Two Crossings: Walt Disney and the C&S narrow gauge, part 1

Walt Disney and the Colorado & Southern narrow gauge. Not a combination one would expect. However, they crossed paths at least twice, once quite directly.

1948 proved a pivotal year when Walt Disney’s dream of a what would later become Disneyland took flight after a visit to a fair. That year marked the beginning of the Chicago Railroad Fair and, Disney, already a railfan, rode the California Limited along with his fellow railbuff Ward Kimball to the Windy City. At some point in Arizona Disney had a chance to blow the whistle on the train’s engine. Kimball remarked that “I had never, ever seen him so happy.”

When the duo arrived in Chicago, Disney had already been considering the creation of what he called “Mickey Mouse Park” with rides for children. What he found at the Rail Fair caused him to completely re-envision the concept of an amusement park. The Fair’s grounds were set up similar to the 1893 World Columbian Exposition with its various “villages.” The Rail Fair’s version consisted of locations including a beach, a French quarter, a dude ranch, and a pueblo village. According to Train by Tom Zoellner, “The connecting thread between all these villages was…an old timey railroad: the Deadwood Central, a tribute to the western mining roads of the 1870s, which ran on narrow gauge and cost a dime to ride.”

And what equipment did this old-timey train consist of? None other than C&S 2-6-0 No. 9, mail car No. 13, coach 76, business car 911, and a string of Rio Grande gondolas converted to open-air rider cars all dressed up in fantastical old-west garb. The C&S equipment, minus 911, had been preserved previously for the 1939 World’s Fair in New York where the 3-piece set had been on static display. After that fair, the train sat in the CB&Q’s Aurora, IL shops awaiting an unknown future. No. 9, revived to active life again, likely since pulling the last C&S passenger train from Leadville to Denver in 1937, was now pulling trainloads of Rail Fair visitors back and forth between two stations named Deadwood and Central City. These passengers could then visit each of the far-flung lands.

Guidebook for the Chicago Railroad Fair. C&S No. 9 in front of C&S mail car No. 13

Disney liked the design so much that Ward Kimball said Walt talked of “little else” on the return train trip to California. Disneyland later took shape as four village-style lands, Adventureland, Frontierland, Tomorrowland, and Fantasyland, all linked together by an old-time narrow gauge train that author Tom Zoellner points out “look[ed] eerily similar to the Chicago Railroad Fair.” 

1955 Disneyland map

Disneyland Railroad 1955 - B. Don Erb photo

Two side notes are worth mentioning: First, Disney told Kimball that he planned to run his proposed railroad for fun for himself on days when the park was not open. Secondly, another individual was inspired by the little C&S train at the Fair: a teenaged Lindsey Ashby. The train bug caught him there and he would later, along with wife Rosa, pioneer a tourist train out of Central City, CO and later the Georgetown Loop.

In an upcoming post, I will show another connection between Walt Disney and the C&Sng. It may be less direct, but it still had an effect on the future of two important surviving C&S cars.

The Locos We Lost - Part 2

 According to Colorado Rail Annual Number Ten by Cornelius W. Hauck, the C&S made a 1938 inventory of the remaining narrow gauge engines.  Next to No. 6 is the note "Held to be sent to World's Fair, New York. (Due flues 2-40)."

Hauck notes that during a July 7th, 1938 general meeting "the 6 had been set aside for [the World's Fair], but the suggestion was made that the 9 was in better shape and might well be used instead."  As we know, that was in fact done.

It seems No. 6 had one more shot at life when in the same year the C&S offered locomotives for display to towns along its line.  Unfortunately, a note to the Superintendent of Motive Power states, "We now find that none of the towns are agreeable to accepting this engine.  You may therefore scrap engine 6, which will complete the AFE."  She was scrapped in 1939.

Just one year after her scrapping, Central City began its pursuit of a display locomotive, followed by the appeasement of a tax debt to Idaho Springs with another display train.  Alas, No. 6 was lost a year before she could be one of the locos to be considered for either of these towns.

But that's not the end of the story.  A small part of No. 6 lives on.  According to Jason Midyette's book One Short Season, during work in 2005 to bring No. 9 back to life for a short time on the Georgetown Loop, it was discovered that "ENG 6" was marked on the inside of the lead drivers.  It appears, to my assumption, that in the process of sprucing up No. 9 for the World's Fair, the lead drivers needed replacing and No. 6's were in better condition and thus were swapped. 

