Manchester Railroad Days

The following was posted by Mary Flowers on another Manchester page. It is reposted here with her permission :

My grandfather, Charles W. Naish, Sr had the most seniority of any engineer who retired from the ACL in Manchester, GA. (Circa 1863/1964)

He was too young for WWI & too old for WWII so he volunteered his engineering skills to haul nitroglycerin during the war. He was known for having such a soft touch on the brakes that the train cars didn’t clank together when he stopped. One of his firemen told us that he could drink coffee in the caboose when “ Uncle Charlie” was the engineer & never spill a drop.

A few years after he retired this picture was made at Six Flags Over Georgia where he was hired to create the training & service manuals for their engineers to operate the old style train engines used when they opened the park.

He drove from Manchester to Atlanta every day for almost two years to work with what he loved until an auto accident stopped his driving.

He was my hero.