While Hitachi Rail has numerous siblings who are part of our global business, we interviewed identical twins Tim and Tom Volk who are not only siblings but have each worked at Hitachi Rail for more than 30 years. Read on to hear their story…
In 1992, you would have been hard pressed to walk from point A to point B without running into one of the four Volk brothers working in the Pittsburgh offices of what their coworkers jokingly renamed “Union Switch & Volk”*. Identical twins Tim and Tom Volk are still with Hitachi Rail and learning from each other despite – or maybe because of – their inherent competitive nature.
Tim, who is the older sibling by just two minutes, is a Principal Signalling Wayside Engineer. While it’s rare for him to have any direct day-to-day work interactions with Tom, who is a Senior Application Engineer, that doesn’t stop the two of them from talking business whenever they get together.
Twins are unique in the sense that everything is a competition - this means you learn a lot more a lot quicker, because you’re always arguing about something or trying to outdo the other. We go into details that most people don’t talk about.
Their competitive nature is one thing the two of them seem to agree on.
“There is definitely a competition between us, but it hasn’t separated us,” Tim said. “You learn when disagreeing about who’s right. Even if you’re wrong, you’re still learning. It’s also nice that if you don’t know who to ask about a certain topic, you can always go to your brother.”
A Family Affair
Both began learning about electronics at an early age, experimenting with obsolete equipment that their father brought home from his job with the Air Force for his nine children to play with. Tim’s and Tom’s fascination with anything electronics continued, with both attending Pittsburgh Technical Institute and Point Park College.
Tom joined Union Switch & Signal in 1985, followed four years later by Tim. Older brother Fred and younger brother Pat also worked for the company through the years, and the sons of both Tim and Tom also joined the business as summer interns.
“When I first started, I think it took people four or five years to realise that there were twins in the building,” laughed Tim. “They just thought I was everywhere. People tend to remember you once they know you’re a twin.”
For Tom, one of the funniest things is “coworkers asking me if I have the same birthday as Tim. I say I’m not even related to him.” He also shares that sometimes he gets credit for things that Tim does at work and vice versa.
The confusion carries over to their personal lives. Once when he was a bachelor, Tim went to a dance in West Virginia. Friends of Tom’s wife saw him there and, shortly after, broke the difficult news that Tom was cheating on her.
“Another funny incident happened when Tom was working as a dishwasher in a local restaurant,” remembers Tim. “His manager saw me in the dining room having a meal, but he had seen Tom working in the back. He didn’t know what to think.”
Extended family gatherings usually mean the Volk brothers are off in a corner talking shop. Not much conversation is required, however.
“We know each other so well that we can tell what the other is thinking by just a facial expression or a couple of words,” said Tom. “It’s not ESP. We simply grew up together.”
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