Arizona & Eastern
This Gallery is dedicated to Tom Schlosser, Gene Shepherd and "my kids" at the Arizona & Eastern. In early 2002 Tom Schlosser, now passed, who was a great friend and associate, offered me the opportunity to be the General Manager of the Arizona & Eastern (AZER). Along with several other railroads, RailAmerica was in the middle of acquiring AZER. Tom had himself only just joined RA as the Western Region VP and needed someone to take over GM duties in Globe. I took the reins in February 2002 and left there when I retired 3 years later in February 2005. It turned out to be one of the most fun filled, pleasurable and interesting phases of my career.
We had our down days, like broken rail derailments (which always seemed to happen in the middle of the night) on 75# rail with no ties underneath. But there were also some great days and accomplishments, like moving over 50 unit trains of Ponderosa pine logs which resulted from the Sitgreaves NF fire of Fall 2002. To everyone's amazement we handled the logs without a major incident, only 1 single wheel derailment, and basically an on-schedule interchange of the logs to the UP at Bowie, AZ. In between we continued to provide Phelps-Dodge copper operations the best possible service at their Miami, AZ smelter and kept all of our other customers on plan. I'm sure that I could not have accomplished any of those without Tom's and Gene's support and the steady, dependable, every day work of the "kids."
Read MoreWe had our down days, like broken rail derailments (which always seemed to happen in the middle of the night) on 75# rail with no ties underneath. But there were also some great days and accomplishments, like moving over 50 unit trains of Ponderosa pine logs which resulted from the Sitgreaves NF fire of Fall 2002. To everyone's amazement we handled the logs without a major incident, only 1 single wheel derailment, and basically an on-schedule interchange of the logs to the UP at Bowie, AZ. In between we continued to provide Phelps-Dodge copper operations the best possible service at their Miami, AZ smelter and kept all of our other customers on plan. I'm sure that I could not have accomplished any of those without Tom's and Gene's support and the steady, dependable, every day work of the "kids."
