I guess a bio is supposed to start at the beginning—so, I was born in 1933 in Los Angeles and raised in Inglewood a couple of miles east of where LAX is now. Having started life that long ago, I sometimes have a hard time understanding what my daughter Melissa is talking about; like, “this is for the landing page of our blog.” To me, landing is something an airplane does and Blog was a scary science fiction movie character when I was a kid.
Susi: Tom–mee, that science fiction character when you were a kid was
THE BLOB! Melissa is talking about something she’s doing on the internet
called a BLOG!
Oh! Yeah, uh—whatever the damn thing is. Anyway, in spite of this, Melissa and I have communicated pretty well since she was born. So, I’ll give this a try.
From the time I was five years old, my parents took me to the ballet, opera and stage shows, maybe trying to instill a bit of culture into my young life. I was fascinated by the beautiful dancing, elaborate painted stage sets, the wonderful effects created by the stage lighting and the excitement of live theatre. It wasn’t long before I decided that I wanted to be a theatrical set and lighting designer when I grew up.
A few years after having made this momentous decision, a movie studio was filming scenes at the Santa Fe station in Inglewood. Being close to Hollywood, our 1880s depot was often used for movie shoots but, this time, the studio had covered the depot and grounds with fake snow in areas that would show in the movie. This interested me because our depot had now become a “theatrical set.” However, even more fascinating was the steam locomotive and train that sat a little ways away, quietly steaming while the movie crew set up camera and lights for the first shot. When everyone was ready, a blast of the engine whistle scared the shit out of me and I instantly backed up to where I felt safe, as this previously simmering engine suddenly came to life, making deafening noises and shooting smoke into the air as it charged into camera range. After it made its short trip to the depot and the actors were finished doing the scene, it backed up out of camera range and quiet time returned until it came time to do the next shot. Even though I was somewhat fearful of the steaming machine, I was fascinated by it and I decided I wanted to be a Santa Fe locomotive engineer when I grew up.
Well, as you can see, by the time I was in grammar school, I had a big-time career conflict going on in my head. Which is it going to be when I grow up: a designer for the theatre or a Santa Fe locomotive engineer??!
My family and I continued going to the theatre and I was pretty much in theatre mode until my history class took a field trip to our historic Santa Fe depot. There, we talked with the station employees and watched a freight train rumbling through town and I found out that, every day, right behind that train, was another freight train that stopped and switched cars into and out of various industries like the furniture factory, lumber yards and beer warehouse. So, once in a while, I would ride my bike to the depot to watch what they did and, after they got to know me, the brakemen sometimes let me do things that were safe, like uncoupling cars and bleeding air off the brake system. Eventually, one of the engineers asked if I would like to come up into the cab. YES! I climbed up the ladder and spent an hour riding around in this rather grimy but fascinating steam engine cab, filled with pipes and gauges and levers and a roaring fire in the firebox. Pretty exciting world in that steamy cab, especially when you’re not quite sixteen.
Now, my parents had always encouraged me to do the things that I wanted to do but, by my junior and senior year in high school, they could see that, even though I was building stage sets and designing lighting on the high school stage and in community theatre, I was also becoming very interested in what was happening down at the railroad station. Working at any job with heavy equipment the size of boxcars and locomotives is not the safest job in the USA and certainly not as safe as being a designer for the theatre. I’m sure that the possibility of their only child loosing legs and arms under the wheels of a train did not thrill my parents and, during my senior year, my parents did seem to be buying more and more tickets to stage shows, after which we would have great discussions about how wonderful it would be when I became old enough to work in professional theatre.
High School Graduation, June, 1951: I had always been more interested in creative classes than in academic classes, so attending college, even the offer to send me to the prestigious Pasadena Playhouse School of Theatre as a design student, didn’t turn me on. I was seventeen and wanted to be free of school for a while. There were no job openings except something like a paper route or a market bag boy until I was eighteen. I decided to let my parents support me until I turned eighteen and I spent the summer on the beach. By the middle of September no theatre company had come pounding on my door begging me to design sets and lighting for them so, on my 18th birthday, well tanned and ready to work, I entered the Santa Fe office in Los Angeles and they hired me as a switchman (which is the same as a brakeman who works in the switching yard). I was thrilled. I came home, told my parents the good news and went out to celebrate with my friends— Mom and Dad stayed home with the papers they would reluctantly sign in order for me to work for the Santa Fe; they had to give their permission since I was not yet 21.
Well….I did live to retire as a passenger train engineer in 1996 and I still have all my arms and legs. After we retired, in 2004, my wife Susi and I moved to Sonora, CA, a small town in the gold country that had three wonderful live theatres that we could work with and they presented fine shows all year. Surprise! I also ended up being a Train Conductor at Railtown State Historic Park until I was 85 (if you happen to see Huell Howser’s California Gold trip to Jamestown and Railtown on PBS, I was the conductor).
But, don’t go away yet. I did get to do set and lighting designs for many theatres and, most of those shows included my actress wife, Susi. In 1966, I left the Santa Fe and for eleven years, I worked in theatre. It was an exciting time, especially the seven years Susi and I worked in the show room at Harrah’s at Lake Tahoe; we call that our Tahoe Adventure and, the most exciting thing that happened there was that Melissa came into our lives. In 1977, I returned to Santa Fe but I also continued to design for theatres. We look forward to sharing some railroad, theatre and other stories with you once Melissa gets us old folks tuned into what the hell a Blob—oops, a Blog— really is.
Tommy Johnson
