The Vintage Firetruck and its story

May 29, 2023 / Apple Hill Cottage / 12 Comments

Today–Memorial Day, 2023–I am reposting a story I wrote ten years ago in honor of my uncle who I never knew.…

We’ve been fighting with our stuff these last few weeks, and it’s been getting me down. I haven’t written about stuff lately: I’ve been shredding it, organizing it, recycling it, boxing it up, throwing it out, giving it away, … And truthfully?

It doesn’t look like I’ve done anything.

And then I came to this: Antique Steelcraft Toy Mack Firetruck This is the cleaned up version. For the last three years it has been relegated to the floor of my upstairs sewing room where it’s been catching dust rather than putting out fires. And let me tell you, this baby catches a lot of dust.

What to do with this cool old maybe-worth-some-money toy? (It is now sitting on top of my son’s refrigerator.)

This Mack Hook and Ladder truck was manufactured by Steelcraft in Cleveland Ohio sometime between 1928 and 1935. It has two ladders on the sides that attach to a ladder in the back. When these ladders are put together, they are over three feet high. A kid could put out some mighty fires with this thing.

Steelcraft Vintage Hook and Ladder Truck

The ladders also can be cranked up and down — the deluxe model. But in 1930, there were no warnings on toys; this Mack truck could do some damage… It has string that could choke; small parts that could fall off and hit; clips that could pinch fingers, and seriously sharp ladder edges that could poke an eye out. But it also has a real brass bell that dings and a hose that unwinds… Generations have played with this truck — my kids played with it and lived (with no serious injuries). Vintage Steelcraft Mack Firetruck

It belonged to my mother’s brother, Uncle Donnie. I never knew him; he was killed in World War II in France in 1944.

Jean and big brother Don I don’t know much about him. My grandma, Nanny, always started to cry when his name was mentioned, so we never talked about him much. Mom only said that she was the kid sister, and just as she was getting old enough for them to be friends again, he joined the army and went off to war. He was a smart kid, an intellectual-type, who graduated from high school in 1943, went to college for one semester, and then went to war. A young boy who probably never wanted to be a soldier… and yet, he went, he served, and he died. At age 20.

He served with General Patton’s Third Army in the infantry. On October 26, 1944 the local newspaper published an excerpt from his letters home. It is a very long article, and I’m skipping here and there for these quotes below.
Waynesburg Republican, Oct. 26, 1944

…the French people stand in front of their homes (some of which have been bombed) with pitchers and glasses of cider and wine. The only trouble with the cider is that it’s hard instead of soft… Since I wrote you last we have done a lot of riding over France. Also a lot of walking both day and night. I never before realized France was such a beautiful country. Excellent terrain for fruit trees and agricultural rolling land, mostly level, with acres of wheat, oats, hay and grape vines neatly taken care of. We were about a month too soon for the plentiful supply of apples, grapes, etc…. Where I am now acres and acres of fields of wheat, oats, etc. are going to waste because of fighting around them… Last night I slept in a trench for the first time and didn’t sleep badly. A fox hole will probably follow…

We had our first hot water showers yesterday since our arrival in France. You can imagine how we felt. We’re hoping to get some clean clothes soon…The past ten days or two weeks have proven rather rough and tough for some of us. Especially in the way of sleep. Strange thing about it though is that when we get a chance to sleep, we just can’t seem to close our eyes…

Yes, the war news is good, but don’t let the newspapers make you believe the war is about over. I’ll tell you one thing, if we didn’t have air supremacy, I don’t know what we’d do. You don’t see any German planes by day and few by night…
Sept. 24. A lot of guys are getting souvenirs lately such as German pistols, knives, belts, etc. I don’t think I’ll bother with anything like that… Besides I’m not interested in souvenirs — just am anxious to get this thing over as soon as possible and get back home…

His obituary says he was killed on November 8 between Nancy and Metz in Northern France.

And I have a few photos. A yellowed newspaper article. A letter from the War Department. His obituary. And his firetruck.

Back in Time, Up in the Mountains

October 26, 2016October 25, 2016 / Apple Hill Cottage / 12 Comments

This isn’t a travel blog, because well, we don’t travel much.

All our time is spent up, here in this place, and there’s no time left for somewhere else.

But for an early Christmas present Pedro and Olivier got us tickets for the Cass Scenic Railroad State Park in Cass, West Virginia. And it was so much fun, you, dear reader, get to hear about it, see photos, and then, ahem, make plans to travel there yourselves. (In the spring. Although I’m told the same railroad line operates a Polar Express tour in November and December and they are already sold out for this year…)

It was a wild and wonderful day in late October in the wild and wonderful mountains of Pocahontas County, West Virginia. 60% of Pocahontas County is State or National land, and we took so many photos both our cameras died…

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The Cass Scenic Railroad State Park is about 45 minutes east of Elkins WV. There are several scenic railroad trips one could take on this Durbin and Greenbrier Valley Railroad; the old Cass logging train up the mountain to Whittaker Station is just one. The Cass logging train has been going up Cheat Mountain since 1901 when the line was first built. Shay Locomotive #5 is the second oldest steam engine in the country.

