Author Note: This is Part 1 of a series.

The characters presented in this story are entirely fictional and not intended to represent any members of a real life railroading or model railroading organization.

Background Info: The Scioto River runs through central Ohio, emptying into the Ohio River south of Columbus. Scioto (pronounced SY-OH-TOH) actually means "deer" in the Wyandot language spoken by the branch of the Huron Indian tribe that once inhabited central Ohio. Railroads formed an important part of the local economy throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries. Both the Norfolk & Western Railroad and the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad had branch lines running through the Scioto Valley. By the 1980s only a single line owned by the Norfolk Southern Railway was still in use. Many of the other railroad tracks in the valley were gone, having been torn out and replaced with hiking and biking trails that followed the meandering course of the river through the valley.

Local interest in railroading remained high, with a few small railroad and trolley museums located in some of the major towns along the old right of way. There was also the Scioto Valley Model Railroading Society, a group of men and boys who operated a large HO scale layout in the basement of a local church. The massive 24 foot by 32 foot layout modeled the local railroads as they existed circa 1950, when steam locomotives were still in use but diesel locomotives were being introduced. The members of the society dubbed their layout the Scioto Valley Railroad (SVRR).

In the summer of 1984 a car-load of members of the Scioto Valley Model Railroading Society went on a road trip...

"Are we there yet?" asked 11-year-old Kenny Chandler as he stared out the window at the passing road signs.

This query brought groans from most of the other occupants of the car. Rob Chandler, Kenny's older brother, exchanged disgusted looks with his friend Casey Jones. The two 14-year-olds rolled their eyes in annoyance. Kenny had been asking this same question periodically for the past two hours.

Donald Chandler asked his youngest son, "Do you see any train equipment around here, Kenny?"

"I saw a sign for Lancaster!" said Kenny, hopefully.

"Yes you did," said Donald. "But that's just for the Lancaster exit from the turnpike. The Strasburg Railroad isn't right at the exit. We have another 30 minutes or so to go until we get there."

Kenny groaned in frustration, a sound echoed by some of the other younger kids in the car. The Chandler family automobile, a green 1982 Mercury Marquis Colony Park station wagon, was stuffed full with two adults and six children, with most of the luggage tied to the roof rack of the full sized family hauler. Donald Chandler was driving and Thomas Arden, another of the fathers in the SVRR group, was riding shotgun.

Four boys occupied the rear bench seat. Sam Arden and Jeff Arden, who were the 12 and 9-year-old sons of Thomas, shared the wide seat with Kenny the Complainer and Mark Rhinehart, who was 12-years-old. Rob and Casey, the two teenagers, were lounging in the rear cargo compartment, wedged in between some of the lighter luggage that would not fit on the roof rack. Casey's full legal name was Raymond Casey Jones, Jr. But everyone had had always called him Casey, even before he got into model railroading. The two teen friends were slightly uncomfortable wedged in among the spare luggage in the cargo deck of the big wagon, but at least it kept them away from the little brats in the back seat. This made it easier for the two older boys to amuse themselves.

Among other things, the two friends in back had been playing License Plate Bingo. They had a printed list of all fifty US states and ten Canadian provinces. Ohio had been a piece of cake. They checked that one off before they were a block away from their starting point. Now, after more than eight hours of driving, they had checked off 21 states and 2 provinces. Their station wagon bore the Ohio vanity license plate, "PRR GG1", in honor of Donald Chandler's favorite locomotive, the Pennsylvania Railroad GG1 Electric. In fact Rob's father liked to tell people that his station wagon was painted Brunswick Green, one of the standard livery colors used by the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) for the GG1. Rob never disputed this claim even though he clearly remembered that the color name printed on the car's sticker had been Medium Spruce Metallic.

"Hawaii!" yelled Casey in triumph.

"Where?" said Rob, groaning in frustration but still scanning the nearby cars. Casey had been trying this all day.

"No," said Casey finally, "I guess not... Nebraska."

"Will you stop that?" said Rob. "How can a car with Hawaiian license plates even get to Pennsylvania? The Hawaiian Islands are half way across the Pacific Ocean!"

"Well," said Donald, "they'd have to use their windshield wipers a lot."