Photo of No. 6 from The Pictorial Supplement of the DSP&P

1980 C&S News (2) - C&S Diesel Wreck Near French Gulch Water Tank

A wealth of railfan history exists in the archives of the Rocky Mountain Rail Report, the newsletter of the Rocky Mountain Railroad Club started in 1939.  Here is some more miscellaneous South Park Line/C&S-related news from the 1980 editions.   

1980

August

(C&S Diesel Plummets 60 feet Near French Gulch Water Tank)

LC&S collection photo. from
High Line to Leadville by Doris B. Osterwald

BILL MAY, C&S ROUNDHOUSE FOREMAN at Leadville, is offering a substantial reward for the elimination of the pesky muskrats responsible for the recent upsetting of C&S Engine 6223, on the Leadville-Climax Branch. Seems as how these villainous critters tunneled around the culvert in the fill at French Gulch on the high country rail line, causing spring run-off waters to wash out said fill and leave the C&S track hanging high and dry. Imagine the surprise of the crew on the return trip to Leadville, when they approached French Gulch and found these conditions. Fortunately, the engineer and brakeman were able to unload in time to avoid injury, but Engine 6223 was not so fortunate and plunged 60 feet down the mountain. None of the cars in the short train chose to follow the engine. [Ed. Actually, one tank car partially went into the crevasse] All of this excitement took place on June 23, and it was not until June 29 that the 6223 was hauled back up the bank and onto the rails. A new fill has been constructed and the branch is back in operation with Engine 6219 handling the work. Now, if I can just find that old musket. [Ed. In a not-so-humorous follow-up, when 6223 was taken back to Leadville, the engine was shoved by 6220 onto the wye a bit too hard. The back end of the engine went off the end-of-track. Since the roadbed was slightly elevated, the engine played a game of see-saw]

LC&S collection photo from
High Line to Leadville by Doris B. Osterwald

[Ed. The water tank seen in the photo was the tank that used to serve the narrow gauge engines on the route. Used until 1943 when the line between Leadville and Climax was standard-gauged, the tank was moved to the opposite side of the track in order to serve the C&S' standard gauge steamers. The tank remained in place even after dieselization. It still stands today. The Leadville, Colorado & Southern tourist trains still stop here to let passengers off to look around and see the tank.]

September

(Eye-Witness to Last C&Sng Passenger Run Shows Video Footage)

Helen McGraw Tatum thrilled the capacity audience at the August club meeting with her presentation, LAST RUN OF ENGINE #9. This nostalgic look at life on the South Park Division of the Colorado & Southern Railway presented not only train operations on the narrow gauge line, but also scenes of the communities served by the famous railroad. OSHA would just love the ice-cutting process and loading of the large blocks of ice into the narrow guage boxcars as seen in this 45-year-old movie. Cattle ranching, a July 4th celebration at Bailey, and views of everyday life in the area combined with some classic train shots for a most memorable evening.

[Ed. Below is a short clip from Tatum's film with shots of No. 9 and other C&S locomotives]

 

If you can track it down, the DVD of the whole video is available:

[The engine and both cars of the passenger train in the above footage still exist today. No. 9 is on display at High Line Railroad Park in Breckenridge. The coach 76 and RPO mail car 13 are on display in the museum building in Silver Plume by the Georgetown Loop Railroad. The video below tells the story of the two cars.]

December

(Signatures of Pictorial Supplement of DSP&P - 25 Cents!)

IN THE PRINTING OF BOOKS, several pages are printed at a time on one large sheet of paper, which is then folded to form a section of the book. These sets of 16 or 32 pages are called SIGNATURES, which are ultimately assembled and bound into the finished product. The Archives Committee of the Rocky Mountain Railroad Club will offer for sale at the December meeting, signatures from the club's 1959 publication, "Pictorial Supplement to Denver South Park & Pacific," by R. H. Kindig, E. J. Haley, and M. C. Poor. Containing 16 pages, these sections of the hard-to-find book are filled with interesting text and pictures on Colorado's most memorable narrow gauge railroad. Also available from the club's archives at the December meeting, will be a beautiful selection of 8"xll" color prints from the same publication. Ideal for your own collection or just in time for Christmas, signatures and prints are priced at only 25 cents per copy, on a first-come, first-served basis. 

