" The Great Flood" or " Fish Tale" of MacMillan Yard

The official version.

To anyone who is aware of the Tunnel from "Master Control" to the checking booth, and is, or capable of making a sketch it would be invaluable for this story, I unfortunately can't draw a straight line with ruler, so in lieu of that I will do my best to describe it.

There were three main tracks coming into the Yard, and if a three trains were all coming into the Yard at the same time they all could be checked in comfort by the following means.

There was a checking booth in the Admin. Bldg. and a tunnel that went under that track, and up to a checking booth between the other two tracks, on the other side of that track, where two people could go, to check two more trains entering the yard simultaneously.

To enter the secondary checking booth you had to go down a flight of stairs and walk through a tunnel which was really a culvert about seven feet high, to another flight of stairs about fifty ft. away, go up the flight of stairs and into the secondary checking booth which had chairs and was nicely heated.

Each spring when the accumulated snows of the previous winter started melting the tunnel would flood to a depth of eight to ten inches, and if anyone had to go through the tunnel they would have to slog through this water, and as this was part of the job they were expected to do this if they had rubber boots or not.

The dates I forget, but one winter in the early years of the yard there had been an abundance of snow around from the previous winter which started to melt, causing the water in the tunnel to rise instigating many complaints from the checkers expected to go through the tunnel to check the inbound trains.

It should be said that a fifty dollar sump pump and thirty five dollars worth of pipe would have fixed this problem but, the company in their infinite wisdom thought that after spending three hundred million dollars on this project the additional money spent would put them over budget, and so provided a pair of hip waders at the top of the stairs for anyone to use if they had to go through the water.

It should come as no surprise, that there were still complaints about the water, and having to put on rubber boots, worn by everyone on the three shifts having to trudge through the stagnant water, and this could be in the order of forty people.

I was working the East Outbound at the time, and being the sympathetic sort, and a bit of a shit disturber, people would come to me and complain, and after a number of complaints, I thought I should go to the Grievance Officer of the Union, and remind him of the problem, and tell him he should do something about it.

Now Aubrey was a good Grievance Officer but on this issue, which he thought was rather petty, partly, because he was never asked to go through the water, and check a train he was apathetic.

When I approached him over the situation, he kind of pooh poohed it, and said in a rather somewhat sarcastic, and condescending tone, that someone had seen a fin in the water, which sent off lights in my head, the same sort of thing we would see in the comics, when the subject in question got a good idea.

I went back to my desk, and mentioned to my compatriots, Michael H., Dennis F., and George S., George being a stereotypical German, of who it was once said, ask him what time it is, and he will tell you how to build a watch, and told them what Aubrey had said.

After we discussed it I told them of my solution to the problem, and that was, if someone thought they had seen a fish in the tunnel, lets make sure they do.

I phoned up the live bait place in Parkdale the same area where George lived and asked how much it would cost us for two hundred live suckers, and they told me twenty dollars.

I asked the three guys if they would be willing to kick in five dollars each, to which they replied of course, took up the collection, swore them to secrecy, gave the twenty dollars to George and told him to get the suckers, and bring them back the next day.

George brought the fish in the next day, in a plastic garbage bag, inside a couple stout shopping bags a little early, and I was waiting, and because everyone was changing shifts, no one was paying any attention to me, they were probably fighting over chairs, I sneaked down to the tunnel and released the two hundred suckers, but it appears the guy had stiffed us a little there were to crappies among the suckers, but there appeared to be two hundred fish so that was OK, in fact maybe it looked a little better.

The first guy to be asked to go over to the checking booth to check a train was Michael H., one of the co-conspirators which he did and on his return, he kind of off handily mentioned about the fish, but he wasn't taken serious, everyone pooh poohed him, he turned in his check and came over to his workplace on the rack.

We asked him what it looked like and he said terrific that every step you took through the water the school of fish panicked and kept swishing in front of him, and if it had been dust, they would have kicked up a cloud, we thought it best not to push the situation knowing that someone else would be sent there before to long, so we waited.