Casey joined in the general laughter in response to that joke, but he eventually mumbled.. apparently to himself, "I know I saw a Hawaii plate back when Mom and I were driving up from Alabama."

Rob looked at his friend sympathetically and thought how lucky he and his brother were to still have both their parents. Casey's mother was a widow who had moved herself and her son to Ohio from Alabama three years ago. Finally Rob whispered "You probably did, pal. You probably did."

Eventually the big wagon slowed and exited the Pennsylvania Turnpike at the Lancaster-Lebanon exit. The toll was paid, and soon the car was tooling down the scenic two lane country highway called PA Route 72 towards Lancaster. As they cruised down the highway through the Amish farmland it quickly became obvious that Lancaster County, Pennsylvania was a major tourist destination. The pastoral landscape was frequently marred by billboards promoting all manner of attractions, including the ones they had come all the way from Ohio to see, the Strasburg Railroad and the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania.

Of course the youngsters in the back seat were anxious to see them all. "Can we go see Dutch Wonderland?" asked Jeff, after spotting a billboard for a local amusement park.

"I don't think so, Jeff," said Thomas. "We already have lots of things planned for this trip. We don't have time to be adding stuff."

Donald chimed in, "We said we might visit Hershey Park on the way back home if we have time, but that would be it as far as amusement parks go."

This news was met with whining from the back seat. Rob decided to enter the debate himself. "Why do you guys want to go to some small time amusement park here in Pennsylvania when there is all this cool railroading stuff around? We have great amusement parks back home in Ohio... King's Island and Cedar Point, just to name two."

There were still one or two groans, but mostly the rugrats seemed satisfied with this explanation. Of course with them peace never lasted very long. As soon as they arrived in downtown Lancaster Kenny was back at it again. "Okay, we're here! Where is the railroad?"

"Patience, Kenny," said Donald. "It's called the Strasburg Railroad, not the Lancaster Railroad. We still need to drive to Strasburg."

As another round of groaning broke out Rob had to stifle a laugh. His little brother Kenny was the least patient person he had ever known. Their father was an incurable optimist... he had to be, asking Kenny to be patient.

Twenty minutes later they had made it to and through the small picturesque town of Strasburg and finally the Strasburg Railroad train depot was in sight on the left. So was the museum, in fact. It turned out that the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania was literally across the street from the Strasburg Railroad depot. Of course the little brats in the back seat went ballistic when the car rolled past their primary targets and continued on into the Amish farmland beyond.

"Look guys," said Thomas, "you all knew we weren't gonna be riding the trains and seeing the museum until tomorrow. It's after 6 PM already and we've been on the road nearly ten hours, what with lunch and rest stops. We still have to check into the motel, get the luggage off the roof of the car and get it all dragged into our rooms."

This calmed the agitated brats down, but only a little. Fortunately it only took a single left turn onto a side road and a brief drive before they approached a railroad crossing and finally spotted their destination on the right just past the tracks... the Red Caboose Motel!

"Oh, man!" said Sam as they pulled into the motel parking lot. "It's just a building! I thought we were gonna sleep in a real caboose tonight!"

"Calm down!" said Thomas, cutting across the whining from several occupants of the back seat. "I can see some cabooses in the back. This building is probably just the office."

That turned out, in fact, to be the case. The single story building at the front of the property housed the motel office/lobby as well as a large gift shop and the kitchen for the restaurant. The building was flanked by two full-sized railroad dining cars that served as the dining rooms for the Red Caboose Motel Restaurant.

Donald pulled his big Mercury wagon around the side of the building and parked. As the gang poured out of the car and stretched, trying to work the kinks out of their muscles, it became quite obvious that there were at least a couple dozen 25 ton full-sized cabooses lined up on several railroad tracks behind the office/restaurant structure. The cabooses were painted in a variety of color schemes matching the livery of the railroad that originally owned and operated each caboose.

Nearly everyone needed to visit the bathroom by that point so they took turns using the public men's room while the fathers checked in at the office. Within 15 minutes they had keys to two of the cabooses out back and it was time to find their rooms and unload the car.

