Image provided by: Morrow County Museum; Heppner, OR
About Heppner gazette-times. (Heppner, Or.) 1925-current | View Entire Issue (March 17, 1977)
Thursday. March 17, 1977, Heppner, Ore. THE GAZETTE-TIMES Page 9-A Tree farm railroad man - y ' f , ff i xi. . 1 .Lewis Lorengel has put in nearly three decades on the rails to between Kinzua and Condon and logging spurs on the Kinzua Tree Farm. During that time, he has chalked up more than a half million miles of travel as engineer on the Condon, Kinzua and Southern railroad. Born in Portland in 1912, Lorengel "Louie" grew up on steam logging engines in Klickitat County, Wash. He came to Kinzua in 1949 because he "knew it had a Heisler Locomotive." (See picture, page 1.) Lorengel was working with a relative of Carl Coleman jiii? '"" w "' wi' ''"'hk '" v " "Kin 11 "m!" v ii n "'. 1 : BUCKNUM'S : comes to the I comes to the rescue everyday. Thanks Bucknum's Tavern before he came to Kinzua. He recalls the fellow said, "I know Carl and I know you won't last two weeks." Lor engel walked into Kinzua and told Carl the story. Said Coleman, "Let's try it and see for ourselves." Said Lorengel, "Turned out to be the best boss I ever worked for." Lorengel recalls backing an engine into the side of a box car. One impulse was to leave a note on Carl's desk and "Get to the woods." Lorengel went to see Carl and told him what happened. "He looked at me a little bit and asked, 'What was the real cause of the acci dent?' I told him the BS was about that deep," Lorengel measures with a wave of his hand. Lorengel took over as en gineer of a new General Electric Diesel locomotive in 1951. The new diesel had about half the power of the Heisler steam engine, but the ratio of fuel consumption was much better. Since 1962, Lorengel has recorded 205,000 miles over the tracks. A single load of logs would require 55 miles a Kinzua day over the tracks. There are 24 miles of track between Condon and Kinzua. The first trip in the diesel took place about May 13 of 1951 and the last working trip By Tom Franks was recorded Nov. 19 of 1976. The diesel was sold and moved from the yards at Kinzua ' recently after a thorough inspection from Lorengel. Speed over the line was J- 1? JjvJaI IN ANY I Yf I Hi,,. CROWD! Like Kinzira Corporation in the logging industry-so do r;e strive for tne finest. 13 average, about eight miles per hour, Lorengel said. Sometimes there were some close calls and over the years a few accidents which tied up the line for a few days. "Louie" figures his closest call came m February of 1968 when 20 feet of snow was over the line. The C.K. & S. was stuck two miles out of Condon, but the line was cleared by returning for bulldozers. Not expecting that the Kinzua train had reached Condon, the Union Pacific came in from GARDNER'S SALUTES mzm corporation GawlnUV MEH'S O the north, plowing snow. The collision bucked one of the cats partially into the cab with Louie. "At first all I could think of was an atomic bomb or earthquake," he said. The C.K. & S. line is known to railroad fans. "Railroad fans have rode this thing from all over," Louie said. At 65 years of age, Louie Lorengel is 28 years and more than half a million miles from , the point where he started hauling logs from Camp 5 in 1949. IflEflR i Heppner 676-9218 E Heppner Main
