The discovery of anthracite coal, a low-sulfur, hot burning fuel, in eastern Pennsylvania established an early requirement for a practical means of transporting the commodity from the mines to the cities on the eastern coast of the United States. Because of the clean burning qualities of anthracite, there was created an instant demand for the commodity. The horse drawn wagons that transported the first coal loads to the southeast to Philadelphia were hampered by both the size of the load that they could handle and the lack of speed of that means of transport.
Thus, it was not long before a group of investors, led by Stephen Girard, decided that a canal that would parallel the Schuylkill River and would be fed by its waters, would be preferable to the existing means of transport. A charter was issued and construction began from Port Carbon, PA two miles (3.2 km) east of Pottsville to Philadelphia, about 100 miles (160 km) to the southeast.
The engineering problems for this project were daunting, indeed. The mountainous terrain of the northern 20 miles (32 km) were high and contained rocks known as "Pennsylvania conglomerate." These rocks are extremely hard to break up, even with present day technology. At one location, near the town of Landingville, it was found to be more feasible to construct a tunnel, the first such structure in North America, than to attempt to remove or bypass the obstacle. Finally, however, the canal was completed and anthracite, also known as "black diamonds," began to move from the mines to Philadelphia. The first boat to travel the Schuylkill Canal to Philadelphia did so in 1824.
Flooding in the area near Pottsville caused deposits of silt that effectively closed the northmost seven miles (11.2 km) of the canal. Schuylkill Haven became the northern terminus of the Schuylkill Canal, and "corporate headquarters" came to be located in that town. The canal office was built at the foot of Coal Street, adjacent to a lock that would later be named "Bausman's lock," after my great-great-grandfather, John Bausman, whose photograph is reproduced on my homepage.
A boatyard where boats were both fabricated and maintained was located just east of Schuylkill Haven. The water that was in this area was a prime fishing spot that we called "the Doggy Pond" (I have no idea of the origin of the name) when I was in grade school. Unfortunately it was covered over later.
After the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad reached Pottsville, the Schuylkill Canal found itself in fierce competition for business. As profits went down because of business taken from the canal by the railroad, the northernmost sections of the canal came to be used less frequently. Finally siltation moved south, resulting in the canal being closed section by section. A portion of the canal located near Philadelphia remained in use until about 1900.
The last vestige of the Schuylkill Canal in the area of its source is the Tumbling Run dams, located near Pottsville. Currently this pair of dams is used as the water supply for the borough of Schuylkill Haven. But the dam was originally built to supply water for the canal during dry periods.
My family has had many members employed by railroads for several generations. Most of the railroad employees worked for the Philadelphia and Reading (P&R) and Reading Railroads, although some were employed by the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR).
My father, Luther T. Boussum, worked for many years as a machinist at the Reading Locomotive Shop on Sixth Street in Reading, PA, where he specialized in air brake work. He terminated his employment there shortly after he purchased the Haven Cab Company, a taxicab company located in Schuylkill Haven, PA in the spring of 1948. Just before leaving the Reading Locomotive Shop he worked on the building of the Reading Class T1 Northerns, 4-8-4 locomotives with 72" drivers that were originally built for high-speed freight service. He was no longer there when the last Reading steam locomotives were built, the Class G3 Pacifics, 4-6-2 that represented the final passenger steam locomotives built by the Reading. These locomotives headed the Reading's varnish runs, such as the Schuylkill and the King Coal, which operated from Pottsville, PA to New York City and return.
My grandfather, Thomas E. Boussum, was the yardmaster at the Mine Hill yard, located between Schuylkill Haven and Cressona, PA. The Mine Hill yard runs south and west of the Alcoa aluminum extrusion plant in Cressona and provides a link between the Pottsville to Philadelphia mainline and the line that ran westward to Lykens, PA.
He was well-known by the railroad for his knowledge of the Lykens branch of the Philadelphia and Reading, and my dad told me a story many times about his taking the family for a passenger train ride along that branch almost every Sunday afternoon. My grandfather would stand on the platform of the last coach, checking the condition of the track as the train went west. Whenever he spotted a problem on the tracks he knew where he should send a work crew on Monday morning.
