My name is Fred Stratton I love trains and live in Salisbury, NC. I was born and raised in New Jersey growing up in Wayne, NJ just a few hundred feet away from both the Lackawanna's Boonton Line and the Erie's Greenwood Lake Branch. My father worked and retired after 37 years with the Erie and then Erie Lackawanna railroad and I have some many fine memeories of him and the railroad he worked for. I can remember in 1960 just after we moved to Wayne, the many trains that would pass behind my house, I also remembering many a day after school going thru the woods and climbing the fill that the tracks were on to watch these commuter trains go by. I wasn't too sure where these people were heading in these trains but I do remember they were coming home from work and heading west.

My Son Jeremy Standing Where The Old Wayne Station Used To Be.7/3/98

I can also remember on the Greenwood Lake Branch the commuter trains going by as I was waiting for the school bus early in the morning. I would see the RS3's pulling a short string of stillwell coaches and had the opportunity many times to ride this train to Hoboken from the Wayne Station which was visible from my school bus stop. Those days are gone now, but I have these memories that will live on forever and I can pass down to my son as he grows older and we visit NJ from time to time. I now live near a CSX branchline in Florida, sometimes I can hear the trains go by and when I do I think of my childhood and growing up with the railroad, lying in my bed at night hearing the trains go by. Remember, tomorrow's memories are made today.
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