LwS S2, E1 - The Life of John M. Prophet III & his First Recording from Bay View Tower
Hi everyone. It took me months to complete, but the first episode of season two of Living With Steam is now available for streaming. In this one, I focus on the life of John Prophet and how he came to be such a knowledgeable and dedicated railfan; becoming the foremost expert on the Pennsylvania Railroad for his time. Some of the material I cover was conveyed in much more detail in the video I released back in September as an accompaniment to the lecture I gave on John's life to the NRHS back in September. Check out the video on the LWS Facebook page especially since there's images and video to help move the story along.
The primary feature of this episode are John's very first recordings made at Bayview (BV) Tower on April 10, 1948. They're a mix of NYC, NKP, and PRR steam and diesel engines pulling a variety of trains including both the east/west 20th Century Limited.
It's a long one, but it was necessary to get it all in.
Enjoy!
This episode features the recordings John Prophet made the very first time he took his wire recorder out to a railroad track... anywhere. Since John's best friend, Sam Herrington, was a tower operator for the New York Central, John recorded from Bayview (BV) Tower near Blasdell, NY, since Sam was on duty that night. John had owned for wire recorder for about a week when he decided to give his new toy a try-out. The results are a little rough, but it gives you the opportunity to hear what the constant rail activity was like at this very busy location. PERFECT for watching trains of the NYC, NKP, and PRR.
April 10, 1948 was a cold, early spring day... or morning. John made these recordings between 11:00 and 3:30 in the morning. Whenever John recorded from BV, he usually sat at the top of the stairs or on the middle landing of the stairs leading the second floor of the tower. At 1:00 in the morning, it was probably VERY cold outside, so John sat inside the tower with Sam and some other gents who were keen to know what a wire recorder could do.
John M. Prophet III was born in 1915. He was the son of a long legacy of "John M. Prophets." John's grandfather was the founder of the Winter & Prophet Canning Company in Mount Morris, NY. It was through the family business that John discovered trains of the Pennsylvania Railroad. Winters & Prophet opened in 1879 in Mt. Morris. When John's father took over as superintendent of the company, it's name had been changed to New York Canning. They were a VERY successful manufacturing facility and a major employer in Mt. Morris.
In the aerial photo, the red arrow points to canning facilities. The yellow arrow points to the PRR tracks. It's no wonder John fell in love with trains (especially the Pennsy) at a very young age.
The picture below shows the clerks in the freight office of the New York Central at Buffalo Central Terminal. John is sitting behind his desk... third man from the front on the right side of the room.
As a side story, this episode talks about the Voice-O-Graph recording booths and the "Voice of Your Man in Service" recordings that were made by the Pepsi-Cola Company during World War 2. Below are photos are the Pepsi-Cola Center for Service Men & Woman in San Francisco, CA, the location where the recording heard in this episode was made.
To find out more, do a YouTube search for "Voice-O-Gram booths" to see this fascinating machines in action.
The German Magnetophone was the first machine designed and built to record on magnetic tape. However, people in the United States didn't know about this technology until one was captured in the raid of a German town during the war.
Portable record cutters were available by the mid 1940s, but they were fragile and not at all convenient for recording trains since a record only held 3:30 minutes of content (if you were lucky).
Here is the page of "notes" John wrote for his first BV wire. I've added annotations of my own to help identify what John recorded.
For a long time, I could never understand why John was so utterly vague about his notes. No engine is indicated whether it was a steam or diesel. Of course, the answer is pretty obvious; it was 1:00 in the morning and DARK OUTSIDE! An oncoming engine is going to have a headlight that would blind you as it approached. Outside of a solitary light overlooking the stairs, there was no outside lighting to show John what trains were approaching. So if Sam Herrington didn't tell John what train was scheduled to pass the tower, he'd have no way of knowing what was coming.
All John saw were pitch black monoliths of steel thundering by his location with the faint glow of light from the windows of passenger cars following behind.
END
