Early Memories of Pine Creek

pmPilgrim photo, 1982

The above picture is a scan from a photo from 1982 or '83. The trains were still running and the rails were still there. But this picture gives the rails a ghostly quality. Within a few years they would be silenced and removed making way for the Pine Creek Rail to Trail where I will be riding in a little over 2 1/2 months.

As I try to remember my earliest memories of Pine Creek it is extremely difficult. How do you pick out the earliest memory of something that was always there. Pine Creek, or often just "The Creek" (pronounced "crick"), was as much a part of life as the Susquehanna River and Bald Eagle Mountain. It never wasn't there. But as I rummage around in the recesses of memory several memories came up that stand out.

Perhaps the earliest was a train derailment up the creek at Slate Run if I remember it correctly although it could also have been Cedar Run. It was in the mid-1950s and I remember the family piling in the old Packard and heading up to see it. Somewhere in my batches of slides from that era are a couple pictures of the derailment. They are washed out now and I wish I could put my hands on them easily.

What I remember most about the derailment was that there was a box car filled with watermelons. Or at least that's how I remember it. I don't think we went down and got a close-up view but I do remember wishing we could get some of that watermelon.

Perhaps the most lasting image of the creek for me has always been the sharp sides along the road that follows the creek. In many places there isn't a lot of space between the side of the hills and the railroad or the creek itself. In spring th road signs warning of "Falling Rock" were heeded because there were big rocks, boulders, along the side of the road. As the snows melted and the water came off the steep sides toward the creek at the bottom of the valley, it would often bring rocks and boulders down on the road.

Just as interesting was the ice that formed along the rocky sides. It was often still there into April or even later depending on the year. In the shadier sections it always reminded us of the long cold winters of those years. It also reminded those of us who lived in town why many of our classmates didn't get to school when we were able to. We didn't think of it as wilderness then. But we knew that life was harder the further up the creek you went.

Now a whole lot has changed in the years since. The road isn't much wider (if at all). There has been very little development although some think the Rails to Trails will add some needed dollars in tourism which may change some of the dynamics. But the creek is still the centerpiece. And it is not always a friendly, benign neighbor.

But that is for another time.