★ ★ ★ ★ 

SIGNATURES AUCTION - In cataloging the signatures from the "Pictorial Supplement to Denver South Park & Pacific," Assistant Archivist Keith Kirby has assembled three sets which comprise virtually complete copies of the book. In an effort to make these available to folks who might not own copies of the publication, these signatures will be sold as complete sets. At the December club meeting, two sets of the Pictorial Supplement signatures will be auctioned, with Erwin (Going, Going, Gone) Chaim conducting the sale. Here is a great opportunity to obtain one of the most popular Rocky Mountain Railroad Club books, while supporting the Archives Fund at the same time. 

The Publications Committee made a concerted effort and sold over 350 copies of the Memorial edition of D.S.P. & P. Soft cover booklets that were published by the club, years ago, have been reviewed and will be reprinted in 1981, for free distribution to members. 

C&S 9's 2010 arrival in Breckenridge

Here is C&S No. 9 when she was placed on display in the town of Breckenridge, a mining town she traveled through so many times during her operating days between Denver and Leadville. The engine has been cosmetically restored since its short and ill-fated partial season operating on the Georgetown Loop in 2006. 

Footage of the C&Sng in the 1930s

I wanted to bring attention to a great video called Excursion to the Thirties which includes a good stretch of C&S narrow gauge film footage.  

I originally posted a clip from a Youtube channel that posted it. Later, I found out that the DVD is still commercially available. In light of this, I removed the video link.

The video is available for purchase at a number of sites including...

Walthers

Railfan Depot

Trainfan Video Depot

In the video you'll see:

Clear Creek segment (1938 and 1939)

Here you'll see...

On August 11th, 1939 C&S 70 working in Idaho Springs.

C&S 69 running light past the Argo Mine

C&S 70 backing with a train of gondolas to Black Hawk

C&S 70 and train returning to Forks Creek

    -you'll see the crew perform a flying switch with caboose 1003

    -keep an eye out for the brakeman when he steps between the caboose and a rapidly approaching boxcar!

C&S 70 and train now eastbound heading for Golden

You'll see C&S 9 and 65 (with one as a midtrain helper) along with caboose 1003 traveling from Golden to Forks Creek on July 19, 1938. C&S 9 is now on display in Breckenridge. 

Leadville Segment (1938)

Here you'll see...

the Leadville depot

the Leadville engine house

C&S 74 switching cars in the Leadville yards on July 6th, 1938 for the Molybdenum mine. The train then heads towards Climax with what appears to be caboose 1009.  C&S engine 74 and caboose 1009 are both now at the Colorado Railroad Museum in Golden.

Boreas Pass Segment (1938)

Here you'll see..

C&S 71, 8 (dead), and 69 leave Breckenridge for Como on an equipment transport prior to abandonment. C&S 71 is now on display in Central City.

    -Watch for two crew members riding the front of 71 apparently keeping an eye on the unmaintained track

C&S 73, westbound, with a scrap train traveling through Webster on July 19, 1938

The train climbing to the top of Kenosha Pass. 

The train running through Kenosha summit. Track has been relaid at the summit near the site of the wye used to turn helpers.

Later in the day, the same train climbs eastbound up out of the South Park with 69 as helper

After reaching Kenosha summit, C&S 69 uncouples and backs up light to Como

The 5 Remaining C&S Locos - Update 9

  As my reading and research continues I want to continually update this article from its original form as published in The Bogies and the Loop.  Updates are in bold and underlined.   Thanks to recent research, this update includes new details related to C&S No. 9.

And Then There Were Five:

 The Stories of the Remaining Five C&S Locomotives 

By Kurt Maechner  

          On a cold winter morning in 1986 C&S 71 was hauled up onto a flatbed truck in Central City. The destination was the newly reconstructed portion of the Georgetown Loop route. The engine got away, but much to their surprise, when they tried to move the tender, they were met by a string of Central City residents barring its passage out of town. They gathered in protest like Greenpeace stopping a whaling ship. What is it about these little engines that pulled people out of bed to protect it? Why do we still haggle on internet groups about the fates of these relics of a bygone railroad? Perhaps they each say something about life, even about us. Maybe we can even learn from their stories.

         Five engines remain of the C&S from its roster of 69. Each has an intriguing story of how it outwitted the grim scrapper. These are their stories…and a little about what each says about life.

