The Sunshine Special

By Elena Huegel

Alleen DeGaris, a native of Missouri who lived most of her adult life in Mexico, travels for three days on the Sunshine Special, a train operated in the early years of the twentieth century by the Missouri Pacific Lines. While the train progresses through the different cities of northern México and the southern United States, it travels into a liminal space where that which was is no longer but what is to come has not yet arrived. As this remarkable woman weaves her story of grief and hope, faith and family, it becomes clear that she, too, like the name of the train on which she rides, is the Sunshine Special.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Aug 20, 2023
• ISBN: 9798369405345

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Copyright © 2023 by Elena Huegel.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction based on the life of Alleen DeGaris Huegel, her friends, her family and places where she lived and traveled.

The cover shows a service plate used on the dining cars of the Sunshine Special superimposed on an afghan that Alleen DeGaris Huegel crocheted. Other photographs are from the author’s family albums.

Rev. date: 08/18/2023

Xlibris

844-714-8691

www.Xlibris.com

847091

In loving memory of

Alleen DeGaris Huegel

who brought sunshine to many while being true to herself,

and passed on to her children, grandchildren and future generations a

living legacy of faith, joy and kindness.

CONTENTS

Foreword

Route of the Sunshine Special

By way of gratitude and clarification

Station 1:     Good-bye Mexico City, Thursday, 8:10 AM

Station 2:     Lechería, Thursday, 8:44 AM

Station 3:     Querétaro Thursday, 2:36 PM

Station 4:     San Luis Potosí, Thursday, 8:40 PM

Station 5:     Sidetracked to Aguascalientes, Thursday, during the night

Station 6:     Saltillo, Friday, 5:05 AM

Station 7:     Monterrey, Friday, 7:50 AM

Station 8:     Nuevo Laredo, Friday, 1:50 PM; Laredo, Saturday, 4:00am

Station 9:     San Antonio, Saturday, 8:30 AM

Station 10:   Austin, Saturday, 11:02 AM

Station 11:   Palestine, Saturday, 4:20 PM

Station 12:   Longview, Saturday, 6:20 PM

Station 13:   Texarkana, Saturday, 8:35 PM

Station 14:   Little Rock, Saturday, 11:40 PM

Station 15:   St. Louis, Sunday, 8:30 AM

Epilogue: The final stop

FOREWORD

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By John Huegel

What was the Sunshine Special?

The story in this book takes place on The Sunshine Special, a noteworthy train operated in the early years of the twentieth century by the Missouri Pacific Lines in conjunction with the Texas and Pacific Railway, the International Great Northern and the National Railways of Mexico. The train was inaugurated on December 5, 1915 and saw service until 1948 when it was sidelined by the Texas Eagle. Originating in St. Louis, Missouri, it ran in three sections: the west section divided at Longview going to Dallas, Fort Worth, and El Paso with connections to Los Angeles; the south Texas section going to San Antonio, Laredo and Mexico City; and then at Palestine the east section branched off for Houston and Brownsville.

Our story takes place on the south Texas section which served Mexico City. In the years before the international highway between Mexico City and Laredo, Texas, was built in 1936, the mode of travel from Mexico City to the central part of the United States was by train, on the Sunshine Special. This was a popular tourist train but also served businessmen and expatriates travelling to and from Mexico. It carried an assortment of coaches, a diner. and through Pullman sleeping cars from Mexico City to San Antonio and St. Louis. For a short time after 1946 it even carried a through Pullman sleeper from Mexico City to New York, and another to Washington, D.C.

During most of the years the train saw service, it left Mexico City at 8.20 PM and arrived in St. Louis at 8:30 on the third morning. During the war years, however, due to heavy traffic and breakdown of equipment, the schedule was adjusted so that the train left Mexico City in the morning at 8:10, with a long layover in Laredo, Texas, arriving in St. Louis the morning of the fourth day.

Since my mother’s home town was Hannibal, Missouri, on the Mississippi River 120 miles north of St Louis, we rode this train whenever we went to Hannibal to visit my grandmother.

We had many memorable experiences traveling on The Sunshine Special. The title my daughter chose for this book is not only the name of the train, but also describes my mother’s radiant and joyous personality. She was truly a sunshine special.

My mother gave me my first Lionel toy train in 1937 and supported my lifelong fascination with model trains and real trains, a hobby which has given me many happy hours.

ROUTE OF THE

SUNSHINE SPECIAL

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BY WAY OF GRATITUDE

AND CLARIFICATION

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As I looked back on my notes for this book, I realized that it has been at least ten years in the making. A move to a different country, the demands of my work, and multiple other projects kept this book simmering on the back burner. However, it never went completely cold. Ideas, insights and new stories would pop up unexpectedly in family gatherings or on evening walks with my father, and I would jot these down on 3 by 5 cards adding them to the story as I was able. Then came the 2020-2021 COVID-19 pandemic and as most of my work went on line, I discovered I had a little extra time to take up the project once again.

The idea of telling Alleen DeGaris Huegel’s story in three days on The Sunshine Special, the train that connected Mexico City and Saint Louis, Missouri, came to me while traveling with my father, John Huegel, on the Alaska Railroad. My father, being the consummate train fan himself, supplied me with all the railroading information I needed besides taking the time to record audios sharing every memory he could muster about his mother. I am in debt to his book, Herald of the Cross, a detailed biography of my grandfather, Frederick J. Huegel. Many of the same stories appear in both books, but from different perspectives.

