Home
  Search Archives     
  Available Archives
   1969-1979
   1980-1989
   1990-1999
   2000-2009
   2010-2017
    1969    
    1969    
1970
1970
1970
1971
1971
1971
1972
1972
1972
1973
1973
1973
1974
1974
1974
1975
1975
1975
1976
1976
1976
1977
1977
1977
1978
1978
1978
1979
1979
1979
    1980    
    1980    
1981
1981
1981
1982
1982
1982
1983
1983
1983
1984
1984
1984
1985
1985
1985
1986
1986
1986
1987
1987
1987
1988
1988
1988
1989
1989
1989
    1990    
    1990    
1991
1991
1991
1992
1992
1992
1993
1993
1993
1994
1994
1994
1995
1995
1995
1996
1996
1996
1997
1997
1997
1998
1998
1998
1999
1999
1999
    2000    
    2000    
2001
2001
2001
2002
2002
2002
2003
2003
2003
2004
2004
2004
2005
2005
2005
2006
2006
2006
2007
2007
2007
2008
2008
2008
2009
2009
2009
    2010    
    2010    
2011
2011
2011
2012
2012
2012
2013
2013
2013
2014
2014
2014
2015
2015
2015
2016
2016
2016
2017
2017
2017

 
   1985 >> August >> Walking The Lines  

Walking the Lines
by Dennis Bratcher, NIA #3193

Reprinted from "Crown Jewels of the Wire", August 1985, page 16

I thought the following information might be of interest to some of the threadless collectors.

I recently found two CD 701 threadless eggs within six miles of each other. Unfortunately, they were badly shattered having both been run over by a bulldozer in clearing undergrowth from around present open wire lines. They were found along the right-of-way of the old Virginia Central Railroad, now a part of the Chesapeake and Ohio division of The Chessie System. The location is between Hanover Junction (near Doswell, VA, where the C & 0 branch line crosses the Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potornac Railroad mainline) and Beaverdam, Virginia. The eggs are both olive-green black glass and are Style F, the so-called "Confederate egg." The surface of each insulator is slightly pebbled in places, although they are not nearly as crude as some of this style and are completely free of any etching, the glass having a shiny, waxy look. This confirms other reports of this style of CD 701 being found in central Virginia (see Ray Klingensmith's excellent article on eggs in Crown Jewels, February, 1980, pp.13-28).

Along the same stretch of track a little south of Hanover Junction, I also ran across a nice unembossed CD 729.1 in blue (in better shape!) For the railroad buffs, this insulator was found in a railroad cut which was the site of a tragic head-on train wreck in the Spring of 1862, a collision between an eastbound special troop train (Confederate) pulled by the engine JEFF DAVIS and a westbound supply train pulled by the MILLBORO.

Too, along the same Virginia Central line between Richmond and Gordonsville, Virginia, I have found pieces of no less than 40 Leffert's ramshorns, although I have yet to come up with more than half the glass portion intact and have found no horns. I'll keep looking!



| Magazine Home | Search the Archives |