Manliness is a must to work in Wyoming Winters

Watching and reading the Portland and Astoria, OR news this past week with the snow and icy road conditions and the incredible fear it put in the hearts of drivers, it was hard not to smile and chuckle. It brings back old flashbacks of my days of yore as a commercial driver.  

Circa 1989, I was working for Wyoming Express in Cheyenne, WY. My Daughter Nicole was just 5 years old in this photo. I drove this truck, a B-Series 1982 GMC Top Kick with 8.2L (500 HP) V8 Detroit Diesel with a two-speed rear axle for almost 3 years up and over the Sherman Summit from Laramie to Cheyenne on I-80 for 3 nail biting years. 

The company was such a poor boy outfit they couldn’t afford to buy me a real road tractor like the one I SHOULD have been driving pictured below.

I spent the first 4 years of my trucking career driving oil field service equipment in NW Wyoming, then the next 11 hauling freight. I worked for 3 different freight companies in Wyoming, Edson Express, Wyoming Express and North Park Transportation and advanced to manager at all 3. I’ve driven all over the United States (44 in all) in an 18-wheeler but those 3 years with Wyoming Express was like nothing I’ve experienced before or since. 

I’ve also driven every kind of truck made since but the Top Kick, by far, was the biggest piece of under-powered junk I've driven in my whole commercial truck driving career. I must admit, those old Detroits were as tough as nails, they were indestructible, in fact. They were so under-powered and rough riding that you’d feel like you were riding in a saddle bronc competition at a rodeo. I swear, you could run over a small rock and the truck would launch your head straight into the ceiling. Those trucks didn’t have air ride suspensions either, just one set of leaf springs on the rear axle. No power steering either.

The other fantastic feature of the truck was the incredible amount of diesel smoke it produced, since the engine had a million miles on it. It used oil like diesel fuel. The exhaust pipe was mounted under the cab of the truck.

In the winter when I left the truck to idle while I was making deliveries, the smoke was so strong you literally had to be at least 50 feet away from it to not gag from the smell. No matter how hard I tried there was no avoiding getting the stench of the diesel smoke on my clothes. I don’t how many times when parking in the alleys in Laramie with the truck at an idle making deliveries, that angry businessmen came out and screamed at me to turn the truck off because the diesel smoke was getting sucked inside the rear door of their businesses. Every business in Laramie knew I was nearby when I left my truck running that’s for sure.       

In Wyoming I-80 reaches its maximum elevation of 8,640 feet above sea level at the Sherman Summit, it’s the highest elevation on the I-80 interstate highway. It’s a gradual climb all the way to the Sherman Summit.

The video below is an extreme example of what can happen on I-80 in the winter. I saw lots of truck and passenger car wrecks, ones that had slid off the road into the ditch and high winds laying trailers on their sides. In the 3 years of driving between Cheyenne and Laramie I never had an accident. Why? Because I knew the limits of my driving ability and equipment and drove very slow and carefully.

When I left Cheyenne with the trailers they were usually loaded to full capacity, sometimes over the capacity. It’s a good thing they didn’t have a DOT scale in route or they’d of cut me off at the knees. Once I started the ascent to the top of Sherman the Top Kick’s maximum speed was a hair raising 25 to 35 MPH. Once you finally reached the Sherman Summit you then had the wonderful adventure of the steep descent, which is a 2 to 3-mile section of S turns as you drop off into Laramie. Many a day I had to chain up to get to and fro, so I have a special hatred of tire chains. One winter there was a period that I chained up every day for 3 weeks. I could still chain up in my sleep, I had to throw them so many times.

Most days I was pulling a loaded 45-foot trailer with a loaded 28-foot pup trailer in combination (better known as Rocky Mountain Doubles) behind it. 

The Top Kick wasn’t a “Road” Tractor it was a “City” Tractor and it wasn’t built to carry that heavy of a load, so I literally crawled to Laramie every day.

