The Lakeland evening telegram. (Lakeland, Fla.) 1911-1922, 1915-01-19
BILL DAIDY's CHAPTER
BY ROBERT r. HOFFMAN.

tltieu 10 an opinion on everything un-
der the sun, and, within wide limits,
is entitled to the unrestricted express
sion of that opinion.
Bill Daddy is one of those who be-
lieve there is good in the large exer-
else of that privilege, although Of late
years he has added caution to candor.
In the old daysShe came in OF his en-
CINE, loaded with the usual accumula-
ton of griefs over the shortcomings
Of the roundhouse, which are apt to
loom large in the long watches of the
night run.
He gradually grew the habit of clos
ing his regular harangue to the round.
house foreman with a sort of perora-
tion which summed up the real or i'm
aginary derelictions of everybody con-
nected with the road, from call-boy to
| president
In an effort to break the flow Of
Bills rough eloquence the roundhouse
foreman unwittingly set Bills feet
upon the path that led upward-down-
ward. Bill laughingly insists some
times.
Bill. why in thunder don't you
write book" said the long-suffering
! foreman, when Bill had become more
than usually aggressive in his none
| too gentle impeachments. You are
sure wasting your talent on an en-
| CINE"
Bill glared for a moment before he
was able to let down the pressure of
road management which he had men,
tally assumed, and then, as the recol-
lection Of purchase he had recently
made for his growing son flashed
across his mind. he gave way to slow
| grin and said:
Blamed If l don't believe that's
good idea, Ballard Maybe III just 60
/ you a chapter, when my boy gets fit
with his machine"
So. Daddy, in his evenings at home.
took to rehearsing his daily griefs to
the boy, who laboriously hammered
them out of the typewriter into gro
, tesqucs of composition and the print
er's art.
Daddy dictated" and revised"
killed copy" and edited" although
he did not know it in those terms,
and after many days what he had
grown to call The Chapter" was fin-
ished. decked out with border lines
that fairly exhausted the resources Of
the boy and the eighty-odd characters
of the machine
Bill eloated over it for week of
nights, and then liked it so well that
he decided to have it all done over
again, in order that he might not only
supply ballard, but also send carbon
copies of 1t surreptitiously TO the su-
perintendcnt of motive power, the di
vision superintendent, and-holy of
NOTES.-THE general manager.
The superintendent of motive pow.
err duly received his copy. threw it in
the waste basket, and remarked casu-
ally. "Bill,"
He liked Bill, but not Bills too free
excavations.
The division superintendent read his
copy and. laughing pigeonholed it for
future use in letting down the pres
sure of the superintendent of motive
power when next they should lock
horns over engine failures.
The general manager took up his
copy from its personal cover and read
it from start to finish, as follows:
Chapter One.
If this don't fit your case, you get a
clearance card right here The board
is out for others.
When you build an engine and want
the most results and don't care what
kind, fix yourself with lot Of dis
couraged craftsmen, and, for chief, get
good wrangler that talks into his
whiskers and don't decide much.
Tell them fellows, at the start, that
you put them into that cheese-box Of
flee to stay, and they can't break out
onto the road to see an engine do bust
ness, noways
Don't pay any of them too much.
They are working on paper, and you
can easily fix the engine after we get
it.
Hire lot of master mechanics that
know all about sawm.l.a. there amt
none around here, bit ,9l can see
them running in the Voc = Z --ou take
ride with me. They will DO ready to
lay up your new engine when it comes
out
Fix up boiler steel specifications
that you know are o. K, and then let
the purchasing agent bluff you into
taking something better but cheaper;
he can prove it, That will sure give a
lift, once in while, to some of US fell
lows that's little slow about circulat.
ing in the scenery, and it will make
things brisk in the boiler shop Them
fellows need work They ar too strong
to rest nights.
Use hammered engine frames. If |
was a track man I'd like to be able to
put my hand on busted weld and
say, "Them's it." after the engine
jumped the track and got pulled out of
borrowpit. The dispatcher won't
care. if she don't block the track. It
makes work for the blacks miths
Fix your spring-rigging so, when It
breaks, the equalizer will hit, point
down, in the track. Gives the engine
better start when she jumps. She
will go farther and everything had
ought to be made to go as far as 1t
can.
Truck-pedestal binder-bolts should
set low enough to rip up a frosty
plank crossing. 1t gives the engines a
good name as goers. One nuts
enough. Two stay on too well.
Put your driYing.hox Wedge-holts I'm .