track were laid down and picked up as the machine chugged to the dam site a mile away. After two years work the shovel was to be moved back on the railroad. It was stored along the road between our home and the tracks. Hyman – Goodman found no use for the machine so it just stood there marring the landscape. Kids climbed over it and got dirty. My mother hated the thing. Over the years my father made many attempts to get rid of the monster. Finally in 1930, he was told that the shovel was his to do what he pleased with it. He sold it to the scarp dealer for twenty-five dollars. This was a week’s wages at that time but little compensation for the nuisance it had been for nearly a dozen years. Fire in the Chimney There was a lot happening at the station in the 1890’s when summer boarders arrived to go back to the city. Jefferson Township Historical Society The Ugly Steam Shovel The Oak Ridge reservoir dam was built in 1900. It was greatly enlarged in 1917 by the contracting firm, Hyman – Goodman of Jersey. A huge steam shovel, originally used to build the Panama Canal, was brought upon the Susquehanna to move a necessary massive amount of soil. It was the heaviest shipment ever to be assigned to the Oak Ridge station. The shovel had eight wheels to move on the standard gauge track. A shelter covered the boiler, the engine, and the operator. There was a system of sheaves and cables and a four foot bucket on the long hinged boom. Sections of After 1927, the Susquehanna supplied soft coal for heating station building. It burned with intense heat, a sulfur smell and left a combustible residue on the chimney. A passerby noticed flames coming from the station chimney and notified the agent. The ever present fire ladder came into rapid use but the water barrel had been neglected. Available hands brought pails of water from nearby neighbors. It was poured on the charred roofing while the fire was allowed to burn out. The building was saved to serve the railroad thirty more years. The combined station and freight house buildings were moved one hundred feet to the fuel company’s property in 1962 and are still used as a warehouse for the company’s business. Alfred Ringling’s manor house being completed in 1918. The building contained 28 rooms, 8 baths, elaborate wood carvings, Tiffany stained glass, a $75,000 organ and fire5 A glimpse of the postal clerk at Oak Ridge in 1915. He sorted the mail while traveling, delivering mail from town to town. The engine is No. 24 hauling the “Sussex mail”. (Authors collection)
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