L-1393 Boilermaker builds a life out of metal

Deep in the heart of North Carolina, where the clang of work echoes through the Norfolk Southern shops, Scott Griffin has built a career, and a creative life as an artist, out of metal. A member of Local 1393 (Altoona, Pennsylvania), Griffin has spent 20 years as a Boilermaker, working emergencies and building the heavy components that keep the railroad running.

Though he’s been with Norfolk Southern long enough that he’s number three on the roster and could choose easier hours, he sticks with the late shift, 4 p.m. to 2 a.m. “I wouldn’t have to work nights,” he says, “but I love it.”

Griffin has been in the trade for 30 years, specializing in industrial welding.

“I’ve always been in industrial welding,” he explains. “We build a ton of equipment—seats, gas tanks, shifters. I build the entire tank, leak and pressure test it.”

The Norfolk Southern CRS facility in Charlotte, North Carolina, is where Griffin works, fabricates and repairs the components the railroad uses across its system. “Our customer is Norfolk Southern,” he says. “We build the parts for assembly.”  

In the shop where he works, there are only three men, surrounded by pallets of parts and blueprints. “I work with mainly new parts. We do both repairs and fabrication,” he says. “With me being there so long, they trust my skills to create new things they need. I’ll make them a complete custom part.”

But once Griffin clocks out, his welding torch takes on another life. Since the mid-1990s, he’s been transforming metal into intricate works of art.

“Early on, after a year or two, I started my art, but it was very crude,” he recalls. “I wasn’t welding six months before I started making art.”

At first, it was small projects—napkin and wine bottle holders and flowers for his mother, grandmother and wife. “I’ve made thousands of roses,” he says. Over time, his art evolved.

“People are very visual. Art adds something. Now every piece I do has some kind of meaning behind it.”

His subjects range from gothic candelabras to wildlife, from symbolic flowers to public sculptures that rotate through art walks in historic downtowns. He’s leased out pieces such as Dual Sunset, a pair of seven-foot rotating sculptures, and Pieces, a whimsical scene of two mushrooms designed as homes for imaginary elves.

“Pick up the pieces of your life and move on,” he says of its meaning.

One of Griffin’s most striking works is a full-scale metal sculpture of Harriet Tubman, made entirely from panels he patterned out of cardboard and scaled using his wife’s measurements.

“She’s about my wife’s size, so I measured her,” he says. “Tubman’s been finished for 18 months and she’s now at a restaurant in Charleston.”

His craftsmanship also found its way back to Norfolk Southern. When coworkers retire, Griffin often fabricates replicas of the machinery they worked on, such as tractors, plows or locomotives. He depicts them in “the torn-up condition they worked in their life.” His favorite piece is a replica of his great-grandfather’s 1906 Frick steam engine. “I’d like to have that one back,” he says.

Last year, Griffin completed one of his most ambitious projects, a six-foot boardroom table for Norfolk Southern. Inside the steel frame, he built a miniature bridge complete with railroad tracks, ballast and lighting.

“The table itself is four inches deep, like a pan,” he explains. “In that pan, I created a six-foot bridge within the table. When they sit at it, they see that piece.”

He even signed his work in graffiti-style script in a nod to the artistic flair that’s become his signature. A 12-foot version is next on his list.

Though his finished pieces are in homes around the world, Griffin says his art isn’t about profit. “Even though the money is nice, it’s not about the money,” he says. “Any time I’m in my shop creating, I can build anything I want. It gives me a feeling of accomplishment. I do it because I love it.”