His father, Samuel Bausman, was a member of a freight train crew, although I do not know his specific job, serving aboard a P&R rarity of that time, a backcab Consolidation, 2-8-0. (Most of the P&R's motive power were camelback locomotives with Wooten fireboxes necessitated by the P&R's demand for burning anthracite.) I once saw a photograph of my great-grandfather and his crew standing beside the locomotive, but unfortunately do not have the picture in my collection of family photographs. His father, John Bausman, was the locktender on the Schuylkill Canal at Schuylkill Haven, pictured on my home page.
My mother's father, Charles (Ted) Deibler was also an employee of the P&R, working as a passenger conductor. Mom told me story about her dad that tells something about him. One day, his train was coming westbound from Philadelphia near Auburn, PA, when a man was spotted lying across the eastbound tracks. The Flyer, a crack P&R express passenger run would be passing through in just a few minutes. With no time to spare, my grandfather pulled on the emergency brake cable and dismounted from the train. He walked over to the man and asked "Was machs' hier?" ("What are you doing here," in Pennsylvania German.) The man answered, "Ich will mich tod mache." ("I want to kill myself," in the same language.) My grandfather then told him that he would be waiting a long time on that track but if he came over to the other track my grandfather's crew would dispatch of him in a hurry. The man got up, walked over to the westbound track and lay down in front of the locomotive.
My grandfather gave the hand signal meaning, "Give her a handful (of steam)." The locomotive edged forward. Then he signalled for brakes. The train stopped. After a couple of cycles of this procedure, the eastbound express rushed past.My grandfather picked the man up by the collar of his shirt and told him to leave and not come back. The guy stormed off into the woods, calling my grandfather "every name in the book." (And probably a few that did not make it into the volume.)
Earlier in my life, my dad had two American Flyer 'O' gauge trains, a New York Central J3 Hudson and a Pennsylvania K5 Pacific. As I remember these trains, the Pennsylvania set was a freight set, and the New York Central was a passenger outfit with a set of three heavyweight coaches. These three coaches were true "heavyweights" in every sense of the word. They were cast metal coaches: a combine coach, passenger coach, and open vestibule observation coach. The prewar 'O' gauge metal coaches were replaced by plastic coaches after Gilbert went over to 'S' gauge track in 1946.
Although I have some diesels, the period I prefer to model is the early "transitional" years of prototype railroading... a time when external combustion (steam) still outnumbered internal combustion (diesel) motive power on American railroads. I only have two Alco PA/PB-1 combinations and one GP7 ("Jeep"), of a total of about 50 'S' gauge locomotives. So my railroad will be limited to the late 1940s.
I model a railroad, the "Schuylkill Valley Line," based on the Reading Railroad of the early post World War II era. Like the Reading, the SVL parallels the Schuylkill River and runs from the anthracite coal region to New York City. The purpose of the railroad is to move anthracite coal from the mine to the port cities of Philadelphia and New York. Implicit is the existence of other anthracite roads such as the Lehigh Valley, Lehigh and New England, Central Railroad of New Jersey, Reading, and Pennsylvania, although the presence of these lines is nowhere to be found with the exception of the Reading, Pennsylvania, and the Lehigh and New England. I do, however, own a badly butchered Gilbert Royal Blue that might just be cobbled into the Lehigh Valley's John Wilkes, a "varnish run" of that flag.
I also own several American Flyer 'O' gauge trains: a Reading P7sb Atlantic with freight cars, a New York Central J3 Hudson with a set of red pressed steel coaches, and a Baltimore and Ohio "Royal Blue" streamlined set. In addition to these I own a Lionel Pennsylvania S1 6-8-6 steam turbine with a couple of freight cars. Unfortunately the 'O' gauge trains that my dad had were given to a neighbor after he and I went over to 'S' gauge in 1948.
In the 1950s, my dad bought a Tyco General and began modelling in 'HO' gauge. At the same time he bought me a Gilbert 'HO' gauge Pennsylvania 0-6-0 switcher with a slope back tender. Several other 'HO' sets were acquired in the next few years, but after marrying my wife, Sylvia, I went back to 'S' gauge. Our first Christmas together in 1966 I was going to put up an 'HO' layout. When I started laying the track, Sylvia asked me why I was not putting up the "big" trains. That was all the impetus I needed, and soon my Gilbert Hudson was running on a layout in our living room. Since then I have dabbled with 'HO' but somehow always return to 'S' gauge.