The Other 64 

    A vast majority of the C&S engines met the scrapper one way or another. 35 of the 69 were scrapped by the C&S itself. 29, though eventually scrapped, were sold or traded to various companies and lumber railroads including Morse Brothers, Hallack & Howard Lumber Company, Manistee & Luther R.R., Clarkson Saw Mill Company, B.G. Peters Salt & Lumber Company, Oak Grove & Georgetown R.R. Co., J.J. White Company, Ed Hines Lumber Company, and the Montrose Lumber Company. A few notable exchanges include C&S 55 that was sold to the Milwaukee Road and operated on their Bellevue & Cascade narrow gauge line. Number 64 was moved to Mexico to run for the Sosa & Garcia Company. Two engines (no. 69 & 70) went to the White Pass & Yukon Route in Alaska. Finally, two of the C&S’ last and largest engines, no. 75 and 76 were eventually purchased, and converted to standard gauge, by the Central Railway of Peru to be used for the Cerro de Pasco Copper Corp. There are several hearsay reports that one of the engines tumbled to the bottom of a canyon due to an unrecorded derailment. 

In 2017 I was contacted by Bob Whetham, author of In Search of the Narrow Gauge.  During

a trip to Peru in 1965 he stumbled upon what he and others believe to be the remains of either C&S 75 or 76 in a scrap yard in Huancayo.  He noted at the time that he "remember[ed] the canted cylinders which were very unusual."  His photo (right) shows the tender in the background and the boiler behind that tender (it is not the engine in the foreground). 

Mike Trent on the DSP&P forum commented, "I would state that I am quite certain, beyond a reasonable doubt, that this is #76's tender. I have spent quite a bit of time comparing this image to others of #76. This had a distinctive rivet pattern, and it seems to fit, right down to the bunker sides.  It seems likely that the boiler in the back is one of the two. The only other photo I have ever seen shows a boiler complete with piston valves with the steam dome cover removed in what appears to be a different location than this one. The boilers would be harder to distinguish....But I'm going to get on board that this is #76's tender."

Presumably, it was eventually scrapped completely at a later date.

     And then there were five.

71: All Roads Lead to Home  

       Do all roads really lead to Rome? In real life, all roads lead to home. In all its small positive and negative nuances, our home affects us more than any other influence in life. Whether we love it or have run from it, it must be reckoned with. One C&S loco was adopted by a town, and despite unsuccessful efforts to remove it, and successful efforts to abuse it, it remains affectionately at its adopted home.

       When the railroad finally received permission to abandon the South Park in 1937, the C&S, finding no buyers in 1938 for their surplus locomotives, began the process of scrapping them.  This began in 1938 with No. 5 and one month later consumed 65 and 58.  

     There was an attempt at saving at least one engine for posterity.  The railroad made an offer to any town along its line: A free narrow gauge locomotive to stuff and mount. This would have been engine 6.  Despite the number of people who protested the abandonment of the line, not a single town along its remaining rails took them up on the offer.  A memo to the Superintendent of Motive Power stated that "the scrapping of 6 narrow gauge engines, one of which we asked you to hold up anticipating that we could use the engine for historical purposes.  We now find that none of the towns is agreeable to accepting this engine.  You may therefore scrap engine 6."

     However, by 1941, one town (and eventually Idaho Springs), Central City, who had lost its railroad connection 10 years earlier, changed its mind and said yes, though it had to fight the management of the Burlington Route (now owner of the C&S) for many months to get it at this point.  By this time the Q didn't want to give away any assets, even if it was scrap value. Engine 71, that had the unfortunate privilege of being used on many scrapping operations on the line, was chosen. Along with gondola 4319 and combination car 20, it was taken to the end of track at Black Hawk in April of 1941. It was then hauled by truck and found a home on exhibit near the site of the Central City depot.

     There it would remain for a little over 45 years.

   She did receive some attention over the years.  During the 1950's or 1960's, the CB&Q sent someone along to spiff up the paint and, in the process, added the Burlington herald to the whole train.  A fence was also added to keep vandals out.  Rick Steele comments in the Narrow Gauge Forum that he scraped and repainted the engine and No. 20 back to the original C&S markings in 1970.

