The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-12-24
A SNOW CUT AND SNOW SHED IN THE FAR NORTHWEST

there is-Httle to do save the ordinary
run of repairs and reconstruction, but
along about the LIST of October all this
is changed
Little fiurries of snow on the level
and gradual but continuous spread
ing of white on the tops and in the up
per creviceS of the mountains give
warning that the hard. desperate bat
ties of the winter months are at hand.
The superintendent takes a trip over
the road with his assistants, and a
careful inspection of the sheds and
tunnels is made. In divisional mead
quarters the rotaries and the old-time
FUCKERS are overhauled and prepared
for use, and as the middle of the month
approaches the watchmen who patrol
the tracks are doubled.
There is no mistaking the signs. Even
a novice could see that something i'm
portant is pending. In the divisional
shops. in the offices and even at the
smaller stations along the line there are
evidences that the period of work is
soon to supersede the ease of the sum-
mer days.
Stock of Food laid In.
In the various baggage cars are
placed great wooden safes packed with
condensed foods. Beef in the form of
extract canned soups, condiments and
hard bread, enough to feed 100 persons
for ten days. are carefully deposited in
these moving storehouses, and from
then until the coming of spring they
are inspected and overhauled once each
week by men detailed for the purpose.
At the isolated stations and guarded
sidings, reserve supplies of provisions.
coal. wood and water, are laid in; then
6rally arrives the day when every
thing is reported in readiness for the
descent of winter
The first call for the fighting contin-
gent of the vast railway army is al
ways attended by scenes of excite
nent. Lowering skies and chill winds
have foretold the fall of snow. and
when the various crews arise some
morning they find the earth covered
with a mantle of white.
L is then the work gang boss over
haus his men and sees that each unit
in the force is provided with the ne
cessary shovel and spade. 1t is then,
too, that the crew OF each snow pillow
and each reserve engine go over the
last time the various bits Of machinery
and the divers couplings upon which
their lives are soon to depend.
Within twelve hours. If the fall is
continuous. the plows go out. Each is
accompanied by a gang Of shovelers.
and straight drive is made for those
passes and cuts where experience has
foretold the greatest depth. If the
snow is wet and fiaky. quick work is
made Of the banks, but if cold weather
has really set in and the snow has been
frozen into rounded granules, the prop
Neition is entirely different.
Differences of Soft Snow.
In the first case the damp masses re-
main where they have been thrown by
the pillow, but under the latter con-
di:ions il is impossible without the
most strenuous efforts to keen the
glistening. frozen pellets from sliding
back onto the tracks. Cases have been
known when a comparatively light fall
of snow has blocked a mountain track
for forty-eight hours.
in the old days when the rotaries
were weapons of the future and the
snow had to be literally "bucked'' by
main force from the tracks, casualties
were numerous. The type of pillow used
was home made affair-a product of
the railway shops. 1t consisted of a
reinforced and strongly braced box car
as a base, upon one end Of which was
built an iron tipped pillow shaped some
thing like a lofty cow-cateher. Near
the top the sides were so arranged that
the snow masses were directed into the
air at an angle.
When particularly heavy and tight
~ packed drift was TO be tackled it
was the custom TO place one of these
crude affairs in front of from six to
ten engines and charge the drift with
a flying start of a mile or two. If the |
drift consisted of graduated snow
frozen into separate particles, the enor-.
nous mass of iron went through it like |
a heated knife through butter In the |
wake of the pillow came an army of |
shovelers whose duty it was to bank |
the scattered masses far enough from /
the track to prevent srsri sliding hack /