Rocky Mountain Railroad Club October 2023 Rail Report

The Abilene and Smoky Valley Railroad was founded in 1993 as a heritage railway, dedicated to preserving the legacy of the railroad industry in Kansas by highlighting the interconnectedness of railroads, the people, and the land in our state. An all-volunteer organization, the A&SV runs regular excursions, private charters, school field trip excursions and dinner trains between Abilene and the neighboring Dickinson County community of Enterprise. The railroad operates on track that was initially laid by the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad in 1886.

Passengers on the A&SV do more than just ride trains. Since we are a living history museum project, you can experience train operations firsthand by touring our engines, talk with crew members and observe them doing their jobs, and hear the stories of how the Rock Island and other railroads once provided dependable transportation service that was the lifeline of a burgeoning regional agribusiness economy. You will board the train at Abilene’s historic Rock Island Depot in Old Abilene Town and ride in antique passenger and freight cars, including a wooden coach that was manufactured for the Missouri-Kansas-Texas railroad in 1902.

The Abilene and Smoky Valley is the only steam railroad in Kansas. We use Santa Fe 3415, a century-old Baldwin “Pacific” locomotive (built 1919) that our volunteer staff rebuilt after the engine sat in Abilene’s Eisenhower Park for 40 years. Santa Fe 3415 is our railroad’s superstar, attracting thousands of railfans to Abilene since the engine made its first run on our rails in 2009. The engine has been featured in railroad publications and TV programs, including the PBS “Tracks Ahead” series. In 2022, the Saturday Evening Post’s website named the A&SV as one of America’sbest steam train rides.

Thanks to Ross Boelling, president and general manager, and Dak Dillon Photography for hosting the A&SV's first photographer's special day.

Former Santa Fe 3415 will wrap up some 28 trips in 2023 in October 2023. The 1472-inspection is due and will require 3415's flues to be removed and inspected. This major inspection is expected to take 1 or 2 years. Fortunately, diesel #4 will be keeping the trains rolling between Abilene and Enterprise, Kansas.

Presidents column

Andy Dell

It has been a busy summer and unfortunately not all good for me personally. Thank you to all who participated in the survey. That gave our board of directors some insight as to the pulse of the membership. I will address here several of the decisions made at the September board meeting.

Printed Rail Report for members subscribing to the printed report:

The printed Rail Report remains to be a challenge since Bruce Nall retired last December from the exceptional job he had done for 25 years. There are enough members that would likely drop membership if the printed report went away and so the board voted to outsource the mailing of the Rail Report. This should aleviate some of the delay with me having to go get the printed newsletters from the printer, print mailing labels, apply mailing labels and stamps and finally drop them off at the post office. Then they are lost in the USPS system and hopefully find their way to your doorstep if you subscribe to the printed report. Printing costs and postage amongst other things have increased in price over the last few years and the board will be discussing price increases for the printed report as costs have remained the same for a few years now. That being said, if you don't like the increase in cost, now would be a great time to switch to the emailed Rail report.

Membership renewal for 2024:

As Denny Leonard did a great job last year writing an article on membership renewal, I will just reuse that article and make the appropriate changes for the 2024 year. See Denny's article below. We have not voted on potential dues increase for the printed Rail Report yet but one decision made was to drop the International membership plan. In the past, this different price helped cover the additional postage fees the club incurred to mail the Rail Report overseas to those members. As the four international members have all switched to the email version, we didn't see any point in charging them extra. That being said, International members, please renew as a General member with the emailed Rail Report unless you are feeling generous and wish to renew as a Contributor or higher level.

Meetings at the church:

For now we will continue to meet at the church monthly with potentially the month of May being off in favor of our now annual picnic at the CRRM. The picnic may be a different month as we have not confirmed any plans yet, so stay tuned to the Rail Report for that information. We are continuing to struggle to find folks to help with the technical side of running the meeting as well as finding presenters and presenters that are available to present locally. That being said if we have some months where the presenter is not presenting locally and we don't have volunteers to run the meeting locally, we may need to have a Zoom only meeting on a given month. There is also the potential for a month with no presenter and we may have to cancel the meeting that month. Our program chair will try to provide this information with plenty of advance notice but some things are out of our control.

New President needed!

I have been President for nearly two years now and am finding myself a bit burned out. I don't feel I have the time or energy needed to do a good job of leading the club and handling various things that I put on my plate as there were not enough volunteers for certain tasks. If no one steps up to volunteer for this position, I commit to be being President again in 2024 but just know several tasks will likely get more delayed depending on my work load at the time.

I feel it is time to hand off the batton to the next person that would like to give it a shot. The main requirements are access to email and the Zoom platform. A basic understanding of email management and MS Word is great as well. Generating a monthly Board of Directors agenda and conducting a monthly meeting over Zoom for ~ 2 hours is the main task. Other tasks include responding to occasional emails from members or other rail related individuals takes a few minutes a week. Writing a column each month for the Rail Report is nice but not required as I have cut back to once a quarter if even that. Being present at monthly meetings either in person or via Zoom is also a good thing to portray the face of the president of the Railroad Club but not neccessary. Anyone interested in running for president, please email me at andydell76@gmail.com. I don't do phone calls much anymore as my tinnitus makes it hard for me to hear on the phone.

Renewals Are Around the Corner By Denny Leonard, Past President and Membership Volunteer

Our next membership year runs from January 1, 2024, to the first Monday in January 2025. The renewal season is the two months prior with the renewal process beginning in November. The club will mail 2024 membership renewal invoices the first week of November. The club uses the USPS for invoice delivery. Please be on the lookout for this mailing. We know it is easy to overlook with all the solicitations you get in your mailbox. The response to paper invoicing is higher than with inserts in the Rail Report or by electronic mail. The Club is holding the Regular membership prices at two levels. The cost of production and delivery is the basis for the different prices. For Regular members who receive their newsletters through email, the yearly membership is $30.00. For Regular members who receive their newsletters by USPS mail, the yearly membership will be finalized in November. For a Contributing, Sustaining or Patron level member the delivery method is their choice. As International members receive their newsletters by email only, we have dropped that category as it is no longer neccessary. International members, please renew as a Regular member.

Please consider taking the Rail Report by email, the digital color is great. Renewing using PayPal helps the Club. If you are sending a check, there will be a delay in both the check being cashed and membership roster being updated as we only go to our PO Box downtown as schedule allows. Seniority numbers mean a great deal to some and have little meaning to others. Those who consider it important should make sure to renew on time. I consider seniority numbers to be a historic and important part of membership in the Rocky Mountain Railroad Club, but please realize that managing the membership and senority numbers is a HUGE task.

� PLEASE ; � Do Not Be Late Renewing The renewal must be received by January 2, 2023, to maintain your seniority. Late renewals will likely receive a new roster number at the end of the list!