The Chandlers would be sharing their caboose with Casey. It turned out to be an old Seaboard Coast Line caboose that had been gutted inside and remodeled into a motel room. There was one queen bed in the main room and two sets of bunk beds flanking the hallway leading back to the private bathroom. The caboose was nicely decorated inside with railroad themes and had plenty of room for the four people. Donald would sleep in the queen bed and the boys would occupy three of the four available bunks.

There was only one problem with their caboose. "It's not red!" said Kenny.

"So?" said Rob, "It's orange, which is fairly close."

"It's not red!" said Kenny, stubbornly pouting as he grudgingly helped carry their luggage inside.

"Why do you even care about that, Kenny?" said Casey. "This is the coolest motel room you will ever sleep in..."

"No!" said Kenny, "It would be cool if it was a red caboose. An orange caboose is stupid!"

"Kenny," said Donald, irritation creeping into his voice, "you can't even see what color it is on the outside when we're in here sleeping or whatever. Give it a rest, please."

Kenny grumbled a lot as they finished bringing the luggage into the room, but he did stop complaining. This lasted until they joined up with the other members of the group out by the car. It turned out that neither of the two cabooses the group was staying in was red.

The Ardens and Mark Rhinehart were staying in a Great Northern Railway caboose painted "Big Sky Blue" that was configured the same way as their orange Seaboard Coast Line caboose.

"There are red cabooses here," said Kenny, looking around the property. It was true. There were at least 3 bright red cabooses in sight: One from the New Haven Railroad, one from the Santa Fe Railroad, and one from the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. "Why can't we stay in those?"

"Those cabooses might not have the right configuration of beds." said Donald. "I doubt all these cabooses have the bunk beds we need for you boys."

"Yeah," said Thomas, "some of them are probably configured for single guests or couples, not for families."

"That's stupid!" said Kenny, getting more agitated. Jeff joined in the bellyaching at that point.

"Can't we at least ask to move?" said Jeff.

"No!" said both men in unison.

"Please?" said Kenny, supporting Jeff.

"No!" said Donald. "We've already loaded our luggage into our assigned rooms, we are not moving."

"Awww, come on!" said Jeff.

"Listen everyone," said Donald. "We've had a long drive. We're all tired and hungry. Why don't we get some dinner?"

"Yeah," said Rob, supporting his father. "Let's eat! You guys will feel better about the cabooses afterwards."

This idea was enthusiastically supported by nearly everyone. Casey said, "Yeah, I'm starving! Let's eat!"

Unfortunately Rob recognized that look on the face of his petulant little brother Kenny, who stamped his foot and said, "No!"

"Come on!" said Jeff. "Why can't we at least ask at the office before we give up?"

It was clear that the two young objectors were not in the mood to compromise. Then Rob noticed that look on the face of his father. Trouble was approaching... with the speed of an express train.

Rob nudged Casey's arm to get his attention. They exchanged meaningful glances and a bit of impromptu sign language. Casey nodded in silent agreement. Whatever was about to happen, the two teens would keep their mouths shut and give the combatants a wide berth. They wanted no part of the pending melee.

Melee? To Rob it looked more like a wild west shootout about to break out down at the train station. The two surly brats stood there, fists clenched in anger, faced off against their much larger and more powerful fathers. It hardly seemed like a fair contest. Rob and Casey were not the only "neutral parties" who wanted no part of this developing situation. Sam Arden and Mark Rhinehart both moved away from the confrontational duo, their hands held low and open, wordlessly signalling the adults that they weren't participating in this rebellion against parental authority.

Jeff Arden, the smallest of the young rebels, started things off by saying, "I'm gonna go ask at the office about moving to a red caboose."

"No you will not!" said Thomas, who was clearly running out of patience with his youngest son.

"Let's go!" said Kenny. He and his compatriot turned their backs on their fathers and started walking purposefully towards the office.

They made it about eight steps before they were grabbed from behind by the furious men. The two protesting boys were frogmarched back towards the cabooses. The procession was followed by the other four boys in the group, who all kept a safe distance.

There were wide wooden stairways with iron railings installed at both ends of each caboose. Each stairway allowed easy access to the front platform of one caboose and the rear platform of the next caboose in the row.

