Coghill is a railroad siding between Alix and Haynes about three miles south and east of Stanton School.  A section crew lived there until the 50s.  Then there was just a section man lived there for a few years….

It was a very important grain loading place for the farmers of Stanton and Stone districts.  Many farmers would load a large number of carloads of grain to be shipped to Eastern Terminals.  In threshing time, crews were hired to haul the grain directly from the thresher to the siding.  They used teams and many four-horse teams hitched to grain tanks holding 125 to 150 bushels of grain, and these hurried to keep the thresher going.

Of course, the railroad didn’t always [have cars shunted] into the siding….  Farmers loaded a wagon lightly and put a speedier team on it.  When they saw (from a hill) a railway car or several cars, the race was on.  The first man there held the car.

Sometimes the train crew … made a flying switch.  The car would probably stop far past the siding.  Then the farmer had to hitch his team to the car with a heavy chain and double trees.  It was the true pulling team that slowly pulled the car to the siding….

Coghill was a very busy little siding until grain elevators and trucks did away with so much heavy scooping.

This article is from the book Pioneers and Progress, a history of the Alix-Clive area printed in 1974 by DW Friesen and Sons Ltd., Calgary.  Copies of it and of its follow-up Gleanings are available for sale at the Alix Public Library, Alix Wagon Wheel Museum, and Alix Home Hardware.
 

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Can you match the railway terms and definitions from Along these Lines ed. L. S. Kozma, Edmonton: Canadian Northern Society, 2004? Answers will be posted on our Facebook page on Monday! 

1. Wayfreight   l.c.l.
2. Second trick            
3. Hogger         
4.  Midnight speed        
5. California cab            
6. Backhead 
7. “Into the hole”
8. Hand-bomber       
9. Rip track             
10. Spot

a) The back end of the firebox & boiler within the locomotive cab

b) Less-than-carload of freight

c) Slang for midnight express train

d) Tack set aside for the car-men to make repairs to rolling stock

e) Second shift, from 16:00 to 23:59

f) Slang for hand-fired

g) Slang for locomotive engineer

h) Slang for an unenclosed locomotive cab

i) Uncoupling cars from a train and placing them in a siding

j) Slang, a train that enters a siding to admit a passing or opposing movement