Cluffs

I miss the MKT "Katy" Railroad, one of the crown jewels of railroadiana. I can still see and hear an old red caboose trailing off in the distance, past Westchester Junior High School, disappearing into beautiful pastureland. Spent a lot of time around the tracks along Old Katy Road. The side track between Igloo and Parker Bros gravel was one of my favorite spots. Railroads are not a good place for kids to play and I remember finding things--scary things--that didn't belong there: A doll's head, a woman's high heel shoe, a broken switchblade; old gloves, whiskey bottles and empty chewing tobacco pouches were a mainstay. Train hopping became one of my favorite pastimes. One day, while train watching at a side track that served Levitz Furniture off of Brittmoore, the engineer signaled me to come on board. This was around 1973 or 1974. He introduced himself as Lonnie Yancey. He gave me a ride for a short distance along Old Katy and I got to blow the horn crossing Brittmoore. Who knows, maybe that train you waited for on that summer day had me blowing the horn. That is one of my fondest memories to this day. Around 2008 I decided to try and find Lonnie. I called every Yancey in the phone book. I figured he was long gone, and almost gave up, when I got a call from his brother in Smithville. Lonnie was alive and well and still living in Spring Branch off of Malibu Drive. I visited him a few times and always brought him a can of his favorite snuff--Copenhagen original. We traded stories about the MKT, including the time I saw an 18-wheeler smashed by a train at the Brittmoore/Old Katy crossing. I was 12 years old when that happened and my two school buddies and I had to go to court downtown to testify for the railroad. I confessed to Lonnie that I had hopped his train numerous times and he said that's why he gave me a ride, hoping to keep me from losing a leg. Lonnie was a star quarterback at Smithville High School. He was a decorated Marine, earning a Purple Heart for battling the Japanese in Okinawa. His wife was a librarian at Memorial High School. Here is a beautiful photo he gifted to me--taken around the exact year he gave me a ride in his GP-7 locomotive. He liked to pass the time waiting on sidetracks by crocheting, as seen in the photo. Lonnie passed away in 2015. I still think of him every time I hear the beautiful music of a train trailing off in the late-night distance. . .