       Puffs of steam would return to the air in Central City, however, in 1968 as the Colorado Central Narrow Gauge tourist railroad laid track to Packard Gulch. They ran trains with two Central American locomotives. This group, along with the locos and rolling stock, eventually moved to take over operation of trains on the Georgetown Loop project in 1973. The Colorado Historical Society (CHS), who owned the track, had the idea of also taking 71 to Silver Plume to restore it and run it on the Loop. The engine was indeed taken to Silver Plume in 1986 which lead to much consternation in Central City. A town newspaper referred to the situation as the “Great Train Robbery.” When the CHS then tried to move the tender, this is when some city residents came out to stop it. Their town had requested the locomotive and they wanted to keep it. Following this incident, the engine was promptly returned home...sort of.

   For reasons I have yet to determine, around this time, instead of returning the engine to its display site in Central City, it was placed on display, along with the rest of its train, on a new stretch of rail in Black Hawk.  During the winter of 1987, a trucker by the name of Steve Clifford, who related his story in The Bogies and the Loop, happened to pass through Black Hawk when he noticed "a flimsy make-shift shed constructed over locomotive No. 71 and its tender."  This chance encounter led him to find out just what was going on (and also to him receiving a bid to transport the train on his truck back to Central City).

      

     Something was indeed going on.  Steam rose again from the bear trap stack of 71 from 1987 to 1990. Another organization stepped in to run the Central City line, this time named The Blackhawk and Central City Narrow Gauge Railroad, and No. 71 was their star. There is a lot of discussion on the efficacy of the running of the locomotive in these years. That being said, she did live again, if even for a brief moment of relived
history. The group certainly had big goals. A tourist guide from 1988 states the railroad as planning “to reach Blackhawk in the next five years.” This, unfortunately, was not to happen. The railroad folded and 71 sat again, still, with her gondola and combine until she was moved once again. 

  The Narrow Gauge Discussion forum states that at some point the land where the train had previously been displayed was sold, and so the train, minus the gondola, was transferred to the Couer d'Alene Mine on the opposite side of the valley in the early 1990s.  By 1996 a chain link fence had been erected around the engine .

Casinos came to the City of Central in 1991 and she was eventually placed high up with the combine on a display track by Grand Z Casino and Hotel. The gondola sits in a park near Eureka Street. There’s much consternation over her most recent appointment, but, let’s face it, she’s at least at home.

74: Being left behind may be a part of the plan 

     We are all prone to asking, “What might have happened if…” Regret and longing make us wonder if we had not been left behind by some person, job, or opportunity, would we have found what we really wanted? Then again, maybe being left behind was part of the plan, a far greater plan than our own. 74 may have wondered this as it sat lonely at Morse Bros. Machinery in 1948.

     World War II either saved or destroyed many an engine. Many of the unemployed locos were scrapped for the war effort. Others were used where needed. C&S 74 had the privilege of working with two sister engines on the last remaining narrow gauge portion of the railroad between Leadville and Climax. Molybdenum was a hot commodity in the war effort and Climax had a lot. So much, in fact, that they needed to standard gauge the line, which they did in 1943. Numbers 74, 75, and 76 were then placed on flatcars and shipped to Denver. They were sold to Morse Bros. Machinery and sat on their property for three years. That’s when a Peruvian railroad came looking for some narrow gauge motive power. They took 75 and 76. 74 was left behind to wallow away alone. Left behind.

     Two years later, though, another life awaited 74. In 1948, the Rio Grande Southern was wheezing out its last breaths. The Galloping Geese had bought it a few more years, but the light was fading. The Rocky Mountain Railroad Club knew their chance to see and ride the line was dwindling. They wanted to plan as many excursions as possible. When the club approached the RGS receiver about this, he remarked that it was too costly to lease a D&RGW engine to haul their trains. The Club countered by suggesting that they buy a locomotive. For whatever reason, they took the bait and purchased 74.

     One member of that railroad club was a man named Dr. John B. Schoolland. He was very interested in the Colorado & Northwestern Railroad which ran through his resident town of Boulder and discovered that 74 had started its career on that very railroad. Recognizing that the RGS was near its terminus, he set out to save the engine so it could be displayed in Boulder. The city’s community started various fundraisers that eventually ‘bought’ 74 and had her shipped via rail. 74 returned home in August of 1952 and was placed in Central Park along with a D&RGW coach and RGS caboose.

