> I've just been
> reading The Gangly Country Cousin describing Lehigh valley's Auburn
> division. A large trestle spanned the Brooktondale valley and landed near
> the old Follet Mansion in Besemer. I remember my Grandmother Rutherford
> taking the train form Ithaca to NYC.

My dad used to say the Bessemer line was not the Lehigh Valley RR but a
small RR company, the "Bessemer & ..?... RR" or something like that.   We
used to check our clocks each evening when we heard the whistle (steam
engine era) as it crossed some side road along the Slaterville Road on the
other side of Snyder hill precisely at 7 pm each evening heading East.

I road the Lehigh Valley from Ithaca to NYC once as a little kid and
remember it as a fantastic but noisy clanky trip.   Did it go down through
the Delaware Water Gap?   The scary part was looking way down at the water
of a big river from way up in the rattley car seemingly suspended on the
edge of a curvy rocky ledge, and then seeing the steam engine way up ahead
disappear around a corner.   I knew what happened to the family Lionel Train
engine when it went too fast, and the Lehigh seemed to be quite out of
control to my little mind!

Was privileged to see Richard and pretty Pat Nixon on the back porch of the
Lehigh Valley lounge car at 7 am at Ithaca Station, waving and talking to
the small faithful early morning crowd as they campaigned for their first VP
job.   Pissed off the locals by not scheduling the wave at a more important
time of day when more people would come out, but maybe they though Ithaca
was a farm town and not a place of late night late morning intellect.   The
word on the street was that they had more important places to go that day
and had to get started early after their midnight sleep stop at the station.
She had my vote!

Also remember the first Diesel engine on the Lehigh.    Town all excited and
we had to go down to meet it as it pulled in.   I couldn't imagine a machine
more boring, but maybe I was becoming a teenager.

cp in bc

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