The next person told to go across was Cliff J. , now it must be said, that of Cliff it was said, he was a a few boxcars short of a train.

When Cliff returned, he was wide eyed and amazed, and because no one took him to serious at any time, most said yeh yeh fish in the tunnel yeh Cliff, but if Cliff was anything he was persistent, and when at that moment Jim P. , comes into the office, and Cliff starts telling him about the fish, now Jim was more leary than most, but something in Cliff's manner told him he should look for himself.

When Jim came back he went right over to Aubrey, remember Aubrey, and tells him about the fish in the tunnel, and Aubrey pooh poohs Jim at which time Jim says I'll bet you two hundred dollars there's fish in the tunnel.

It should be said that we were in the back of the office and could see and hear everything that was going on and had a hard time not breaking up, and as both Aubrey and Jim were betting men and good friends of mine I got worried that Aubrey would take the bet, but fortunately he didn't, but that got the ball rolling.

Everyone from the office had to go down and have a look, including the Building Manager Lloyd D. , who I was certain was suspicious of the whole thing, because he checked out all the garbage cans in the office and, the dumpster outside, where I had placed the incriminating evidence, but inside something else, and short of getting in the dumpster he was not going to find it.

Because Jim worked out of the Superintendent's Office, when he got back, he related the story in there, and before long there were many, architects and civil engineers wandering around with blueprints in their hands, trying to figure out how the fish had gotten there, ignoring the obvious, and a wide variety of other top officials from Head Office at Union station, came up not wanting to miss out on this strange phenomenon.

It was almost like the vision at Lourdes, like God was trying to tell them something, some said the fish came in from a near bye creek through the drain grate, but if they had looked at the grate they would have seen that the quarter inch mesh would not allow that.

One of the clerks Louie S., fashioned a fishing pole and went fishing, and when he returned with about six fish I ask him what he was going to do with them, and he said take them home for supper, my eyes seemed to roll back in my head.

When Louie returned to try to catch some more fish, another clerk Terry Y., hid his shoes as Louie had put on the hip waders to do the fishing.

When Louie returned looking for his shoes he could not find them but, found out Terry had hid them, he then went over to Terry to confront him, took off the rubber boots and hit Terry over the head with them.

I had to withhold so much laughter that day that I went home with a terrible headache, but it was sure worth it, and a couple days later the problem was solved.

Before going home that day I went and swore Aubrey to secrecy, and told him what had happened, but he didn't believe me.

He told me the next day that he dad stopped on his way home, at the home of Jim H., the Union General Chairman, and told him what happened, and before he could finish the story, Jim says I'll bet it was Al, at which time Audrey says I told him that, but that, he didn't believe me,, when Jim tells him he is crazy.

Needless to say that when the water was gone it was still damp down there for a while and when crossing through the tunnel one of the clerks slipped and fell initiating a lost time injury, which then required an investigation be held to determine the case of the accident.

When being required to appear at an investigation our Collective Agreement, the 5.1 states during an investigation the person being investigated may have the help of a Union Rep. or one or two fellow employees, at which time I am asked to appear as a fellow employee.

The injured person Ashok K., being of East Indian decent and not entirely in command of the nuances of the English Language, when asked how he had slipped and fell, exclaimed that he had slipped on" seaweed" at which time Ted N. the supervisor says don't you mean moss, and I jumped in and said he said seaweed, and that is what he wants left in the statement, thinking that seaweed sounded funnier, and would have greater impact, if anyone downtown were to read the statement at a later date.

Several years later I mentioned the incident to Jim P., who reported to the Superintendent, not knowing that he never knew it was me, that no one had told him.

He said that it was a good thing they never found out who it was, or they would have strung me up it caused so much concern, at Head Office.

It was certainly for me one of the funniest incidents every to my knowledge

Allan