<\/p>\n
Last week we left George Flood in Boston, trying to round up freight cars that belonged to the Maine Central. He was also engaged at times in taking railroad inventory.<\/p>\n
Here are a few items in his diary under various dates during January, 1866: “Hard day’s work taking account of stock on the railroad. On way home from Augusta, engine failed and I went by team from Vassalboro to Waterville. Had a hard day’s work itemizing all expenses for 1865. Have been at B & M and Eastern depots and have got our Portland and Kennebec cars all forwarded home. Have been to Bath and have succeeded in getting five Eastern cars at Kendalls Mills from Brunswick. Have been to Salem. where they are detaining our cattle car. Have been to Portland on wharves and streets looking for cars.”<\/p>\n
In April Flood was out on the line surveying wood for the railroad. Some of it came from the Flood family, for one diary item says: “Got Sumner’s money for his wood, $87.50 from Maine Central.” Sumner was George Flood’s older brother, who remained all his life near the ancestral home in Clinton. In June, while Flood was in Portland hunting P & K cars, a car of hay caught fire, and he reports: “I worked at the fire and was exhausted.”<\/p>\n
George Flood’s diary, under date of July 4, 1866, records the great Portland fire: “Terrible fire in Portland, burning the larger half of the city. Very little has been saved of goods or furniture.” That Portland fire meant disaster for my father’s parents, when he was a child. My father was five and his sister seven, and lived with their parents in a house on Fore Street in Portland when the great fire broke out. Much of their furniture was moved to a barn that was considered well out of the fire area, but the wind shifted and that barn, containing the belongings of half a dozen families, went up in flames. So my grandfather and grandmother, with those two small children, lost everything except the clothes they were wearing.<\/p>\n
In October Flood was called to Lawrence by a wreck: “Have been to Lawrence where there has been an accident to a B & M freight train. killing two men and smashing ten of our P & K cars.” The very next day a train left the tracks at Haverhill, smashing several more P & K cars. As if that were not enough, on the following day Flood had to report: “At Newmarket another train ran off the track last night and smashed most of our cars. The accident was caused by the train running over a cow.”<\/p>\n
Disaster then struck the railroad’s supply of fuel: “Oct. 31 – P & K woodshed in Portland burned last night with 715 cords.” Meanwhile the railroad was always building new structures: “Nov. 22 – Went to Richmond and laid out the line for a woodshed.”<\/p>\n
Not all of George Flood’s railroad troubles were caused by wrecks and fires: “Nov. 30 – Saw Sup. Chase in Portland in regard to bills for stolen goods. Dec. 10 – Went to Island Pond on the Grand Trunk after a lost trunk. Dec. 29 – Walked home from the depot and froze my ears.”<\/p>\n
At the beginning of January in 1867 George Flood was promoted to General Freight Agent of the Portland and Kennebec. The diary entry for January 8 says: “Took account of wood all along the road as far as Bath. A.T. Thompson went with me. He got drunk.”<\/p>\n
George Flood certainly made the acquaintance of prominent men, and in recording those encounters he often revealed that he was carrying on profitable sidelines besides his job as freight agent: “Feb. 4, 1867 – Went to see Neal Dow and J.S. Ricker about selling them bark. Feb. 21 – Have seen the tannery at Ricker’s about bark and shall send them some soon.”<\/p>\n
On March 22nd Flood wrote that he had received an offer from the Maine Central to work for them at $65 a month. In June he accepted that job. but does not say what his title was. The diary items tell us. however, what he was doing: “June 12 – Have sent tools to the workmen in Maine Central and have oversight of them. Have been getting the names of station agents and section men on the road and seeing to lumber for the Kendalls Mills bridge. Have been to Kendalls Mills to see the bridge, then loaded iron for Newport. I do not like this job as well as the one I had on the P & K.”<\/p>\n
Evidently George Flood kept his railroad ambitions very much alive: “July 13, 1867 – Saw Mr. Prescott, Supt. of the Eastern R.R., who thinks I stand an excellent chance of being Supt. of the Portland and Kennebec, if I should remain on it as freight agent. July 18 – I have not yet entirely given up the idea of going back to the P & K, but want first to have more assurance of chance of promotion.”<\/p>\n
Through the years 1868 and 1869 George Flood continued with the Maine Central, although he was still playing with the idea of going back to the P & K. Then in 1870 the P & K was absorbed into the Maine Central system, and where he worked was a matter of negotiation between Flood and the Maine Central officials. He was made Traffic Superintendent of what had been the old Pen & Ken line from Waterville to Bangor.<\/p>\n
On February 20 Flood wrote: “Immense ice freshet on the Kennebec carried away railroad bridges of the Portland and Kennebec at Augusta, at Seven Mile Brook, and at Ellis on Ten Mile Brook, and otherwise injured the road. Three bridges have gone on the Little Androscoggin. All passengers from Somerset Railroad for Augusta have had to change to the Maine Central at Kendalls Mills and go to Belgrade.”<\/p>\n
On February 23, 1870 Flood recorded: “Maine Central stockholders met today and elected directors. including R.B. Dunn of Waterville. Did not elect a President. Considerable excitement at the meeting.”<\/p>\n
Trouble kept haunting the railroad. On March 17 Flood wrote: “The engine J. Morrill ran off the track this morning near Etna while hauling the passenger train. The engine Kenduskeag took the train from Newport to Waterville, but returning she also ran off the track at Detroit crossing. April 9 – Went to Rice’s Bridge and helped clear logs from it. They had lodged there when a boom broke. April 16 – Came to Waterville on hand car. Freight train going west ran off the track with six cars and delayed the passenger train three hours.”<\/p>\n