  The years were not kind as neglect and vandalism set in. Various community members and students worked to touch up the engine off and on. Unfortunately, the RGS caboose was destroyed via a student prank using dynamite and was replaced with a Rio Grande caboose. In 1979 the Boulder Model Railroad Club committed to taking care of the site. 

74 and her train were eventually moved a bit to a new curved track.  Mike Trent on the Rio Grande Southern Technical Page wrote, "In February 1982, the train was moved about 40 feet north of its original location to allow improvements to be made in the park and because the track under the train had deteriorated badly. Almost all ties under the engine were completely rotted away, and the weight of the locomotive had caused her to settle about three to four inches. The BMRC volunteers were called upon to help, and they did, in a big way. Rail was located and donated with the help of the Georgetown Loop Railroad and State Historical Society. The City of Boulder bought brand new ties, and the volunteers, along with some willing professional help, laid a curved section of track for the train's new home. Dr. Schoolland was present to help drive the 'Golden Spike.'"  For a few months after the move the engine was dressed up in C&S livery and even sported a fabricated Bear Trap stack before being returned to its original look as C&N #30.

In the early 2000s the Colorado Historical Society shipped it to a company to see if the engine could be restored for use on the Georgetown Loop Railroad. This was decided against, but 74 was cosmetically restored by the West Side Locomotive Company of Denver and returned to Boulder.  In 2012, she was leased to the Colorado Railroad Museum in Golden where she resides today.  Who could have guessed that being left behind in 1948 would have saved her for our enjoyment today?

9: Sometimes reinventing yourself opens new doors.  

     Most of us like to stay on the rails marked out for us. With change comes friction and we like to avoid it at all costs. But complacency can also destroy us. Some of us learn that to find life anew we must reinvent ourselves in some way: physically, occupationally, or spiritually. Sometimes that reinvention comes whether we like it or not. This is the story of little number 9, a mogul that has lived more lives than any other C&S engine.

     If ever there was controversy surrounding a C&S locomotive, number 9 takes the cake. Built by Cooke in 1884, the loco started out on the South Park Line. She had the honor of pulling the last scheduled passenger train from Denver to Leadville in 1937. She spent two more years on the Clear Creek line and South Platte branch, but an opportunity in 1939 put the engine out of the scrapper’s hand. From 1939 to 1940 New York hosted the World’s Fair. Many railroads sent representative trains. The Chicago, Burlington, & Quincy, which now owned the C&S, planned on sending one of their Cooke moguls as a narrow gauge representative.  Engines 5, 6, 8, or 9 were the options.  They settled on No. 6, leaving the others to be scrapped.  However, according to Narrow Gauge to Central and Silver Plume, "the suggestion was made that the 9 was in better shape and might well be used instead--which was in fact done."

   According to The Mineral Belt Vol. 2, "C&S 2-6-0 Number 9, Railway express and RPO car 13, and coach 76 were put on exhibit in Denver before being moved to the New York World's Fair in 1939.  Number 9 had just been run through the backshop and coaches were resplendent in new paint.  The 2-6-0 was the only engine of this wheel arrangement saved from scrapping."

     Evading the torch by inches, number 9 then was sent along with her two cars to the World's Fair. CB&Q then kept the little train in storage at their Aurora, Illinois shops until 1948 when Chicago held its railroad fair. The engine and her coaches were leased to the fair to be run as a quaint old time western train. Painted for the defunct Deadwood Central (which, incidentally, according to The Mineral Belt Vol. 1 was the railroad from which CB&Q 537 came from), labeled “Chief Crazy Horse”, and sporting a hack false balloon stack, the engine chugged around a small track pulling visitors.

     She was again stored until the Burlington loaned the engine and 3 cars in 1956 to the tourist hauler Black Hills Central in South Dakota.  According to the July 1956 edition of Narrow Gauge News, the line planned to use ex-White Pass & Yukon No. 69 for power, and intended No. 9 for standby power. The line simply put the engine on display. I have read in a few spots that some believe the engine was pulled

behind another engine and made to look operational by burning tires in the boiler.  Jason Midyette, author of a book on No. 9, pointed out that a 1912 law in South Dakota forbid the use of coal-burning locomotives anyway.  Since No. 9 was intended for backup use, maybe the Black Hills hoped to someday convert it to burn oil?

