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I know there are still P.I.E. and Ryder drivers alive. SO post something.

ROADY said:
Ryder Truck Lines, one of the best jobs I had. I started there in 1980 when Johnson Motor Lines went out and stayed until P.I.E. Nationwide bought Transcon. I knew there was no hope left then and started to work for Roadway.
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Wow, it's been 35 years since "Lazy J" shut down. Used to talk to a Johnson driver from time to time went by the handle of "butter bean", think he was out of NC. Seemed like a real nice guy.
 
SuperCourse said:
Wow, it's been 35 years since "Lazy J" shut down. Used to talk to a Johnson driver from time to time went by the handle of "butter bean", think he was out of NC. Seemed like a real nice guy.
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SuperCourse, time flies when you're having fun. Yep and in the old days we did have fun driving for a Teamster job.
 
ROADY said:
SuperCourse, time flies when you're having fun. Yep and in the old days we did have fun driving for a Teamster job.
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Hackensack, Spring Valley, crumb cake from B&W brought in for the drivers by the salesmen at Hackensack. Wasn't it like that everywhere? :hide:
 
big blue said:
Hi everyone, I drove out of Charlotte, nc started at Ryder Truck Lines 6/73 Those were some good days. I am working at Averitt local. Things are nowhere close to what they were back in the day. Thanks to all the older guys who gave this 22 yr old back then.
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Seabreeze looking for Big Blue, I worked for RTL 1955 till they closed in1990
 
Fageol said:
My earliest impression of PIE was in the early 1950s. I was raised in El Sobrante, CA a few blocks from what is now the I-80/Hilltop Drive on and off ramps. My father is buried in the cemetery that can be seen from the freeway. I used to play in the gullies and fields where that massive cut and fill project was made -- more earth was moved in the San Pablo -- Carquinez Strait section of I-80 than for the Panama Canal. We used to play in those gullies until the kids from the Rollingwood Subdivision below us used to shoot at us with their 22s -- we only had BB guns -- fortunately the gullies were transected by lots of subgullies (I doubt that "subgullies" or gullies within gullies is an approved geological term). Before I-80 was built, folks traveled East (but first north to Donner Pass) on Highway 40. Hilltop Drive (then County Road 24) terminated at the old Highway 40. In those days Highway 40 and San Pablo Avenue were the same roadway. The termination was on a grade known far and wide as "Tank Farm Hill" as Standard Oil of California (now Chevron) had tanks all over the hills feeding or receiving product from its refinery at Point Richmond. When going to and from Richmond for groceries, church, whatever, we headed nominally west on County Road 24 and nominally south down Highway 40. The SOCal refinery supplied much of the fuel to Northern California, Southern Oregon, and Nevada. So there was a constant stream of tankers (mostly truck and trailers and mostly PIE) traversing Tank Farm Hill. That hill was a tough climb for those old 150s and 200s some of which had chain drive and all of which drug (what kid would have used the word "dragged" when "drug" has a better sound and that was in the days before drugs seemingly became a recreational necessity) chains to discharge static electricity. So to a kid from El Sobrante, PIE was lots of fun, particularly at night. We got the noise from the straining engines, the sparks from the chains dragging the ground, and the flames from the stacks (no turbos in those days).

Somewhere around the first of second quarters of 1967 I drove for the PIE tanker operation out of its San Pablo (or Richmond, the boundaries were somewhere around that location) yard. Some vice president in its national headquarters in Oakland wanted to make me a boss in Salt Lake City or Houston for less pay than a driver. PIE wouldn't give me the 13th shift that would have made me a permanent employee under the Tanker Supplement to the National Master Freight Agreement. But as mentioned in a prior post, I was at P.I.E. long enough to find some driver's interpretation of P.I.E.: Power Isn't Everything. I got the hint so I hired on at the Consolidated Freightways tanker operation out of Martinez. PIE must have been a big player in those days. Before I drove for PIE or CF or so many other tanker lashups in those days, I did a stint as a rate clerk for Mitchell Brothers Truck Lines. Mitchell Brothers participated in the Pacific Intermountain Tariff which was probably centered at PIE. Of course that was when truck freight was regulated by the ICC.

Mitchell Brothers was a proud outfit. It had about the best looking fleet of flats on the road; its lease operators had the prettiest and most powerful rigs of any flat/lowboy outfit (Southern Tank Lines followed closely by Western Highway Oil had the prettiest tankers). Now all you see of Mitchell Brothers are a bunch of scroungy looking trucks around PDX. I don't understand why that proud outfit had to go down the tubes; perhaps the brothers saw deregulation coming. Deregulation of freight may have benefited the national economy but I think us truckers paid for those benefits. But this is not to advocate a return to truck freight regulation; I haven't studied that subject sufficiently to form an opinion about returning to "the good old days."
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I'm an old radio DJ...on the air from 1977-89, now doing freight for ABF. Dr. Don Rose from 610 KFRC was a HUGE inspiration for me. Ever listen to him?
 
Trucker 206 said:
I'm an old radio DJ...on the air from 1977-89, now doing freight for ABF. Dr. Don Rose from 610 KFRC was a HUGE inspiration for me. Ever listen to him?
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Don't recall Dr Rose, I worked out of Charlotte N C,ran Jax Fla. for years, between CB chats with Carolina Freight drivers,CF and Big R
I listened to Ralph Emery, Charlie Douglas,and Dave Nemo rom WWL N O LA.
In the early years, late 50s early 60s listened to Lee Moore from WW Va Wheeling Va.
Guess younger guys don't go back that far in history,known as the low horse power days
We were still running a few A50 Macks and L200 IHC gas burners.
 
seabreeze said:
Don't recall Dr Rose, I worked out of Charlotte N C,ran Jax Fla. for years, between CB chats with Carolina Freight drivers,CF and Big R
I listened to Ralph Emery, Charlie Douglas,and Dave Nemo rom WWL N O LA.
In the early years, late 50s early 60s listened to Lee Moore from WW Va Wheeling Va.
Guess younger guys don't go back that far in history,known as the low horse power days
We were still running a few A50 Macks and L200 IHC gas burners.
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Ahh, okay. Thought you were saying something about growing up/living in the San Francisco Bay Area. Lots of good DJ's in that area back then. I left radio for good back in the late 80's for a 'real' job. I don't go back as far as the 'stone knives and bearskin' days, but my Dad sure does. Started his trucking job in 1951, and retired in 1993. Any old story I hear about those days back then and I'm all ears!
 
John hostler said:
I worked there 1971 to 1986....loved it and the people
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John, you probably read, I started with Ryder in Charlotte in 1955, was still there in 1990 when PIE closed the doors.
I would like to post here on TB, but I'm just too bashful.
Welcome aboard.
 
seabreeze said:
John, you probably read, I started with Ryder in Charlotte in 1955, was still there in 1990 when PIE closed the doors.
I would like to post here on TB, but I'm just too bashful.
Welcome aboard.
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OMG, where are my boots? It's starting to get deep here.

(PIE P&D 1984 -1989)
 
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