(The following article by Chip Jones was posted on the Richmond Times-Dispatch website on July 11.)
RICHMOND, Va. — Growing up in Norfolk in a big house above the Elizabeth River, Rush Loving Jr. was always fascinated by big machines on the move.
Ships arrived carrying troops preparing to do battle across the Atlantic Ocean. Ferry boats crossed the water to Newport News and the Eastern Shore.
But above all, there were trains, with whistles that made a sweet soundtrack for a boy in the late 1930s.
“Maybe it’s partly in my genes, I don’t know,” Loving said in a recent interview about his book, “The Men Who Loved Trains: The Story of Men Who Battled Greed to Save an Ailing Industry.”
His great-grandfather owned sailing ships, and his grandfather was a railroad conductor on the old Southern Railway. His father, the Rev. W. Rush Loving, was a Baptist minister who moved his family here in 1940. For many years, he was director of church relations at the University of Richmond.
After the younger Loving went to work at the Richmond Times-Dispatch in 1956, he spent his first Christmas bonus of $70 on a model-train set.
He also started writing more pieces on railroads, an industry that by the 1950s already was starting to trail trucking and airplanes as a mode of moving freight and people.
“The economics of railroading is fascinating,” said Loving, a 1956 graduate of the University of Richmond, who went on to become business editor of The Times-Dispatch, after leaving the paper to serve in the military. “It’s different than a lot of industries.”
Plus, he said, “People like to read about railroads and trains.”
He carried his love of railroading to New York in 1969 when he became an associate editor at Fortune magazine.
At the time, he couldn’t have known that some of the Northeast railroads were teetering on the brink of financial collapse.
Loving was thrust into the biggest story of his career: the collapse of the Penn Central, the more than 20,000-mile-long rail system in 16 states and two provinces of Canada.
In his book published by Indiana University Press, Loving argues that the railroad’s collapse is a lasting tale with cautionary notes for anyone who manages a company or invests in one.
“The result would be a precursor to the great Enron and WorldCom scandals that erupted 31 years later,” he writes. “Never in recent times had the books of a large corporation been so thoroughly cooked.”
There was a reason for the skullduggery, he said in an interview. “Railroads over 100 years ago were attracting the same kind of people attracted to the Enrons of today. There was a lot of speculation, and people took them over and bled them dry.”
The Penn Central scandal provided rich fodder for Loving as he helped transform Fortune from “a stodgy monthly into a lively biweekly.”
The scandal also provides rich material for his book, a work which should resonate not only with train lovers but also with anyone in management. “It’s more of a management book than a railroad book,” he said. “It’s a story about miscommunication in government and corporations.” It shows what happens when communications — and trust — breaks down.
The breakdown occurred in the 1990s when Conrail was acquired by CSX Corp. and Norfolk Southern Corp.
“It’s the tale of nonstop corporate drama that is so grand and sprawling in its consequences and telling that it’s almost impossible to put down,” wrote Frederick N. Rasmussen, a columnist in The (Baltimore) Sun.
Local readers will recognize the name of John W. Snow, CSX’s former chairman and chief, who recently stepped down as President Bush’s Treasury secretary.
Loving criticizes Snow as a rail executive who was more intent on “compiling a record as a cost-cutter” than in making sound investments to maintain and improve CSX, which has tracks and yards in the heart of Richmond.
Snow’s “personality was foreign to rail operations,” Loving writes. He was “the quintessential politician who avoided controversy.”
Loving writes with quiet authority about CSX, where he later became a consultant and what he called a “secret intelligence operative.”
He describes the sometimes confusing signals Snow used to send down from his old office in the James Center.
“His mind was running constantly, and as he talked he often would toss out ideas, but in doing so he left the impression that he was committing himself,” Loving writes of Snow, who was a former economics professor. “Later, when he embraced something totally different, he seemed to abandon the commitment.”
Snow declined to be interviewed for the book, Loving said.
“I’ve heard he’s unhappy about it,” Loving said. “I’ve known John since around 1980 and really have a great deal of respect for him. He did some good things for CSX. I just take issue with some of the things he did,” or didn’t do, such as investing in maintenance.
CSX officials could not be reached for comment yesterday. Norfolk Southern spokesman Bob Fort said Loving treated his railroad fairly, especially in his accounts of the Conrail deal.
“Having survived the latter part of the book, I think Rush did a good job,” Fort said.