On the return trip, back to Cheyenne both trailers were empty. You combine snow, ice and the 50 to 70 mph winds that made visibility nearly impossible some days and it made for a very long day, even though it was only a 100-mile round trip. The wind many a time had the trailers coming off the ground on the windward side.

The weather made everything so much more difficult. During those 11 years in Wyoming I worked for a total 3 different LTL companies (Less Than Truckload) delivering FAK (Freight of All Kinds) as previously mentioned. From 1989 to 1991 I drove the Cheyenne to Laramie route to deliver freight.

At one time, we had contracts with Western Auto, Carquest Auto Parts, Big A Auto Parts, Sears, JC Penney’s, Target and delivered to all kinds of retail stores and small independent businesses.

On a daily basis, without a lift-gate mind you, I delivered engine blocks, transmissions, household appliances, heating and cooling equipment, furniture, mattresses, chain link fence, heavy carpet rolls, tires, lumber, paint, hazardous materials, drugs and medical supplies to hospitals, big shipments of books to schools and Universities, electrical supplies and the list goes on and on. Anything that could fit into or come out of a trailer I handled during those years.

The 2 biggest contracts we had were with the Wyoming Liquor Commission and hauling government commodities. I can't even begin to count how many cases of booze and boxes of government commodities I hand jived during those years.

In Wyoming all liquor sales are controlled by the state. They have a massive warehouse in Cheyenne that houses and supplies the entire state with liquor and wine.

On Tuesday’s and Thursday’s at the Northridge Discount Liquor Store in Laramie many times they could get 500 to 1,000 cases of booze a week. At that time, I delivered to 20 or more liquor stores during the week. It wasn't uncommon to handle close to 1,500 cases of booze total in a week’s time.  

Keep in mind, as I said, there was no lift-gate, it was all hand jive. Each case of booze had to be removed from a shrunk wrapped pallet, set on the back of the truck, then taking off the truck, stacked 4 cases high then wheeled into the stores with a 2-wheel dolly.

So, on Tuesdays and Thursday I’d start my day by going to Northridge and I’d spent an hour sometimes two unloading case after case off the back of the truck in subzero weather in the winter, wearing coveralls and mittens, trying to navigate on their parking lot with a dolly that was as slick as an ice skating rink.

By 9:30 or sometimes 10 in the morning I’d be finished at Northridge and still have to make 25 to 35 more deliveries by 5 pm. Most days I didn’t have time to take a lunch break because so many people were waiting and counting on me to be on time.

Between the stress of driving to and from Laramie and the total workhouse it was when I finally arrived there, I earned my hard work, maximum physical and mental stress manliness certificate 100 times over.

There were no snow days, no not showing up for work, taking a fake sick day (Non-Union so you just didn’t get paid or worse maybe fired) or saying, “I can’t do this.” You pulled up your big boy pants and went to work no matter how bad the weather was. Sure, there were a few very miserable days the roads were closed. But very rarely, the Highway Dept. in Wyoming worked non-stop day and night trying to keep interstate and state highways open to travel because people counted on getting essential goods and services no matter what the weather conditions. Kids in Wyoming, rarely if ever missed school during the winter.

So, last week when I saw that the Astoria school district had canceled school without yet having a single snowflake hit the ground or a single patch of ice it demonstrated how we’ve changed. Back in the day you just couldn’t make any excuses, you had to get it done.

That get it done attitude has been lost in parts of this country. It wasn’t built by men and woman fearful of what “might” happen.

It’s part of the reason I have a low tolerance for people that don’t understand the value of hard work, commitment and a “CAN DO” attitude. 

    
This was the last rig I drove from 2007 to 2014. I worked for a private contractor hauling mail for the US Postal Service to Portland and then back to Astoria 5 nights a week. In those 7 years I never went off the road, got stuck or had an accident on Highway 30, which I drove all the way to PDX and back. I had to give up trucking because of physical disabilities but I did have a good career for 30 plus years. I guess after driving a million miles and handling a million pounds of freight it was time to hung it up.