Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1898-01-29
How the Great Railways Are Kept
Clear in Winter Time.
PLENTY OF DANGER AND EXCITEMENT
Long Lines of Engines Charge the
Drifts in Vain.
THE ROTARY PLOW IN USE
Written for The Evening Star.

Written for The Evening Star
Copyright, 1893, by the S. s. Mcclure Coz
North America is the battle ground Of
the biggest snow fights earth. There
are thousands of men in the northwest
whose only occupation during the winter
months is to fight snow. 1t is exciting
work, too. life that involves the greatest
hardships and continual risks. One might
search the world over for a more desperate
and dangerous employment"
1t was a Canadian Pacific engineer who
spoke. We were travelling over the Rocky
mountains al midnight. Through the glass
paneled door at the tail of the train one
could see the icy crests of the mountains in
the pale moonlight. In the wake OIL the
summer fires the trees stood up thin and
rakish, like the masts of ships. Elsewhere
they were shrouded. with dropping branches
and spattered stems, in the universal snow
The snow gave an impressive sense of
peacefuiness to the impenetrable silence of
the mountains. looked out upon tie SOL
emn stiffness, the broad stretches o, mo-
tionless white, the deep passages of ava
lanches carved along the mountain sides,
with feeling of awe for the immensely of
the power that had SO changed the face Of
nature.
But the railroad man had no Illusions
To him the snow was a foe a foe to be
feared, a foe against whom men and en-
gines had often measured their strength in
vain.
Every now and then the scenery was
blotted out: the glass panels suddenly
showed US nothing but the reflection of e
car and bobbing light of the overhead
lamp. They were snow sheds through
which the train was passing. The railroad,
cut like single step in the side of the
mountain chasm. was rooted in as snugly
as a house. Above. for all We knew the
snow might be tumbling headlong over the
slippery ledge in tempest of passion; but
for all its malevolence, impotent to inflict
an injury to the poor snake of a train hid
ing beneath its shelter.
Force of an Avalanche
These snow sheds have been erected
among the mountains at an enormous cost.
They are of massive timber work-heavy
beams Of squared timber, dove-tailed and
bolted together, and backed with rock.
They are fitted into the mountain so that
they become. as it were. part of the
mountain side, SO as to bid defiance to tie
most terrific avalanche.
Anything may precipitate an avalanche
down the steep declivities of those piled-up
precipices, among which the singie-track
railway looks like pins scratch on the
hand of man. 1t need be no more than a
loosened scrap Of rock that has started
rolling downward with no forethough- of
the immeasurable cataclysm that its pas
sage will create.
In a few yards 1t mas become embed
ded in mighty mass of moving snow,
a wool-whfte torrent licking up the levi
ethan trees as II passes like straws swept
Up in a storm OF autumn leaves, growing
more venomous, more powerful, more IRE
sistible, until the rush OF the wind before
it clears a passage through the forest an
tcipating its ravages, removing all obsta-
cles as the outriders to a royal eQuipage
make way through mass of human be-
fngs.
1t is truly a royal foe that the railroad
men OF the northwest have to encounter
among the mountains. An onrushing ter
rife force, something which cannot be
turned. that cannot be checked. 1t is nee
essary to resort to subterfuge to cheat it.
to hide from it, or to make good by arti-
fetal means the path that the railway
has struck out for itself.
Gathering a Drift.
Among the Cascade mountains 1 have
seen seven and eight engines linked to-
gether charging impotently against the |
snowbanks, and at night time there is |
no more wonderful sight than this, each |
kissing engine throwing its sheath of |
freight on the tenders. with their heavy |
loads of wood fuel On the cleaning snow |
banks, on the great trees seeming to press |
round to mock by their stiffness all this |
useless fuss and fury. this powerless rag |
ing, this resultless disturbance of their |
peace.
Under favorable circumstances the snow |
peTeS Iedully pelore the onslaught OF the /
plow. At times, however, under the bat
terry to which 1t is subjected, it only be- |
comes more rigidly compressed, more solid, |
mere iulpenetrable at each renewed charge,
a solid, unbudging block of ice. The engine /
may go back a mile, the throttle may be |
thrown open, 1t may rush upon the barrier |
at speed of forty or fifty miles an hour,
but when the shock OF the impact is over |
when the snow dust has cleared suffi- (
GENTLY for the engineers to see around |
them. 1t may be that they have only adj
vanced a yard, possibly the engine fires |
have been extinguished. not improbably |
the engine may have been thrown off the |
line.
The one recourse which then remains is
to call in the assistance of a small army
of men, that way may be forced through |
the snow with pick and shovel. and, while |
these operations are progressing the pas