San Marcos free press. [volume] (San Marcos, Tex.) 1877-1892, 1883-02-15
The Station Agent.

"e4 "Ao 6oou zeal neva,
cease to wonder how it is that ,t
crossest depot agents that can a.
found are always located at iuncton~'
where there is nothing but a dsns,
and store and saloon, but sucb :
the case. A traveller gets to a,iun.'
ton and goes into the depot 10 Sns
when the train goes, and the t;cL0.
window is closed. He looks aronns
and finds the agent is helping UNLOAD
freight, or is on side track counI;na
cars, or is over across the track belr
ing farmer kill hogs, or has gone +
the adjoining town with team. IA
carry some passengers. Or, if thu
agent is in the Office he has cot mon
business that the general manager ~
the road. You speak to him and ash
q question, and his brow corrupates
and he goes on counting a pile Of ons
dollar bills, and acts as though he
had dim idea that he had been
spoken to, but he waits until he gets
the money in the safe, and turns the
knob, and then he answers YOU "a
short that you can almost conclude 10
walk to the next station, and then he
bustles out of the Office and locks the
door, and you think he has gone to
attend to some important business
upon which depends the fate of the
road, and you go out on the platform,
and pretty soon you see him helping
his wife to wiring out clothes, or YOU
see him out in the back yard hanging
clothes on the line, or splitting old
railroad ties for wood. You may be
a millionaire, and you may pay your
hostler more than the junction agent
as a salary, but he looks upon you as
a three card monte man, and locks
the stove door for fear you will put in
stick of wood or steal the lining out
of the stove. The agent is in his
element when the train is a few hours
behind, and he sits at the telegraph
instrument working as if the world
rested on his shoulders. You listen
to constant click of the instrument,
and would give a ten-dollar note to
know what is going on over the wires.
Occasionally he will laugh at some.
thing the instrument says, and when
you begin to think the news Of the
world is coming over the wires and is
stored in that massive brain, the agent
turns to a country galoot, who has on
a blue drilling roundabout, and his
pants in his boots, and who wipes his
nose on his mitten, and says: There
is going to be dance at the hop-yard
at Johnston Siding tonight, and they
want us to come up on No. A." Then
you realize that the agent, all these
long hours that you have been watch
ing the expression of his calm, mys-
ferrous face, has been chatting with
thefemale operator at the next station,
and as the country galoot takes chew
of plug tobacco and says be will go
and brush up a little and put on q
clean shirt before No. comes, and
the operator says they will have a
daisy time at the dance, you 60 out
on the platform and try to get &C.
quainted with the fellow who runs
the horsepower wood-saw machine.
There is no man who knows more
than the junction agent about every
thing, if you only draw him out.
Though only four trains a day stop at
his station, and they only stop for
minute, to let off some poor devil who
has got to get off there, the agent is
in his element for a brief moment:
He addresses the conductor as jim,
or George, or Billy" and asks with
show of interest as deep as division
superintendent would have, where he
passed MOL, and if "No.6 is going to
be on time. He may ask something bout
railroad stocks, and you imagine that
he is bulling the market, when the
chances are that he hasn't got I'll
left from his last months salary. Ii
he was polite and did not seem {,
own the road, you would like him Du'
when he snubs you, and treats you as
though information was worth more
than your ticket, you hate him, and II
you should hear there was talk OF
promoting him to a station where
there were six houses, you would Wan'
to prevent it. There may be some
rule by which the crossest man on d
line is given an isolated Junction.