Even though he now had a more responsible position on the railroad, George Flood had not given up his seasonal practice of surveying wood for the line: “April 18 – Went to Pittsfield and commenced to survey wood, coming toward Waterville and reaching Burnham at night. We went into a farm house and got some bread and milk for dinner. April 19 – Started to survey wood from Burnham west, but it commenced to rain and I came home on the passenger train at 10 a.m.” All the rest of that month Flood was surveying wood and crediting it to the proper supplier.<\/p>\n
It was in 1870 that Maine railroads adopted standard gauge. The Androscoggin and Kennebec, which later became the back road from Portland to Waterville through Lewiston, and the Penobscot and Kennebec from Waterville to Bangor, had the very wide gauge of 5 feet, six inches, while the Portland and Kennebec to Augusta, and its extension, the Somerset and Kennebec to Skowhegan, had adopted the British gauge of 4 feet, 8t inches. Following a plan generally adopted throughout the nation, the Maine Central decided to make all its consolidated lines the narrower 4 feet, 8t inch gauge.<\/p>\n
The first inkling of change mentioned in the Flood diaries is the entry for September 22, 1870: “We are at work on the track, laying down the third rail for narrow gauge in the Waterville yard.”<\/p>\n
“Nov. 1 – Hard at work getting ready to narrow the track from Waterville to Bangor. Men from the lower section have been moved forward to the section east of here. Nov. 3 – Commenced to narrow the gauge today and got as far as Rogers Crossing. Men all got soaking wet and we took them to the hotels at Pittsfield and Newport. I followed with a train to move the men forward. Nov. 4 – Narrowed the track as far as Carmel. I have followed all day with the supply train. Nov. 5 – Finished the track to Bangor and on the Dexter branch. I am about used up. Nov. 7 – I went to Kendalls Mills and we ran the first train from one road to the other. Nov. 11 – All the men in the shops are now at work on new track frames for the narrow gauge. Nov. 28 – We now have about 50 cars changed to the narrow gauge and four locomotives, and have bought a new locomotive from the Baldwin Works at Philadelphia. Dec. 8 – Got tools together to change the gauge of the Belfast branch.”<\/p>\n
In March, 1871 George Flood was able to record joyfully in his diary: “Mr. Noyes has been elected General Superintendent of the Maine Central and I am Assistant General Freight Agent with headquarters at Waterville.” But Flood soon found his duties and his authority were not clear: “Went to Augusta and rode on the train to Yarmouth Junction with Judge Rice (President of the Maine Central). I told him I was not satisfied with the title of the office he had given me. He told me to keep quiet and I should not be interfered wi~h, and my duties would be no different from what they are now. He said he would see to it personally that I had a good place.” In April Flood saw another director. A.P. Morrill, who assured Flood that Judge Rice had promised early promotion and for Flood to be patient.<\/p>\n
Flood went immediately to see Rice, who told him that Flood and Hersey at Augusta were to have entire control of the freight business and that Rice did not care where Flood lived. He did not make clear the division of responsibility between Hersey and Flood. Flood wrote in the diary: “I do not like the way Hersey treats me. He does not ask me to do a thing, but orders me.”<\/p>\n
In May Flood went to Augusta to talk again with Hersey. He says of the result: “Hersey treated me most impudently and talked like an ignorant ass, as he most certainly is.” The next time Flood went to Augusta he wrote: “Hersey was away in Boston, so I got on pleasantly as I always do with the other officers.” When Flood next encountered Judge Rice, he complained about his treatment by Hersey. The Judge again urged patience and promised Flood would soon have a good place.<\/p>\n
By the end of June there had been no substantial improvement in Flood’s status!<\/p>\n
“June 26 – Went to Augusta and talked with Judge Rice about my duties. He told me for the present I was to look after the freight cars and see they were forwarded to points needed.”<\/p>\n
Flood by this time was getting fed up with Hersey and with the uncertainty of his duties. He secured two weeks leave in September, 1871 and went to Boston.<\/p>\n
“Sept. 26 – Heard that James F. Joy was coming to Boston, so I stopped to see him. He is President of several railroads in the West. He made an appointment with me at the Tremont House. I found he had no place just now for me except in Kansas.”<\/p>\n
Flood went on to Chicago and made several other fruitless contacts. On Oct.23 Flood wrote: “Had a talk with Hersey. He now understands that I am not to be humbugged, but consider my position as good as his.” As the month ended Flood was taking a more philosophical view: “Things on the road do not go better, but I have made up my mind not to trouble myself, but do all I can.”<\/p>\n
The year 1871 ended with Flood writing: “Went to Augusta and saw Judge Rice, who talks well about my future place.”<\/p>\n
Year: 1963<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Read the script for “Little Talks” program #585, Broadcast on October 13, 1963<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":405,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[796,35296],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8310"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/405"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8310\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}