Another hallmark of Lerro Produc-
tions trips is a lack of sleep, After shooting until around 11:00 on Monday night, the photographers were assem- bled again before sunrise on Tuesday to take advantage of the rising sun. The forecast for the day was not promising, but a timely gap in the clouds allowed for a very productive morning. Differ- ing from other charter operators, Lerro charters are more about runbys and trains. The entire railroad environ- ment is utilized. As the locomotive made a lengthy stop at the water plug at the Cumberland station, photogra- phers were given ample opportunity to do silhouette shots of two railroad workers up on the tender at the spout. The plan for the day was to use No. 729 in pusher service behind the freight train. This has been done be- fore, with the locomotive at the very end of the train pushing on the caboose. This time, though, someone had found photos of Western Maryland steam where the locomotive was placed be- hind the last car of the train but in front of the caboose; thus, the same configuration was used on this day. As an added bonus, it would also allow the 729 to be uncoupled from the train for some “caboose hop” scenes.
Once the photos were done at the wa- ter plug, No. 729 and its caboose head- ed to the interchange track that meets
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up with CSX. This track runs along the C&O Canal and crosses a lock on a bridge. The hole in the clouds lasted long enough to squeeze out some really nice photos here. Once the runbys in Cumberland was done, the train was assembled for the run up the mountain, with WMSR GP30 No. 502 (painted in a WM scheme, even though the WM never owned that model) on the point.
TOP: Downtown Ridgeley,
W.Va., was the lo- cation of the night photo session on October 21. The session included static shots as well as video runbys. ABOVE: No. 729 is pushing hard on the back of a freight as it rounds Helmstetter’s Curve near Cumberland. A Chevy truck waits at the dirt crossing. The gondola in front of the locomotive allowed bet- ter visibility of No. 729 for photographers, and the headlight being left off was another au- thentic touch.
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