Modern cars just do not hold the fascination for me that the "Detroit Dinosaurs" of earlier years did. The modern V6 powered, efficiency "bubble cars" all look like they came off the same line. Without seeing the nameplate or logo it is impossible for me to tell them apart. I prefer cars of a time when one could tell a Lincoln from a Cadillac, a Ford from a Chevrolet, etc. But perhaps I am getting ahead of the story.
When I was born in 1937 my dad owned a 1929 Oldsmobile. To a small child the car was huge, and, by today's standards, it still is. I could sit in the spacious back seat of that car and have more room than a child of my age should have. Unfortunately, the car caught fire while we were visitng my grandfather Boussum in the spring of 1942. As anyone who lived through World War II can tell you, if you had no car at that time you had to rely on public transportation to get anywhere. (They will also tell you that, because of gasoline rationing to help the war effort, even if you had a car you probably still had to rely on public transportation.)
In 1948 my dad bought Haven Cab Co. in Schuylkill Haven, PA. For five plus years to come, one of the taxicabs served a dual role as our family car.
It was right after the end of World War II that a car caught my eye as the prettiest set of wheels that I had ever seen. A colliery owner in my hometown of Schuylkill Haven bought a 1946 Lincoln Continental Cabriolet. This beautiful convertible was medium blue with a tan top. It was the predecessor of the Continental Mark series that came along later. The car was so beautiful that I would walk out of my way on the way home from school just to see it sitting in the owner's driveway. The externally mounted spare, long hood, and overall style still holds my attention.
Shortly after my dad bought the cab company with three 1947 Chevrolets I walked past a 1946 Lincoln four door sedan. The door handles on this car were simple pushbuttons. I thought that was the ultimately cool car of its day. When I saw my dad a few minutes later I told him, "I just saw that car you ought to have for cabs, a Lincoln" To a kid not quite 11 years of age, all cars would cost about the same. It was then that my dad sat me down and told me why he could not even afford to think of owning a Lincoln.
In 1953 my dad bought the first family car after the demise of the 1929 Oldsmobile, a two-tone green 1953 Dodge Coronet four door sedan equipped with the Dodge "Red Ram" V8, one of the Chrysler hemispherical head V8s. This car could FLY, as this 16 year old discovered many times in the three years that we owned it. By the time it was traded in for a 1956 DeSoto four door hardtop, I had acquired my first car, a 1941 Chevrolet that I kept for a week and a half, and my second, a 1947 Dodge four door sedan.
My dad always favored Packard and hoped to own one. Unfortunately, the demise of Packard in 1958 brought an end to his dream. I preferred Lincoln, but the sight of a 1953 vintage Packard Caribbean still can turn my head.
In 1966, just before Sylvia and I got married, I bought my first Lincoln, a 1952 Capri two door hardtop. I managed to put 200,000 miles on the car after buying it and never regretted owning it. In fact I still do own the car.
In 1967 I acquired a 1961 "suicide door" Lincoln Continental sedan. I bought the car to take an upcoming business trip to Bogue Field, a "bounce field" for MCAS Cherry Point, where a Short Airfield for Tactical Support configured expeditionary airfield (see my professional page) had been installed. A trip there the previous year via a commercial flight (the airline flight from Hell) was the inspiration for driving to Morehead City, NC. It was a low-mileage, black beauty that I drove south barely a month after buying it.
Since that car I have owned several other Lincolns. One of them is a 1978 Mark V Continental that is about to undergo full restoration. Again, the car has over 200,000 miles on it and has cost very little in maintenance. It runs like a charm, although the body is presently in poor condition. It enters the shop during the fall of 1998.
Our present family car is a 1988 Lincoln Town Car with which we just recently vacationed in Canada. It is perhaps the most comfortable car that I have ever driven. It is not a "bubble car," of the type about which I wrote earlier.
I also have a great deal of interest in antique and classic cars. Along with my 1978 Mark V, I own a 1962 "suicide door" Lincoln sedan, a 1948 Continental Mark I, and a 1937 Lincoln Zephyr coupe.
