The Axe Grinder

Memories that Last a Lifetime

admin — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 07:48:59 +0000

When you grow up in NYC and move elsewhere, you always carry the NYC experience with you. The following is a campfire story related to the Axe Grinder by a retired FDNY firefighter and Queens native now taking it easy in someplace far away from NYC.

My GG1

That shot brings back some happy memories.
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One day, in 1965, I walked down the ramp into Sunnyside Yard with The Old Man who, through his and my Mom’s connections with the Pennsy, had arranged a cab ride for me and The Old Man, in a GG1, #4877.

I had spent much time dodging GG1′s when running around Sunnyside Yard!!! Now, I was finally gonna get to ride in one! Down to DC, and back.

The Old Man was a Pennsy patrolman 1948-50, before he moved to the FDNY and my Mom was a waitress in the Savarin resturant in Penn Station from 1940-65. Needless to say, they knew a few people. It was a memorable day for me.

Many years later, in August of 1988, about 1500 hours. I’ve just come off the Pulaski Skyway, and am waiting in line to pay the toll and enter the Holland Tunnel and get home to Queens after having spent 2 weeks at a Jersey Shore house my mates and me rented for the summer.

I happen to look to my left, and 2 blocks away I see the outline of a classic black plate girder trestle. Gotta give it a quick look. I knew there was the former Jersey Central yard there, but I had never been there. As I get closer I see its 2 trestles and there is a road between them, leading up a small rise. As I get to the top, I behold a sight that makes my jaw drop.

I sat there, just staring, for a good 5 minutes. What was I looking at? GG1 #4877, in faded Tuscan Red & cats whiskers! What a sight!

Sitting on a lonely stub track. What a mess she was. I drove into the yard, which was empty, and parked right next to the GG. I climbed up and saw that everything was smashed. The windows all broken. No catenary over her head. Not a spot of grafitti though.

What made my jaw drop you may ask? This was the same GG1 that the Old Man and I had a cab ride in. To Washington and back. In the summer of 1965! When I was 15.

I had seen 4877 in Sunnyside Yard dozens of times, pulling “name trains” around the loop. What are the odds that we bump into each other, 23 years later, in Hoboken! Totally by chance.

4877 was also the last GG to pull a revenue train, NYP to S. Amboy in Oct 1983.

She sat there for almost a decade! For many years GG1 4877 was stored in a yard near the New Jersey Transit Passenger Station/Hoboken Passenger Station in NJ unprotected from vandals or the weather. In July 2003, 4877 was moved from Hoboken to a small NJ Transit yard in the northern end of Morristown where restoration efforts could begin. There were plans to restore it to its original Tuscan Red 5 stripe and to make it possible to relocate it to various areas around the state of New Jersey for display.

4877 is now in Lebanon, NJ right of exit 20 on Route 78. In 2010 4877 received some restoration work and is being repainted in its original Tuscan Red & cat whiskers paint scheme.

PLG

Cough it Up

admin — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 04:00:22 +0000

Congratulation NYers! The MTA has a present for you.

$2.50 for subway and $7.00 at the toll booth. That translates to $14 to go to Staten Island and $3.50 to go to Rockaway.

Full Story at NBC News

Here it Comes

admin — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 03:55:27 +0000

Another Corona Mass Ejection and I don’t mean a bukkake contest in Flushing Meadows. From the Space Weather Prediction Center:

An R3 (Strong) Radio Blackout is now in progress, beginning about 7:00 p.m. EST today. The site of the eruption, previously active Region 1429, is now near center disk, so there’s high-potential of an earth-directed CME. In addition, expect the imminent beginning of a Solar Radiation Storm. Analysis now occurring on both fronts, watch here for updates.

Look for auroras on Thursday. Living in NYC doesn’t help and even if you’re out of town, the full moon won’t help much either.

Follow the Ovation plot:

23 Years

admin — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 04:08:14 +0000

Where does the time go?

and from 25 years ago…

Dance Party

admin — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 03:44:37 +0000

This guy might be holding an informal dance on some recently deceased dude’s grave and it won’t be Charles Napier’s grave.

It’s 3AM. Do you know where your hurricane is?

admin — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 07:40:01 +0000

We found Morris and got the wave height gizmo working again.

Current conditions (3:00 AM) at the Gasaxe Hurricane Observatory in Rockaway Beach are as follows:

Air Temperature 75 degrees
Dew Point: 75 degrees
Wind Direction: E
Wind Speed: 36 mph
Wind Gusts: 40 mph
Barometer: 29.12″ steady
Wave Height: 15′
Wave Period: 13 seconds
Ocean Water Temperature 70 degrees

How Long has Bloomburg Lived Here?

admin — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 02:41:01 +0000

In tonight’s press conference, in response to a question about price gouging he said: “it’s not the New York way.”

Oh please.

Surface Activity Loop

admin — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 02:29:07 +0000

Watch this. We’re going to bed.

An Urgent Plea

admin — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 02:21:47 +0000

The staff at the Axe Grinder Hurricane Observatory has lost contact with Morris Fink who is observing from an undisclosed location in Belle Harbor.

His phone goes directly to voicemail. If you happen to see a short, stocky, elderly gent wearing coonskin cap wandering the streets of Belle Harbor or Rockaway Park, tell him to call us on either his phone or the handy talkie we gave him.

Hic Hic Hoorah!

admin — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 02:09:09 +0000

The current satellite image shows the eye close to the Southern end of the Delmarva Peninsula. An HF radio contact in that area is seeing winds in the 50-60 knot range.

The storm is more than half over land now and is apparently weakening in intensity.

We’re gonna finish this bottle of vodka we’ve been working on and go to bed for a while.