Although Kenny was still angry, by the time Donald got him to the front stairway of their orange Seaboard Coast Line caboose, he had stopped struggling and resisting his father. Donald sat on the stairs and began unfastening Kenny's belt. At first Kenny tried to stop him. But after a stern but quiet talking to by his father, Kenny meekly put his hands on top of his head while the man unfastened and lowered the boy's jeans down to his knees.

The man hesitated a moment, clearly considering whether to lower his 11-year-old son's tight white briefs and complete the boy's humiliation. The decision finally made, he tipped the boy over his lap and placed a large hand on the seat of the briefs. Kenny gasped and the buttocks under the form-fitting white cotton clenched in fear. Kenny could be heard to mutter the complaint, "It's not fair!"

Donald looked up at Thomas. "Well, Tom? Shall we stamp out this rebellion once and for all?"

Thomas nodded. He marched his youngest boy over to a stairway and lowered the lad's jeans. Soon each of the young rebels found himself lying over a his father's lap with only a single layer of thin cotton protecting his doomed buttocks as he protested the unfairness of it all.

The other four boys watched in amazement as the two boys were given good, hard spankings. Rob was thrilled since as far as he was concerned his bratty little brother didn't get spanked nearly enough. He thoroughly enjoyed watching Kenny protest and kick as the burn from the spanks built up in his clenching backside. His only regret was that the little twerp wasn't getting it bare-assed. Rob loved his little brother, but the kid seemed to specialize in being as annoying as humanly possible. Brotherly love did not prevent Rob from thinking that Kenny deserved all the pain and humiliation that he could get. Hopefully it will teach him some manners.

Rob did spend some time watching Jeff's spanking in progress. Thomas didn't spare his youngest son, despite Jeff being only 9-years-old. The big man administered sizzling smacks to the seat of Jeff's blue briefs with red trim. They actually looked kind of familiar to Rob. Kenny used to wear briefs just like them, part of the Spiderman Underoos set that the little brat favored. Rob had personally preferred Superman Underoos. After all, Spiderman could swing around the city on webs, but Superman could simply fly wherever he needed to go. No contest as to who was coolest there.

Coolness didn't enter into what was happening on the grounds of the Red Caboose Motel that summer evening. In fact the heat building in the two pre-pubescent bottoms caused their owners to loudy express their displeasure with the operation in progress.

The sights and sounds of two boys being spanked attracted the attention of several other people at the Red Caboose Motel. Rob could see the curtains drawn aside on at least two of the occupied caboose rooms, with youthful faces looking out on the noisy punishments being dealt out on the stairways. A family of five (including one boy and two girls all under the age of 12) that was walking from their caboose room towards the office/restaurant structure stopped briefly to have a look at the spankings in progress before the parents decided to move their brood along towards their destination.

Rob wasn't sure how long the spankings actually lasted. He was sure that Kenny's hadn't lasted long enough, it never did. One thing was certain... long before it was over the well-chastened former rebels had stopped protesting their treatment and began promising total obedience and cooperation for the rest of the trip... between the howls of distress, the sobs and the gasping.

Soon both youngsters were standing in front of the men who had spanked them, each rubbing a very sore bottom as he writhed in place and sobbed. The jeans down around their ankles prevented them doing a proper 'spanked boy dance' but they were shuffling around, (Jeff was nearly hopping) fighting the pain radiating from their burning bottoms. The briefs the two boys wore failed to conceal the tops of their thighs and the lower curves of their bottoms that had been turned a bright shade of red by the strong hands of their fathers.

It was the irrepressible Casey who summed up the situation nicely, "Well, at least they'll both be sleeping with red cabooses tonight!"

Everyone laughed, except for the two sobbing former rebels as they stagger-shuffled around, massaging their red cabooses through the thin layer of cotton that had protected their modesty, if not their pride. Well, the briefs sort of protected their modesty. Their pre-pubescent genitals remained covered, although both lads were sporting noticeable tents in the front of their briefs.

Rob was used to seeing such 'baby boners' on his baby brother after the little brat got spanked. He wasn't sure why Kenny reacted that way, because Rob's own sausage was limp as a noodle whenever he got his rump roasted. Kenny wasn't all that well equipped, even for an 11-year-old, but what he did have was always fully at attention after a spanking. Now the small but very noticeable tent in the white cotton crotch of his Fruit of the Looms indicated that Kenny's 'little friend' was awake and eager to say hello.

