A Wednesday presentation by Anne and Tony Erspamer titled “The Yardmaster: A Working Railroad of Today” at the Marquette Regional History Center gave attendees a firsthand perspective on railroad work.

Tony Erspamer worked for the Lake Superior and Ishpeming Railroad for over 20 years, reaching the rank of yardmaster before retiring two years ago.

He kicked off his part of the presentation in a lighthearted way, telling the audience, “If you feel like jumping and giving me a high five or fist bump, come on running up!”

For Tony, it all started in the summer of 1997.

Workers at Lake Superior and Ishpeming ore dock load the Kaye E. Barker with iron ore from train cars at Marquette’s upper harbor. Attendees of a Wednesday presentation by Anne and Tony Erspamer titled “The Yardmaster: A Working Railroad of Today” at the Marquette Regional History Center got a firsthand perspective on what it’s like to work for the Lake Superior and Ishpeming Railroad. (Journal file photo)

Tony’s friend was the manager of transportation at LS&I. He asked Tony if he had any friends that would be interested in a position at the railroad.

However, it turned out that Tony was looking for a career change himself. He didn’t know much about railroad work, but he was interested in the control operator position.

“The interest sparked me from day one, and continued to climb,” he said.

A hundred people were interviewed for the job, but Tony stood out. He landed the job in the winter of that same year. He trained with a control operator for 30 to 60 days, then took the required 100-question exam. He passed the exam and became a qualified control operator.

“You are the man in charge of all movements by radio; with (keeping) all the trains and any maintenance away from employees that do work on the rail,” he said. “They are not allowed on the rail or allowed to move until they get permission from a control operator.”

At the beginning of Tony’s career, the control board that handles all the switches and lights was a very old mechanism.

“You couldn’t even tell in certain locations where your trains were. So I became very famous for using sticky notes,” he said.

Eventually, LS&I would spend about $2 million to upgrade to an updated computer system. No sticky notes required.

Most crews started out at the Eagle Mills railroad station. At the beginning of each shift, Tony would instruct them on which direction to go as they moved toward Marquette.

Usually there were 120 cars, with each car taking one load, with 60 tons of iron ore per load.

Other crews would be sent toward the Tilden Mine, which also usually had about 120 cars. The train shipping season was 24/7, 365 days a year.

The Marquette ore dock was famous throughout the Great Lakes for not delaying vessels, according to Tony. Shippers loved coming to Marquette because the ore dock was on time, he said.

The end of the year was always a busy time, as steel companies wanted to stockpile iron ore to last through the winter.

During the winter months, special machines were used to clean ice and snow off the rails so trains could safely deliver the ore.

There was a track inspector who would inspect the tracks daily to make sure there were not any dangerous locations the trains would run into.

An average ship would take about 300 to 350 train cars worth of ore. Ships could be loaded in about seven hours.

Larger vessels that could take up to 500 cars worth of ore would take about 10 to 12 hours to load.

It also took time for the ship captain to maneuver the vessel into the dock, along with keeping the vessel level in the water.

However, the vessels that the ore was loaded onto did not run all day, every day.

When the Soo Locks would shut down for the season, Tony’s team would put the ore from the trains into the pockets of the ore dock all winter. Three and a half train cars would fill up one pocket.

Tony’s team also delivered 365 days a year to Algoma Steel, which is located just across the Canadian border from Sault Ste. Marie.

The Canadians would bring 45 gondolas every day to Eagle Mills, Tony’s team would take it and load it at the Tilden Mine, then they’d bring it to Partridge Junction between Eagle Mills and Tilden Mine, exchange it, then it would go to Algoma.

Algoma was pleased with quality of the iron ore pellets, Tony said.

Instead of traveling from the Tilden Mine, being loaded in the cars, brought to Marquette, dropped into the pockets of the ore dock, and then down onto the ship, the quality was better if it was just shipped straight by railroad, he said.

Safety was always the main concern when it came to the railroad.

“The No. 1 priority has always been safety,” Tony said. “It was a wonderful career, knowing we were looking out for each other.”

That doesn’t mean accidents didn’t happen.

Tony told the story of how at one time a friend of his was in a ballast regulator when he bumped his head. He radioed Tony and said he had fallen out of the machine, and the machine was now barreling towards Marquette with no one in it.

Tony called 911. Down the road, the machine was going to go through the County Road 550 crossing. They couldn’t completely stop the machine, so they let it barrel down into Marquette’s west yard, Tony said.

It blew through County Road 550 into the Marquette yard and came to a rest. The machine was able to slow itself down to a stop due to a stretch right before County Road 550 that starts to slope, then flattens out, Tony said, noting that it was a scary ordeal.

Often, there were things that would happen beyond their control.

Tony said he had a friend who was traveling over the Dead River bridge on the way to Marquette with 120 ore cars.

The friend yelled over the radio to Tony that people were rappelling off the bridge.

There was no way the train could stop before the bridge, Tony said. They called 911 and got everyone in action.

Luckily, the rappellers had tied their ropes off the outside of the bridge and not the rail itself. No one was injured, but it was startling nonetheless, he said.

Tony worked for four years as a control operator until he was asked to take a promotion to become a yardmaster.

Yardmasters today are called supervisors of transportation. Tony commented he likes the term yardmaster better.

“I loved the word yardmaster, I always thought that was cool,” he said.

The yardmaster is in charge of the control operator, all trainmen, locomotive engineers and conductors. He always had his ears on the radio listening to what was happening.

“On the railroad you can’t afford to make a mistake,” he said.

Tony’s career at LS&I Railroad spanned 22 years before he retired.

“I miss the men. I loved working directly with the train men. There were a lot a great men. The work was so interesting, but retirement is great,” he said.

Sharing the experience

Anne Erspamer wrote a children’s book, “Yardmaster,” about the railroads. In addition to her husband, Tony, her father, grandfather and uncles had all worked on railroads.

Originally, Anne wanted to make Tony a book featuring photos of him, the railroad and the trains.

She spoke about going to the top of the ore dock in Marquette to take pictures.

“When I got to the top, the size of it overwhelmed me. I was expecting it to be maybe a football field or something, and I thought, this is like four football fields long and like one football field wide. You felt like a little tiny person up there.”

She was surprised at how close the ore cars would run to the platform she was on.

“There’s a little railing and then there’s an ore car, I could probably touch the ore car. So I said, ‘When the guys are working up here, these ore cars are moving?’ The railing wasn’t that big.”

She made the first copy of the book by going online and putting the photos together through a website that would bind them into a book.

She then gave the book to Tony, who appreciated it very much.

One of her friends who was a teacher saw it and told her it would be a great book for elementary school-aged children.

So, Anne then went to Globe Printing in Ishpeming and the business helped her make a smaller-sized, more affordable book. That book can now be purchased at the Marquette Regional History Center’s gift shop.

The talk followed an opening reception for the Marquette Regional History Museum’s “Railroads of Marquette County: Yesterday and Today” exhibit. The exhibit will run until February 2023.

The history center is located at 145 W. Spring St., Marquette. For more information, call 906-226-3571 or visit www.marquettehistory.org.

Taylor Johnson can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 248. Her email address is tjohnson@miningjournal.net.