Jeff Daly stands in front of his latest automotive project Tuesday in his studio in Astoria, Oregon. Daly is remodeling an historic train he bought several years ago to travel on an old RV chassis to be used in local parades and other functions. (Colin Murphey /Daily Astorian via AP)

Jeff Daly stands in front of his latest automotive project Tuesday in his studio in Astoria, Oregon. Daly is remodeling an historic train he bought several years ago to travel on an old RV chassis to be used in local parades and other functions. (Colin Murphey /Daily Astorian via AP)

Forty & Eight: New life for an old Astoria train

Man hopes to have a new and improved train ready for a holiday lighting ceremony next month.

  • By EDWARD STRATTON The Daily Astorian
  • Monday, October 23, 2017 1:30am
  • Northwest

By Edward Stratton

The Daily Astorian

ASTORIA, Ore. — As a child in the 1950s, Jeff Daly remembers hearing the bell and whistle of the American Legion’s Forty & Eight train during Astoria Regatta parades.

“There was no way you didn’t know it was coming,” he said. “Kids were just enthralled with it, and you were really lucky if you could get a ride on it.”

Driving through Gearhart one day in 2014, Daly noticed the nose of the train sticking out behind the Yankee Trader antique store just off U.S. Highway 101. Known for restoring odd automotive remnants from Astoria’s history such as a 1948 Chrysler clown car, he acquired the train and towed it north.

Daly hopes to have a new and improved train ready for the downtown holiday lighting ceremony next month, and fully equipped for a trip to next summer’s Burning Man gathering in Nevada.

Forty & Eight

Returning World War I veterans in the newly created American Legion formed Forty & Eight in 1920 as an invitation-only honors society.

Known formally as The Society of Forty Men and Eight Horses, the group was named after the boxcars in France that each carried 40 men or eight horses to the front.

Ken Rislow, chaplain for the American Legion’s Clatsop Post 12 in Astoria and adjutant for the Forty & Eight since 2006, said the local chapter of the honor society was formed around 1920 along with the American Legion.

The train was originally built in 1945, used for parades and other celebrations and rebuilt several times throughout its life, Rislow said. On the side of the train was written “Clatsop Voiture 547,” denoting the 547th Forty & Eight chapter established nationally.

“There was a team of people that worked on it,” Rislow said of the train. “That was true until 2010. What happened was all the people that took care of it passed away.”

Charles Godwin, the second vice commander of American Post Legion 99 in Seaside, said the train came to South County about a decade ago by way of former commander Al Smith. “I was just a neighbor and had a shop, and I offered to help him out with it,” Godwin said.

He helped fix and restore the one last time and said it ran for several years before coming to rest at a lot in Seaside. The train was eventually towed north by Clatsop County Sheriff Tom Bergin, whose wife owns the Yankee Trader.

“I just didn’t want to see it get scrapped,” Bergin said.

After finding the train, Daly said, he came down with his clown car and towed it north, first to Hammond and later to Astoria.

New and improved

Parked in the basement of Daly’s subterranean workshop in downtown Astoria is a 24-foot motorhome he acquired in Knappa and had stripped down to the frame. Around it is an insulation board mockup of a seating area and conductor’s cabin he plans to install facing backwards from the motorhome’s cabin.

Daly plans to build a steel frame, surrounded by a plywood wall sheathed in decorative steel, fake rivets and wood paneling. A friend in Knappa is recreating the American Legion’s original lettering on panels he can switch out based on the use. A metalworker is designing articulated train wheels with a pulley system to mimic a steaming train, backlit by strobes.

On the ground next to the frame is the original steel train engine. Daly plans to install a barbecue — an idea from Bergin — and machines for smoke, bubbles and flames, along with a metal cow catcher.

Daly plans to check an item off his bucket list and drive the train to Black Rock City, Nevada, for Burning Man in August. Once back in Astoria, he plans to again use the vehicle in parades and charter it for birthdays and other celebrations. The attraction will be similar to the Glam Tram, a custom minibus for the Los Angeles Zoo Daly said he saved before destruction and renovated to an open-air downtown taxi, with blasting music and a fake fireplace in the middle.

“I just love the history of the area, and that’s why I keep bringing it back, because people are scrapping this stuff,” he said. “They were going to scrap this. The clown car was going to be scrapped. I just hate it, because it’s something I remember as a child, and I think many more people are going to enjoy it.”