     Twenty-four years later, in 1981, the Colorado & Southern was finally absorbed into the Burlington Northern and the controversy began. By 1986 BN and the Black Hills Central entered a legal fight over the ownership of the mogul. The end result was that BN decided to send it home by giving it to the Colorado Historical Society. They had it stored on Morningstar siding near Silver Plume on the Georgetown Loop RR. It was relettered on one side in alignment with C&S days, though it still retained a red cab for some time. Its greatest surprise was yet to come.

     When the CHS, who owned the GLRR trackage, and the folks who owned and operated the railroad  reached an impasse in negotiations, a major debacle resulted. The end result was that the operator took all of the rolling stock and locos off the property and moved or donated them elsewhere. Still wanting to operate the railroad, the CHS, hunted for a new operator. However, they had no locomotives…except number 9. Both 74 and 9 were shipped away to check the feasibility of restoring one of them to operation. It was determined that number 9, using 74’s tender would be the best bet. In 2006 Uhrich Locomotive Works completed work on number 9 and sent her back to the Loop. It was an exciting day, yet, retained a bitter end.

     There was already an uproar over the changing of GLRR operators, but the furor was somewhat tempered by the excitement of seeing a real C&S loco run again. When number 9 was pulled out of service due to mechanical problems before the end of the season in 2006, many people’s anger erupted. Regardless of opinions on all sides of the issue, number 9 was traded to the town of Breckenridge. They had an old Sundown and Southern locomotive at their Rotary Snowplow Park. This engine seems to have had more promise to have the power to pull trains on the Loop and is being refurbished.

     The trade originally required that number 9 had to be operated. There were plans to build a short section of track in Breckenridge and run the loco off of compressed air. This has all changed and, after an impressive cosmetic makeover at Mammoth Locomotive Works, the engine was put on display in December 2010 between a rotary and a C&S boxcar at what is called Highline Railroad Park. Reinvented once again.

31: Age Matters 

     Popular culture (read: those trying to make money) bombard us with a belief that whatever is young and new is better. It wasn’t that long ago, however, when age was venerated, when being older made your opinion and insight valuable to others. Today, it seems, all it takes is being young, trendy, and having the ability make a hit song. C&S 31 comes from the former era and it holds a title: the oldest locomotive in Colorado; and that counts for something.

     C&S 31's story is not as storied as her other surviving companions, but it contains its curiosities just as well.  In the words of Jason Midyette who chronicled her story in The Bogies and the Loop, her "survival was more a result of random chance than any actual plan; had the C&S kept it, it would have been rebuilt and modernized (and ultimately scrapped) and had the locomotive been in better shape, it might not have been set aside for display in 1932."  

    Built in 1880, C&S 31 began its career as number 51 on the South Park Line. It later joined the Denver, Leadville, & Gunnison as 191 and finally the C&S as number 31 (though it was never renumbered in actuality). It served for 22 years on those lines until it was sold for $2000 in April 1899 (or 1902-sources vary), a year after the creation of the C&S, to the Edward Hines Lumber Company in Wisconsin and run as Washburn & Northwestern #7. In 1905 it was sold to the Robbins Lumber Co. in Rhinelander, which was bought in 1919 by the Thunder Lake Lumber Co. As a side note, one source said that the cautious owner of the line thought it was too heavy to be used unless the ground was frozen. Midyette states that "By 1932, No. 191 was completely worn out and seldom used."  It was retired that year and placed on display at Wisconsin's Rhinelander Logging Museum, next to the paper mill in town, moving there under its own power for the last time.  It was later moved to Rhinelander's Pioneer Park.  The engine remained on display for a little over four decades.


    The locomotive's time at Rhinelander was not kind.  The museum at the time pursued a philosophy that the more access the public has to history, the more likely they are to feel connected to it.  Consequently, the engine was fully accessible and climbable.  As a result, many parts went missing and the loco's condition diminished.
     
    At the beginning of the 1970's, Cornelius Hauck, co-founder with Bob Richardson of the Colorado Railroad Museum, learned of the existence of 191 and contacted the Rhinelander museum.  The logging museum was open to 191 moving to Colorado if a fitting replacement locomotive could be found for them.   Hauck discovered a Mexican railroad that owned a former Thunder Lake Lumber Co. engine was closing down.  This engine wasn't a trade or later purchase for the Wisconsin line, like 191, but was actually built new in 1925 specifically for the Wisconsin logger.  Hauck convinced the Rhinelander Museum to accept his offer that if he could get this engine to them, they would give him No. 31/191.

