In 1976, Tom Smith, a longtime locomotive enthusiast, rode an Amtrak train from Delaware to Chicago, mainly to absorb the sights along the way. The most consequential sight, however, was already inside the train — his future wife, Karen Smith.
“I looked across the aisle and she was right there,” Smith said. “I asked her on a date, and here we are, in a nutshell.”
The Smiths were some of the more than 100 people aboard a 1941 Alco diesel train as it chugged about seven miles along the Chelatchie Prairie Railroad south from Yacolt Station, 207 Railroad Ave., to the Heisson area. The annual Father’s Day ride — one of four throughout the weekend — typically involves a 1929 steam train. But the nonprofit organization that hosts excursions on the railroad hit a snag as it awaits a permit from the Federal Railroad Administration to operate steam engines, volunteers said.
Tom Smith, now 73, of Camas, said his love of trains formed at a young age, when he could hear them passing his Delaware home. He worked as a freight conductor with Union Pacific Railroad for roughly 20 years, has been on a train in every state but Hawaii and even had his honeymoon on a locomotive.
The couple’s son, Allen Smith, 36, sat next to his parents on the train Sunday along with his wife, Ruth Smith, 37, and three young children. Allen Smith, who also spent his honeymoon on a train, is part of a Lego train club in Portland.
“I spent a lot of time on the side of train tracks waiting for trains to go by so he could take pictures of them,” Allen Smith said of his father during his childhood years.
That fervor seems to have transferred to another generation in Allen Smith’s oldest son Eric, 8. Eric, who has imitated trains since he was a toddler, said he would like to be a railroad engineer someday.
“It just runs in your blood,” Tom Smith said.
Trains have also been a staple in the Jordan family, of Vancouver. Andrea Jordan, 38, is the daughter of a European immigrant. After arriving in New York in the 1960s, Jordan’s mother rode a train to Sacramento, Calif.
Her husband, David Jordan, 40, rode locomotives routinely in Japan while serving in the Navy. They have three children — Laith, 8, Caris, 6, and Sam, 4.
Since 2013, the family has spent Father’s Days riding the Chelatchie Prairie Railroad. Because Laith, a toddler at the time, was captivated by trains, the couple researched and found the annual rides, starting a family tradition.
“When I take my kids on a train, I like to remind them that not everything new is good,” Andrea Jordan said.
Along the ride Sunday, the families witnessed an afternoon’s worth of the Pacific Northwest’s natural and historic wonder: livestock, creeks, trees, a beaver pond, Moulton Station, Yacolt Falls and — for a few seconds — a pitch black tunnel.
“It’s great for making out,” Dixie Hotaling, a volunteer with the railroad, jokingly said of the tunnel.
Hotaling, 79, of Vancouver, remembers riding the train as a girl from Boston to Maine to visit her aunt and uncle. As the train would begin to slow, Hotaling would sometimes be tossed into her uncle’s waiting arms on the side of the tracks.
“I think he might’ve dropped me a couple of times and that’s why I’m messed up,” Hotaling joked.
Hotaling has been volunteering for four years after meeting Jerry Jacobus, 82, of Vancouver, who has been volunteering for about 14 years and was the conductor Sunday.
“I’m just a train nut,” Jacobus said. “It’s a great time. You meet a lot of good people.”
