Grapevine Hill

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C. W. Standefer was firing K1 consolidation #573 on April 21, 1929 when it developed cylinder trouble out on Grapevine Hill. He wrote a letter to the General Foreman the next day explaining what he saw and heard:

Commerce, Texas, April 22, 1929

Mr. L. D. Carrington
General Foreman.
Commerce, Texas.

Dear Sir:

Referring to personal conversation in regards to engine 573 knocking cylinder head out on left side at Grapevine.

Wish to advise that I was fireman on this engine and was called to leave Hodge at 9 P. M. April 21st. with engineer L. C. Fain. We left Hodge at 9 P. M. and did not notice any knock or pound on this engine until we got to the foot of Grapevine hill where we heard a pound on the left side and stopped and looked the engine around but could find nothing wrong. Engineer Fain at this point slacked the engine ahead and back but still could notice anything wrong, but after we had pulled the hill and he slacked off on the throttle starting down the other side is when the engine knocked the cylinder head off. As to the cause of this I can not say.

Yours truly,

C. W. Standifer

Fireman

From Chapter 3 of Cotton Belt Engineer The Life and Times of C. W. "Red" Standefer 1898-1981

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"L. C. Fain of Commerce. He was probably one of the best passenger engineers on the Cotton Belt. That son of a gun, he'd work a heavy throttle and keep her hooked up tight. He'd go into a station and make an air application and just chug, chug, chug until they finally got the engine stopped.", said R. S. Plummer in an interview for East Texas State University's Oral History Project in 1975.

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"Berry" Fain Retires After 50 Years. That is the article headline in the June 1953 issue of Cotton Belt News. L. C. "Berry" Fain started working for Cotton Belt as a laborer in 1901. He stated firing in 1905 and was promoted to engineer in 1913. He made his last run on the North Local out of Commerce on April 30, 1953. There is an R. S. Plummer photo in the News of Berry Fain and crew posing in front of RS-3 #356 taken in Commerce after his last run.