Workin' on the Railroad

Chapter 1 Coal Mesa, New Mexico Early June Roane Wellman hesitated before he stepped through the well-worn door. The June sunlight beat down on his back, scorching through his T-shirt. I wish I was any f*****g place in the whole f*****g world besides here, damn the luck. Looking for a serious job was not how he’d planned to spend the summer between his sophomore and junior years of college, but life sometimes threw a guy a curve ball. To be totally honest, he’d helped it along more than a little in this case. He’d paid far too much attention to partying and not nearly enough to study at UNM the past two semesters. With Roane’s GPA a thin notch above the failure line, Grandpa Wellman had pulled the plug on financing his only grandson’s education, at least for now. If Roane planned to go ahead and get a degree, he’d have to prove he could do it by himself before there would be any more help. So here he was at the labor office of the San Juan and Southwest Railroad to answer a recent ad in the Albuquerque Journal for laborers. The small independent railroad served the remote four corners region, especially some new and reopened mines that were pouring out coal, uranium, copper, and a smattering of precious metals. The SJSW linked to the Santa Fe at Gallup and to the Denver and Rio Grande at Grand Junction. Roane assumed from the wording of the ad that they were building new spur lines to two recently opened mines. In spite of advancing technology and new semi-automated equipment, some of which was actually made by his grandfather’s Wellman Industries, laying track for a shoestring railroad was a labor-intensive task. To look on the bright side, a summer of hard manual labor might help him make the football team again if he could get his grades up. He’d been on the team the past year before his GPA dropped too far, but he’d spent ninety-nine percent of the time on the bench. The coach hadn’t been impressed with his determination or toughness. Maybe Roane could change that perception. Squaring his shoulders, he shoved through the door. Several men, mostly young Navajo and Apache Indians, a few Latinos, and even fewer Anglos, sat around the room, struggling to fill out applications. He’d completed his already and had it in hand. Taking the sheaf of papers, the hiring agent looked him over with a cynical stare. “You really think you’re up to working, sonny? This is no city desk job or errand boy gig. Takes a real man to work on the railroad.” “I’ll give it my best shot, sir. I need a job, one that pays more than minimum wage, and I’m not afraid to work. My dad and my grandfather both saw to that while I was growing up.” Roane must have sounded more convincing than he felt. Before he left, he had a job. He went through supply to pick up a hard hat and some other gear he’d need, got an employee ID card, and had a rack assigned to him in one of the old passenger cars that had been converted to bunkhouses for the workers. The hiring agent also told him how to get to the site where the crew was working. First thing in the morning, Roane would report to Mitch Flannery. He was foreman for the track gang repairing an old grade that had been abandoned some years back when the newly reopened mine had been shut down. That was a lot faster than building from scratch and most of the route was still where they needed it, they said. Roane realized he’d have to learn a whole new vocabulary as well as work long days in the sun, rain, or whatever came along. Looks like a kill-or-cure proposition. No more silver spoon for this boy. s**t, guess I’ll see if I can make them all eat crow before the summer’s over. A bit more than his pride was at stake, but there was that, too. Yeah, I know I f****d up, but since I don’t want to go in the military, I s’pose I gotta do something.