We got our tickets at the station and headed up to the logging museum to wait for the train.

The old company houses in the town of Cass have been renewed, and are now for rent to folks who would like to spend time hiking, kayaking, and exploring. Eight rivers have their headwaters in the mountains of Pocahontas County: the Cheat and the Greenbrier are the largest.

We couldn’t miss hearing the train come into the station. There’s just something about about those long slow train whistles.

On the way up to Whittaker Station, the train goes over two mountain roads, marked with nothing but a stop sign, and train crossing warnings. Of course, long blasts of the train’s whistle are a good warning too.

As you travel up the mountain in the coal-fired steam engine, the train is alternately pulled and pushed by the locomotive. There are two switchbacks; the train backs into them, with the guidance of a switchman, and then the train chugs off again, this time pulling the cars.

The switchbacks are for power. These Shay locomotives go up the mountain on an 11% grade. Today’s train tracks are considered steep if the grade is 2%. These locomotives are the same steam engines that are used in the mountains of British Columbia, but they were retrofitted to use West Virginia coal.

For one trip up the mountain, the locomotive uses one ton of coal to produce the steam. The coal is shoveled by hand by the fireman, just like it always was.

The scenery was spectacular and what a thrill it was to be riding in an open car up a steep grade with the train chugging on the rails and blasting its whistle and the coal cinders flying in your eyes. :-) It was cold, too. Snow and ice covered the tops of Bald Knob and nearby mountains.

You can also take the full tour up to Bald Knob (and even spend the night in a rustic caboose). At 4700 feet it is the third highest point in West Virginia.

We were glad to disembark at Whittaker Station for coffee and hot chocolate. Did I mention it was cold in the mountains?

The entire time we were on the train, I kept humming to myself “Life Is Like a Mountain Railway” a great old bluegrass gospel tune. Even the the wheels on the tracks kept the beat.

I wish I’d gotten a photo of the train stopping to fill up with water, but both of our phones had died by then. When we got back to the station, we checked out the Company Store and bought old fashioned root beer barrel candy; we stopped at the West Virginia Artisan Shop; and we had an early dinner of homemade chicken noodle soup and pulled pork sandwiches at the Cafe. While we were eating, the bluegrass band Donna Ulisse and the Poor Mountain Boys was tuning up for a hurricane relief concert.

It was a lovely day, and as we were going home over Cheat Mountain, the skies proclaimed glory with this fiery sunset.

109. A Light for your Path, Part 2 : Rewiring old lamps

June 26, 2014July 1, 2014 / Apple Hill Cottage

This post is the second part of a series on old lamps. The first was painting; this one will show you how to rewire an old lamp.

Disclaimer: Some people don’t want to tackle lamps and that’s okay. Truthfully, if I didn’t have my handy Mr.H.C. handy, I might not have tried it either. Safety first! If you are hesitant, don’t try this at home. :-)

For this project I bought the kit that included a new lamp cord; my local hardware store actually had more selection of lamp repair parts than the big box stores.

If you don’t have a lamp to repair, quickly run out to your favorite junque shop and get one. I’ll wait. Don’t spend more than $10 because you will have to buy a lampshade and that’s where you will want to splurge. (If you’ve tested your lamp and it works, that’s great! Maybe all you have to do is paint it or spruce it up. The last time I bought a lamp, we tested it at the store, it worked great, and three days later is stopped working. So…) Stop by a hardware store and buy a lamp rewiring kit, too. Then you can use all new parts.

I am making two assumptions here: 1. You have made sure that it isn’t just a burned out light bulb; and 2. You have unplugged the lamp from any electrical outlet. Okay, let’s get started.

You need a basic screwdriver, a wire stripper, a sharpie, and if you (or someone in your household) have a continuity tester you can use it, but it isn’t necessary. The goofy looking tool is a wire stripper. We’ll look closer at it later.

Let’s review Tip # 2 from the last post:
Tip # 2. When taking apart a lamp, especially if you are doing this for the first time, remember how it goes back together. Put all your parts together in a big tin can, or place them somewhere in a line to help you remember what washer goes on what nut.

I was very careful to keep all the pieces together in a tin can, but still, I lost a nut… Luckily nuts are easy to come by in this house…

Lamp repair

Mr. H.C. is providing the technical expertise for this post. (That’s one reason I’m writing it: so I’ll have a written record for myself so I can go back and look it over without having to bug him about every little thing.) One other thing: sometimes rewiring requires three hands. See if you can find a spare one around the house somewhere…

Tools and Basics

First let’s look at sockets. You can buy them as a push switch, a turn knob, a three way turn knob, and most of them have a little pull chain option if you’d like to be very retro. It looks like this in the package, but comes apart into 4 pieces. If you are taking the lamp all apart to paint it, you should just replace everything old with new.

Here are the 4 pieces of the socket: the base, the cover or shell, the cardboard insulator, and the socket/switch. Lamp socket

The new one will come in pieces; the old one on your lamp will have to come apart. On the shell, usually next to the switch, is some unreadable writing. It says Press. You are supposed to be able to press the cover in and release it from the base. Sometimes it works, but if the socket is old, it could be corroded or electrified together, and you may have to press and pry with a screwdriver at the same time.

