Evening star., 1939-03-19

for starter?" asked someone.
Il have it," said Ed. He sent down to his
Office and his secretary brought up one of the
big green pads he loves to use - and there
was a complete layout for the whole thing.
Hungerford, who is intensely creative, had
been working it out for months - that is, the
Railroad Exhibit Building, very much as it
has been built at the Worlds Fair.
For his own particular interest in it. how
ever, he has reserved the pageant drama,
Railroads on Parade" He wrote the script
of the show and wrote it lyrically, and de-
signed the stage and settings for it. He
planned the thing in all its detail and only
regretted that he did not know enough about
music to write the score Kurt WE'LL did that
for him.
When one of his shows gets under way Ed
lives with it, morning, noon and night. in an
old-fashioned private Car the Central has
given him, and which is spotted OF spur just
ofstage. When Wings of Century was
running he witnessed most of the ,l54 per-
formances it played to more than 100000
people, and now he is a little worried for fear
his maximum seating capacity at Flushing
Meadows (of some 5000, 900 persons for the
summer) isn't going to be sufficient.
His flair for dramatizing the lore and legend
of the high iron" stems from Eds earliest
boyhood in Dexter His life pattern has been
conditioned by the celebrated high-liners and
luxury limiteds, the hot-shot freights and the
cleaning side rods and valve motion of eight
wheelers and Pacifics. Mallets Mountain
types and Santa Fes laundering up the grades
and across the switch points and diamonds of
the nations railroads. He has ridden head
end" on the Century as it rocketed through
Cleveland on the Chicago run, and fired for
veteran 'hoggers" wheeling their varnish
over the Cajon and the Gloriata. He has
ridden in the private cars of Presidents and in
the "crummies" of drag freights At various
times he has been employed as newspaper
reporter, editor, press agent and advertising
manager. He has written eighteen books and
nearly hundred magazine articles.
But during all his varied experiences, the
urge to climb aboard the Overland Limited
or the Chief or the Black Diamond or the
Banner Blue has been strong in him and he
has covered more than eighty per cent of all
the railroad mileage in the country and knows
every city in it except Cedar Rapids, Iowa,
which he get around to one of these days.
Today, Ed is an ample and friendly figure
and an integral part of the New York scene
Although he has game leg and sometimes
walks with crutches. he has kept his hair, his
disposition and his appetite. The last of these
is, in fact, noteworthy institution, and to
scores of waiter captains and naitres dhotel
from New York to San Francisco he is known
as gourmet of distinction.
His hobbies are his camera with carefully
filed collection of 10000 negatives taken all
over the world, his vast library of travel and
transport, covered bridges and historical
Americana. He deplores exercise and his
favorite sport is riding the cable cars in San
Francisco. He is constant theatergoer and
has weakness for opera. particularly Manon,
Traviata and Carmen. He goes to work at
eight in the morning and frequently quits by
lunchtime so as to have plenty of time over
his food at his favorite restaurant. He gets
to his Office on Sunday as we'll as week days,
just to reassure himself that the trains are
still running and are within reason) on time.
He is married into happy domesticity. and an
institution in the Hungerford household is the
CONTINUED on poss ~