Second page of the factsheet for the dragline dad showed us in Missouri, 1974.  Some day I would like to visit it and see it work again, its a connection to dad and his expertise on these machines and this machine in particular.

The first dragline I ever saw, the one dad took us to before vacation at the Lake of the Ozarks was this machine.  It survived the years and mining ups and downs, ending up in Florida.

Dad was a Test Engineer for Marion and took our family to Butler MO in 1974. He had some testing to do on this machine. He wasn't a regular Marion erecting Engineer, so the testing would have been either a special startup structural and vibration test for the Engineering Department or investigating a problem. This machine was the first Marion 8200, so he was probably there to do operating field stress and vibration data capture to compare to the design predictions.  

The mine was Midway Mine of the Pittsburg & Midway Coal Company (P&M).  The dragline was named "Midway Princess", but dad called it "Big Bertha" kidding around with us.

We stayed at a little motel somewhere near the mine and I can remember seeing Richard Nixon speaking, I seem to remember it was his resignation speech, on the little B&W TV! I can't remember for certain, I was 10 years old then. After his business at the mine, Dad took us to watch the machine working and then we went camping at the Lake of the Ozarks for a week before heading back to Ohio.  We had a little tent camper behind the car.  I can remember it raining a lot.

Nick Anderson