This is the new socket/switch, so there is no wiring attached to it yet.

Don’t you hate it when DIY posts have photos of clean hands? Yep, so do I.

Let’s take a break for a minute and examine the socket/switch. In the left photo the screw is silver — this is the neutral screw; on the right, the screw is brass — this is the positive, or hot screw.

This wire is marked which side is the hot wire. This wire is new and the tips are nicely soldered together.

Lamp cords are made of two stranded wires, the neutral and the hot wires. The hot wires must be attached to the hot screw and the neutral wires must go the neutral screw. Lamp cords generally aren’t marked as to which side is which; when you take off the wire from the hot screw, it might be helpful to mark that side with a sharpie or nail polish — something to let you know which is the hot wire. If you have a handy dandy continuity tester you can use it here, but there are other ways to determine which is the hot wire. See Tip #1.
Tip # 1: The plug on a lamp cord has two prongs and one is larger than the other. This is the neutral or ground prong. If you straighten the wire and follow the cord up, that section of wire is the neutral wire. Conversely, if you follow the section of wire up from the smaller prong, that’s the hot wire.

The U-shaped piece of metal under the socket is the base for the harp which holds the lampshade. This is the American style of lamp shade holder, so it’s likely your lamp has one. Don’t forget to put it back on before the socket.

The cord goes down through the lamp in a hollow metal tube with threads on each end. At the base of the inside of the lamp tube is a nut holding the whole thing together. The top of the lamp tube is screwed into the base of the socket we just took apart. Consequently, when you unscrew the socket base, you might just unscrew the whole tube. Yes, I’ve done it. (If you are taking it all apart to paint it, you’re going to replace everything anyway, so don’t worry — this is only tricky when you are just repairing a lamp.)

Putting it Back Together

Put the cord through the hole in the bottom of the lamp, then through the threaded tube, putting the lamp pieces together as you go. Every lamp is different; the lamp I painted had three pieces and one long tube that connected them all inside. Many lamps are just one piece with a short threaded tube just below the socket. Make sure to leave plenty of wire out the bottom of the lamp to plug it in. After the wire is all the way up the tube and into the base of the socket, you only need a few inches of cord.

Tip # 2: Mr. H.C. says I can’t leave this out: When the base of the socket has to be reattached to the lamp, twist the cord in the opposite direction — counter-clockwise — about six times (just by hand). This is to keep the cord from kinking while you are screwing the base of the socket into the lamp.

This cord has the hot wire marked; the strands of wire are nicely soldered, so they just have to be curved around the correct screw and the screw tightened. Also note the underwriter’s knot in the cord.

Lamp cord is generally 18 gauge, and if you look on the wire strippers there are numbers that correspond to the size of cord to be cut.

Once the cord is through the socket base, and the socket base is back on the lamp, you have to split the two sections of cord and uncover those strands of wires. This is where you need the wire strippers. The goal is to just cut through the plastic of the cord and not cut any of the wires. Put the cord in the correct notch of the wire strippers and squeeze gently; then with an upward motion just peel that plastic off.

Tip # 3: Each and every one of those strands is important. If you cut any of them accidentally, move down the wire a bit and try again.

After you have prepared the wire ends, split the cord a little further and tie a knot in the cord so it won’t slip off the screws. There is a cool knot, called an underwriter’s knot that is generally used. It looks like the symbol for infinity, and See Jane Drill has a great video on how to learn to tie it. It’s simple and it looks like this.
Underwriter's knot

Close up of lamp wires If the strands of wire are not soldered, they have to be neatly twisted together before they can be wrapped around the screw. Twist them together in a clockwise fashion and bend the wires into a half-circle that will fit easily around the screw. Once you have the wires in place with the correct screws, tighten the screws, and put the socket back together. Remember in Tip # 2 above we talked about how important those strands of wire are? Here as well — if any stray wires end up sticking out around the screws, unscrew them, retwist the wires, and try again. (If you are using a new cord, chances are this is already done for you — another reason to buy the whole kit and just replace everything.)

All that is left is to fit the harp over the harp base, choose a lightbulb (that is a feat in and of itself these days…) and go buy a lampshade.

And now I will confess that I wish I had written this post before I started. And one more thing … if the lamp flickers when you turn it on, don’t use it. Turn it off and seek electrical guidance from a local lamp guru, an electrical expert, a polished professional, a guiding light in the field of lamp repair. Okay, sorry. Mr. H.C. says I shouldn’t make jokes about this being a shocking experience.

If you need more information or my instructions are as clear as mud, here are a couple of web sites that go into great detail (they also use photos of clean, nicely manicured hands): How to Repair a Faulty Lamp for Dummies or Family Handyman’s How to Repair a Table Lamp. But again, I think totally rewiring is easier than repairing. Just my opinion…

And my lamp? I totally changed my mind and went with a creamy linen shade. I don’t always like to get white shades because my walls are mostly off-white and I don’t want the shade to disappear against the wall. But the mirror behind the lamp changes all that. What do you think?