The Sunshine Special is a historical novel and, while it is certainly grounded in the story of my grandmother´s life, it also fictionalizes times, places, people and incidents in an attempt to capture her inner world rather than record an objective or biographical record. The book draws from her letters and diaries as well as her children´s and grandchildren´s memories to create an imaginary story that looks out on the world from inside the mind and heart of a woman on a transitional journey during a special time in her life. She bids good-bye to the life she has known for the past fifty years and grieves what is no longer, while opening her heart to new beginnings. Through her story, we are invited to reflect on our own processes of change and rites of passage.

I owe a debt of gratitude to my parents and brothers as well as aunts and uncles from the Huegel, Gonthier and Spindel families for sharing their memories with me. I hope you enjoy the book and will forgive the creative liberty I have taken with some of your stories. It is my hope that you will recognize in these pages the essence of the remarkable woman many of us were honored to have known.

Elena Huegel

STATION 1

GOOD-BYE MEXICO CITY,

THURSDAY, 8:10 AM

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Cuando joven, de ilusiones; cuando viejo, de recuerdos.

For the young, dreams; for the old, memories.

My life stands behind me on the station platform where just minutes ago warm embraces and light chatter politely covered up the tears that have already been wept. The conductor cries out, ¡vámonos!, all aboard! with crisp finality, and the two short blasts of the mournful whistle announce our departure and the goodbyes that echo in the chamber of my broken heart. There is slight jerk and crunch and the car slowly begins to move. Standing in the vestibule, I wave my handkerchief. My friends, Jane Croft, Mrs. Mary P. Hull, Ada Coverston and Georgene, and Celestino López and his wife answer, brandishing what quickly become shrinking splotches of white when the train picks up speed until the platform disappears as it swings around a curve and under the Insurgentes Avenue overpass.

The dappled memories gallop in and out of my mind like the sunshine shadows flitting by outside the train. Soon I will turn around and look forward to what lies ahead, but not yet. Now is time to remember, savor and wonder. Now is time for naming the loss, for ironing, folding and packing each memory like the beautiful linens stowed in my wardrobe trunk, chosen and used, crisp and clean, to set a feast of gratitude in my mind.

I have never liked good-byes, but my husband Fritz, eats them up. In the first weeks when we came to Mexico fifty years ago, our aggravations growing daily with the challenges of language learning and our inept attempts at cultural understanding, Fritz told me he wanted to give up and go home. I was just as frustrated as he with our new life and his choice for us to become missionaries, but I told him that there was no way I was going back to face all the people who had given us those good-bye parties. I guess I hate good-byes because I always remember something else I wanted to say. I always feel like something has been left hanging, something important has remained unsaid, and that I might not ever have the chance again to say it.

Fritz and I wobble, not yet accustomed to the swaying of the Pullman car, as we walk from the vestibule to our private compartment. The porter, a slight neat gentleman with salt and pepper hair, comes down the corridor in the opposite direction, checks our tickets, and opens the door for us. The familiar smell of wool and disinfectant welcomes us into the tidy compartment where sunlight and shadows dance across the upholstered couch. Rich browns and yellows with a hint of red in the carpeting please my eyes, the muffled but rhythmic beat of the wheels, metal on metal, is music to my ears, and the movement lulls my body.

Fritz settles down in the seat facing forward and I sit on the couch opposite him. We both stare out the window in silence. It is amusing to me, but even after making the difficult decision to leave, a decision Fritz deeply opposed for he has always wanted to die and be buried here in his adopted country, he has not been nearly as outwardly emotional as I have been. Tears slide down my cheeks like the train slipping across the great valley of Anahuac, the land between waters as the Aztecs called the high plateau surrounded by mountains and once dotted by lakes including Texcoco, all but obliterated by the growing sprawl of Mexico City. I wait with a little impatience, wiping the tears away with my good-by flag, the embroidered white hanky, for my last chance to take in the dazzling beauty of Ixtaccíhuatl, the white volcano princess sleeping over the city while her majestic lover, Popocatépetl, watches nearby, occasionally erupting angrily with smoke and ash. When I finally spot the morning sun glinting on the far away snow covered peaks and cone, I remember the legend so often repeated to visitors to the city, of the daughter of the Aztec emperor who fell in love with a warrior sent into combat. When the false news arrived that he had been killed, she died of grief. Popocatepetl kneels eternally by Ixtaccihuatl`s grave, her body silhouetted against the blue sky while he waits for her to wake. The volcanoes are inexorably linked to the nearly forty years I lived in this city. I often paused from my daily tasks at sunset as the delicate pink to deep purple hues tinted everything from the billowing clouds to the very air around me, to watch the volcano couple gradually prepare for the night, changing colors like clothing until becoming shadowy, but massive, blue outlines on the horizon beyond the city lights.

I remembered the first time I saw the Anahuac valley and heard the Aztec legends whispered on the cool breezes that come down from the mountain ranges. I had already lived in two of the dry north central states of Mexico for twelve years, but nothing had prepared me for the vibrant financial, cultural, religious and political axis of the country. The city grew on me, feeding parts of my soul that had been starving for the social enrichment so easily found in this cosmopolitan center. Even though I have been enthused over going back to the United States to live, my heart and my love is in Mexico. The Mexicans are my folks, and I love them deeply. My soul attends the funeral, the death of relationship with a people, a culture, a different way of being. I commit to honoring the memory even when I am far away.

I have always been keen on following the news, especially political, and the first thing that Fritz and I purchased upon our move to Mexico City was an Atwater Kent shortwave radio. We listened faithfully to the BBC news every evening and in 1932, as we began to make the Mexican capital our home, events on the world scene portended the conflicted years to come. Hitler received his German citizenship allowing him to run for elections, Gandhi was arrested and