Rob had to stifle a laugh when he noticed that 9-year-old Jeff Arden had pitched a significantly larger tent in the crotch of his Spiderman briefs than Kenny had pitched in his white briefs. Rob's little brother was two years older than Jeff and larger everywhere on his body except, apparently, 'where it counts'. Rob had never seen Jeff naked, but the tightly stretched blue cotton on the front of the lad's briefs hinted at a very impressive set of equipment for a boy his age. Rob grinned as he remembered the line from that movie Young Frankenstein, after Igor learned that the monster was gonna be incredibly well hung, "He's going to be very popular."

After the two freshly spanked lads gingerly pulled their jeans back up over aching backsides they were given a chance to visit the bathroom in their motel rooms and wash up a bit. Then the entire group headed over to the Red Caboose Motel Restaurant and were able to get adjacent tables for dinner. The Chandlers and Casey were at one of the four-seat tables. The family of five who had witnessed part of the spankings were already seated in the restaurant when the SVRR group arrived. There was a bit of laughing and pointing from the kids at that table when they spotted the boys who had so recently been spanked, but they quickly lost interest and returned their attention to eating dinner.

Rob had never eaten Pennsylvania Dutch cooking before, nor had the other people at his table. The food turned out to be excellent and everyone liked it. Casey was able to make a suggestion for dessert. "If the Pennsylvania Dutch version of shoofly pie is anything like the stuff we had down South, it will be incredible." Casey had lived in Alabama for the first eleven years of his life so he had lots of experience with Southern cooking, even though his Southern accent had faded dramatically over the three years that Rob had known him.

Rob and his father both took Casey's advice and loved the shoofly pie, which turned out to be sort of like a molasses crumb cake inside a pie shell. Kenny was still feeling a bit stubborn despite nursing a sore bottom so he ignored Casey's advice and ordered the peanut butter pie for dessert, though Rob had to admit that looked pretty good too.

Although everyone in their group enjoyed the food at the Red Caboose Motel Restaurant the real highlight of the meal came from the fact that their tables had a view of the Strasburg Railroad tracks that ran along the southern edge of the motel property. Soon after they were seated a train pulled by a 2-10-0 steam locomotive went by headed east leaving Strasburg for Paradise. The train consisted of the tender, locomotive and six vintage wooden passenger coaches. The SVRR gang would probably be riding that same train tomorrow.

As the group walked back to their cabooses for the night it was obvious that everyone felt much better after enjoying an excellent meal and were already well on their way to recovering from their long road trip. Even Kenny and his red-bottomed buddy Jeff were chattering about the cool stuff they would be doing tomorrow, all worries about the color of their caboose rooms forgotten.

Rob chuckled to himself, thinking about the utter pointlessness of the argument that had gotten the two youngest members of the their group spanked in public. That was his little brother Kenny for you - frequently wrong, but always certain he was right. Oh well, at least watching Kenny drive everyone crazy... and get himself spanked for it... was an entertaining way to kill some of the boring hours of his adolescence. Rob had other methods, of course. But those would have to wait until later... when he had some privacy.

Author Note: There really is a Red Caboose Motel in Ronks, Pennsylvania where guests can stay in old railroad cabooses that have been converted into motel rooms. The author has never stayed in one of these caboose motel rooms, but he did see the place along the Strasburg Railroad right of way when riding on that steam excursion railroad as a teenaged tourist back in the 1970s. The Red Caboose Motel is located about a half mile from the Strasburg Railroad depot.

The Red Caboose Motel depicted in this story is fictional and bears only a superficial resemblance to the real business. Any similarity between the characters presented in this story and the owners, staff or guests of the real motel is entirely coincidental and unintentional.

Dedication: I spent many happy hours of my childhood engaged in railfan and model railroading activities with my father. This series is dedicated to the memory of my dad, who was a wonderful man and a great father.

The author welcomes comments from readers. You can contact Bobby Watson by e-mail at: mrbwatson (at) gmail.com
Please be patient - Bobby doesn't always check his e-mail every day.