My interest in aviation and aerospace goes back to the very beginning. As a small child, I was always attracted to airplanes and trains. Any time I saw a plane flying overhead I would watch it until it disappeared over the horizon. I always imagined what it would be like to actually be able to take a ride in an airplane, but that was something that would need to be placed on hold. My dad would not take a plane ride.
I lived aviation vicariously and became an avid kite flyer, and tried to imagine what it would be like to be able to ride along on a kite, several hundred feet up. I studied paper airplanes seriously, considered and fabricated all the types, and made qualitative judgements of how well each type flew.
Actually, I believe that I first was attracted to aviation one evening when, at the age of three years, I can remember being seated on the floor of the dining room in the apartment in which my family lived at the time. On looking out of the kitchen window, which was on the west wall of the house, I could see a brilliant Venus shining like a diamond against a dark blue-black sky as the planet followed the sun. I really think that on that early evening in 1940-41 I became interested in both flight and astronomy.
At the age of 7 I attempted to build my first model airplane, a "stick and tissue" model of the Japanese Raiden ("Jack") fighter plane. Of course, it did not work out all that well. But it was a first attempt. Soon I discovered Strombecker solid models. These models were made of white pine and were factory carved so that the model builder really only needed to sand the model smooth, glue the separate parts together, and paint the finished model to get a fairly nice looking plane as the end product. I built many of these Strombecker models through my high school years.
Finally, at the age of 8 years I successfully built my first "stick and tissue" model, a German "Stuka" dive-bomber. I built this model under the watchful eye of an older neighbor who became my mentor in modeling, John Bolton. Proudly I hung this plane from the ceiling of my bedroom with the nose down in a typical dive bombing position.
Later I would build many models, finally favoring Guillow's solid models, which consisted of a block of balsa, from which I would carve the fuselage, a sheet of 1/8" or 3/16" balsa with the wings inscribed on it, and a 1/16" sheet with the empennage inscribed. These models presented the greatest challenge to my modelling skills, because of the need to carve the fuselage, at the time. (A link to Guillow's home page is on this website.)
By that time I had settled on pursuing aviation as a career, planning on joining the Air Force and becoming a fighter pilot. During my last two years of high school I became active as a Civil Air Patrol cadet and attained the rank of Second Lieutenant in Squadron 807 of the 31st Wing. I attended CAP encampment at Olmstead Airforce Base, Middletown, PA both summers while I was a member. My official duty as Second Lieutenant was Cadet Public Information Officer for Squadron 807.
My Uncle Bill (William S. Boussum) was a veteran of World War I who had been gassed during that conflict. He wanted to get me an appointment to West Point, but while I was in high school the Air Force announced that it would be opening its academy in September of 1955. I was in the class of 1955 in high school and told my uncle that I really would prefer an appointment to that school. He did manage to get me an appointment through our local Congressional representative, Ivor D. Fenton.
As it turned out, I neither got to attend the Air Force Academy nor pursue a career as a fighter pilot because my physical examination at Olmstead Air Force Base (presently Harrisburg-York (PA) International Airport) revealed that I was color-blind. Thus my dream of being a fighter pilot and ultimately becoming an astronaut crashed and burned.
My first reaction was if I couldn't fly them I wanted nothing to do with them. However, my first job as a technical writer was to be assigned to a team working out of Naval Air Engineering Laboratory (Shipboard Installations) (NAEL(SI)) at the Philadelphia, PA Navy Yard developing a deck of Maintenance Requirement Cards for the Short Airfield for Tactical Support (SATS) system.
At the conclusion of the task for preparing MR cards for the SATS system, I worked on evaluating several US Navy and Marine Corps airfields to compare their visual landing aids against the standards. Later this project expanded to include the preparation of a visual landing aids standardization document for airfields. This document was written in the form of a service bulletin. The information contained in this document was later incorporated into the shorebased visual landing aids manual. I also worked with updating the corresponding manual for both carriers and helicopter ships.
Still later I worked with manuals covering shipboard catapults and arresting gear. Although I have worked in other areas as a technical writer, aviation has almost always lurked somewhere in the background. Although I came away thinking, "If I can't fly them I don't want to do anything with them," it turns out that I could not get away from them.