Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, December 15, 1994 TAG: 9412150022
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CODY LOWE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
But, in another spirit of the season, they should despair not.
Local entrepreneurs Andy Alonso and Danny Rudder have captured the flavor of the last three excursions pulled by the big black-and-burgundy engine in a new calendar coming out just in time for Christmas.
Putting together the full-color package on such short notice has not been easy, Alonso and Rudder said in interviews late last week.
Friday, they had to find a new company to prepare the color pictures for publication when their first choice was unable to complete the work in time for submission to the printers this week.
Hectic though it has been, "God has a way of bringing things together even when we don't know it's happening," Alonso said.
The stapled calendar will feature 13 9-by-12-inch pages of pictures of the engine, the cars and the people of "The Last Excursions," taken since the locomotive's retirement was announced Oct. 28.
Alonso, who now does mainly corporate photography for companies including Norfolk Southern, also has more than a decade's worth of experience as a news photographer who's been published in The New York Times, Washington Post and Time magazine. It was his news experience, he said, that prompted him to take a "more journalistic approach than is usual with train calendars," he said.
The calendar will also include photos by Rudder, who runs a Roanoke photo lab, Vince Miller, Gary Hambrick and Ken Miller.
All the pictures will be captioned, and there will be a brief historical background on the 5000-horsepower Class J engine.
Alonso and Rudder said they considered including a picture of the 611 on its last trip into Roanoke after its final excursion, but decided not to.
The calendar "is not about the death of the 611 but about how it gave life through the excursions," Alonso said.
"For the real train buff, we hope they'll say this is different. That it is real, that it's good, that it's what they remember."
While he hopes the calendar will be appealing to non-buffs as well, Alonso acknowledges that the biggest natural market is among the huge contingent of railroad fans and employees in the region.
The calendar will available through the Virginia Museum of Transportation gift shop run by the Roanoke chapter of the National Railway Historical Association, which will share in the profits. The calendars also will be promoted through Tudor's Biscuit World, which will get a percentage for each calendar sold.
"We're doing this as a business," Alonso said, "but we want to give back to those who help us out."
For instance, the youth group at Alonso's church - Raleigh Court United Methodist - is selling the calendars as a fund-raiser for a spring trip. Alonso said he and Rudder are open to working with other non-profit groups.
The partners are enthusiastic about the prospects of selling the 5,000 copies of the calendar's first run. A few hundred orders already have come in, Alonso said, even before the calendar has been printed.
He and Rudder handed out fliers at the November excursion in Greenville, S.C., that have already drawn orders from as far away as Michigan and California.
Though neither Alonso nor Rudder would have been eligible for the "steam fanatic" label before they decided to produce the calendar, both got a sense of why some people were teary eyed when the 611 rolled back into Roanoke for the last time.
"Since I've been working around it, [the 611] does seem almost like a living organism," Rudder said.
"I'm sure it was my imagination, but when the train was leaving Chattanooga for that last trip home, the whistle almost sounded like it was moaning."
The calendar is available by sending a check for $14.95 - plus 67-cents in sales tax for Virginia residents - to "The Last Excursions," A.R. Alonso/Rudder Photo Lab, 400 W. Campbell Ave. S.W., Roanoke 24016. Phone orders, including Visa and MasterCard, may be made by calling 343-7125. The price includes shipping and handling.
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