warranty! The new work started with nine feet of water and ice shield, followed by a layer (on all other surfaces) of fifteen pound felt. (If anyone wants to know specifics on materials used, feel free to ask me.) Then, new period-style shingles were installed. Of course, during the installation, the railroad which – we had closed – had to be reopened briefly to allow a local, staffed by our own Steve Geritsen, to use the runaround located west of the station and return thru our work area (some guys will do anything for attention) which had a tremendous impact on our work (just kidding, we still love you Steve).
A visit to the station will reveal that the ends of the roof have been left exposed. The original station had clapboard in this area, and in the interest of maintaining a degree of historical accuracy, we will be installing matching clapboard in these areas. All in all, another great day at the station preserving the history of the NYS&W. We can all take pride in the work that we have all worked so hard to accomplish!
All photos by Frank Ball.