Pete Carpenter, long-time president of CSXT, is retiring from the company. He is staying on as a consultant.

JACKSONVILLE, Feb. 15 -- Pete Carpenter doesn't remember the first time he wanted to pinch himself, the Florida Times-Union reports.

Maybe it was in early 1999, while eating lunch with three acquaintances in Austin, Texas. One of the people at the table, a man named George W. Bush, was talking about how he hoped to start a presidential campaign in a few months.

Maybe it was at another lunch, where he sat across from business and political legend Nelson Rockefeller. (Carpenter concedes he was a last-minute replacement for that lunch.)

Maybe it was the first time he picked up his multi-million dollar paycheck as president of one of the biggest railroads in the country. It was a hefty sum for a cop's son who grew up in poor rural Eastern Kentucky and whose first job, at 12 years old, was delivering cans of cold beer door-to-door for 15 bucks a week.

Carpenter, 59, has been thinking about those pinch-me-I'm-dreaming incidents a lot lately. After 38 years in the railroad industry, all of them with some form of CSX Transportation, Carpenter is retiring this week. He will stay with the company as a consultant.

"I've pinched myself time and time again," said Carpenter, retaining a portion of his Kentucky twang, "and said 'How the hell is this happening to me?'"

Carpenter has seen a lot of changes in the railroad industry, looking at them from the perspective of having more than a dozen different jobs with the company. His first job, in 1962, was working as a brakeman on the rail lines for what was then called Louisville & Nashville railroad. And his last job will be as vice chairman at CSX Corp., the parent company of the railroad.

The most significant, and positive, change, Carpenter says, has been the consolidation of the industry, going from dozens of tiny railroads in the 1960s to now, when CSXT is one of four major railroads in the country.

And he was at the forefront of a lot of those consolidations. He became vice chairman during CSX's much-maligned takeover of Conrail, a Philadelphia railroad CSX bought a share of in 1998.

Carpenter has served as vice chairman of the corporation since 1999, working out of Jacksonville, even though the corporate headquarters is in Richmond, Va. As vice chairman, he has been one of a few key executives who counsel chairman John Snow and is the highest-ranking corporate official based in Jacksonville.

"Pete's an extremely honorable person," Snow said in an interview this week. "He holds himself to the highest moral character."

And like several others who know Carpenter well, Snow said it is Carpenter's steadfast beliefs that made him such a good employee and supervisor.

Michael Ward, the current president of the railroad, said Carpenter got better as he climbed the corporate ladder. He took his blue-collar work ethic with him and then used his savvy business sense to make decisions.

"Pete is a reverse Peter Principle," Ward said. "The higher he got in the organization, the more he blossomed." Carpenter bounced around the rail industry for most of his career, moving his family about 15 times, to places like Baltimore, Detroit and Ashland, Ohio. The job he held longest -- president of the railroad, from 1992 to 1997 -- is also considered in company circles to be the one he was the best at. As president, Carpenter is recognized by Wall Street analysts as putting the company on a solid financial track. Under Carpenter's presidency, the company's revenue grew 13 percent, operating income climbed 56 percent and the stock price reached new highs.

And inside the company, Carpenter is credited with turning around relationships between union workers and management, which at times have been rocky. CSX officials say he did that by launching a "social compact" with all employees. And while there are still disagreements, relationships overall are much improved.

Carpenter says he did it by sticking to one of his favorite mottos: Treat others like you treat yourself.

"One of the things that always bothered me in the railroad business is the lack of trust between labor and management," Carpenter said. "I'm proud of the strides we've taken in that area." As a consultant for the railroad, Carpenter will continue to work with young executives at CSX. And he hopes to spend more time with his other non-work interests, like his grandchildren, the boards of directors he sits on and his responsibilities at the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra.

Back in Kentucky, few who knew Carpenter as he grew up -- whether he was selling them beer, or working at Kroger's grocery store, his second job -- are surprised at his success. Carl Wenderoth, Carpenter's high school basketball coach in Kentucky, said as a teenager, Carpenter mixed leadership skills with street smarts.

"He was one of the no-doubters," the now-retired Wenderoth said in an interview from his Kentucky home. "He was going to go somewhere in life."