While building the train, Daly has been receiving chemotherapy for prostate cancer. Having projects such as the train provides goals to keep him from getting complacent.

“It turns out I’m beating the cancer more than the cancer is beating me,” Daly said. “I’m not going to sit around the house saying, ‘I don’t feel good.’ ”

Talk to us

> Give us your news tips.

> Send us a letter to the editor.

> More Herald contact information.

More in Northwest

Washington State Ferries said it would deploy its new electric ferries first on the Mukilteo-Clinton run. Additional orders are expected to follow to replace more than a dozen other aging vessels in the fleet. (Photo by Tom Banse)
Washington state to buy new hybrid electric ferries from Florida shipyard

Gov. Bob Ferguson made the final call to turn down a higher bid from a local boat builder.

The Washington state Capitol. (Photo by Jacquelyn Jimenez Romero/Washington State Standard)
These Washington laws take effect July 1

Fee hikes for hunting and fishing licenses, workplace protections for immigrants and… Continue reading

Washington will have the nation’s third-highest state gas tax behind California and Pennsylvania.(Photo by Bill Lucia/Washington State Standard)
Gas tax will rise in Washington on July 1

Washington’s century-old fuel tax is going up again. On Tuesday, the gasoline… Continue reading

The BEAD program was created under the federal infrastructure law that former President Joe Biden signed in 2021. It was fashioned as a way to expand high-speed internet service into rural areas and other parts of the country where it was unavailable or lacking. (Stock photo)
Feds throw Washington’s $1.2B broadband program into disarray

States spent more than two years preparing to distribute the infrastructure funding, now the Trump administration is making last-minute changes to the rules.

Firefighters undertake a prescribed burn at the Upper Applegate Watershed near Medford, Oregon on Thursday, April 27, 2023. Such burns can help reduce the risk of large wildfires. (Kyle Sullivan, Bureau of Land Management/Flickr)
Trump looks to ‘consolidate’ wildland fire agencies

An executive order signed earlier this month by President Donald Trump would… Continue reading

Photo courtesy of Washington governor’s office
Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson, center, met with several statewide elected officials on Monday to discuss the how federal funding cuts could impact the state.
Tax collections tumble again in latest Washington budget forecast

The decline in receipts will force the state to draw down savings, but Gov. Bob Ferguson said he isn’t ready to summon the Legislature into a special session.

An EV charger in Granite Falls outside of Granite Falls City Hall on Thursday, Aug. 22, 2024 in Granite Falls, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
Seattle judge orders Trump administration to unfreeze EV charger funding

The preliminary court ruling would unlock the money for more than a dozen states, including $71 million for Washington.

Nearly three-quarters of acute care hospital inspections were late, as of December, according to the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee. One facility hadn’t gotten a state inspection since early 2018. (Stock photo)
Washington faces major lag in state inspections of hospitals

Washington state inspectors are way behind in their examinations of hospitals and… Continue reading

A classroom inside College Place Middle School in Lynnwood in 2023. New discipline guidelines for public school students will go into effect across Washington state next month. (Annie Barker / The Herald)
Washington updates student discipline rules for public schools

New discipline guidelines for public school students will go into effect across… Continue reading

The Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, which is one of the largest immigrant detention facilities in the western U.S. (Grace Deng/Washington State Standard)
WA looks to strengthen safety net for children whose parents are deported

Detained immigrant parents worried who will pick their children up from school.… Continue reading

An EV charger in Granite Falls outside of Granite Falls City Hall on Thursday, Aug. 22, 2024 in Granite Falls, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
Seattle judge considers reversing Trump’s EV charger funding freeze

Congress appropriated $5 billion, but the Trump administration stopped it from reaching states. Washington is leading the legal fight to access the money.

Washington’s payouts — known as tort liability — have skyrocketed from $72 million in fiscal year 2018 to more than $281 million last fiscal year. (Stock photo)
Washington state lawsuit payouts skyrocket to more than $500M in past year

Claims against the state’s Department of Children, Youth and Families are driving a spike in cases.

Support local journalism

If you value local news, make a gift now to support the trusted journalism you get in The Daily Herald. Donations processed in this system are not tax deductible.