  

    Finally, in February 1973, Bob Richardson made the trek to Mexico to orchestrate the move of the Thunder Lake engine to Wisconsin and then oversaw the move of 191 from the Rhinelander museum onto a railcar for its move back home to Colorado. 

   Now back in her home state she was restored to her appearance as Denver, Leadville & Gunnison 191, including cutting back her smokebox to its length while on the South Park.  One very unique aspect of 51/191/31 is that, as stated in The Bogies and the Loop, she "received little in the way of updates and has remained a remarkably original example of an 1880's narrow gauge freight locomotive."  In addition to its authenticity, it is believed to be the oldest surviving locomotive in the state at over 130 years old.  One more curiosity to South Park fans is that the link and pin coupler installed on the pilot of 191 by the Colorado Railroad Museum was found along the grade to Alpine Tunnel, likely there as a result of some distant wreck.  In 2009 the engine received an entire cosmetic make-over at CRRM and has been proudly displayed on numerous publicity materials related to the museum. For at least a few of us, yes, age matters.

 60: Stay ready for work 'til the end.  

     For those who relish the goal to eat, drink, and be merry, life’s twilight years hold little promise. But for those who believe their lives hold a greater purpose, one that outshines occupation, we want to stay ready for work, whatever divine work this might be.  One of the five C&S survivors did just that.

     C&S 60 began her life on the Utah & Northern in 1886. She eventually joined the DL&G and ultimately the Colorado & Southern. A story concerning her latter days suggests that the engine was being used to scrap the remainder of the Clear Creek line in 1941 when, well, she just broke down in the town of Idaho Springs where the loco was subsequently donated to the city for display.  

     The "break down" story, however, is likely a myth.  The Colorado & Southern Railway Society, a historical preservation group that has taken on the mantel of caring for No. 60 and her coach, have studied the engine's service records at the Colorado Railroad Museum and there found evidence to discredit such a story.  

     Their research reports, "The C&S mileage records for 60 show she received a complete overhaul in April of 1936. She ran for a year till mid 1937 when she was stored serviceable in Leadville from mid 1937-January 1939.  The records contain monthly inspection sheets filled out for every month of her layup and which state she was stored serviceable in Leadville."

     There the diminutive consolidation lived out her remaining years ready to do the work she was born to do.  In fact, she had the chance to do just that one more time when in the early winter of 1939 she again plied the rails for 6 months.  She was stored again in June, but this time, as she awaited another fire in her belly, the mileage record demonstrates that it was not to happen again.

     The C&S Ry. Society, consequently concludes that "all of our research seems to support that the idea of the breakdown is a myth."  They theorize that "the story of the 'breakdown' seems to come from having one of her eccentric links disconnected.  We haven't determined why that is or when it was done.  However, from the records, and from physical inspection this far, 60 appears to be in excellent mechanical condition with only mild wear from her service time."

     In 1938 the C&S offered towns along its line a locomotive for display purposes.  No one took the bait.  Yet, a 1941 article in the Clear Creek Mining Journal calls No. 60 in Idaho Springs a "gift."  There is a bit of a complication in this gift, though.  Apparently, Clear Creek County argued, as long ago as 1936, that the railway had not paid a tax debt.  In 1941 the county accepted the locomotive as a settlement for this dispute.  Curiously, the town specified in the agreement that they wanted No. 60 to wear a snowplow.

     On Tuesday, May 13th, scrapper Rube Morris hauled the engine and a coach (no. 70) to Idaho Springs using engine 69.  The engine and her small train were on display on a small strip of land between Miner Street and Colorado Blvd.  At some point a log-cabin styled gift shop was built next to the train.  Some have referenced that the gift shop owner sometimes burned old tires in the boiler to simulate steam in order to garner customers.

   As in the case of engine 71 in Central City, it appears that the Chicago, Burlington, & Quincy Railroad sent a crew to spiff up the engines in the 1950s or 1960s and consequently repainted the engine with the Burlington herald on the tender and "C&S" under a smaller engine number on the cab.  When the paint scheme was returned to the original, as it is today, is unclear.

     Using temporary track, the train was moved forward on March 14, 1987 into what is now Harold A. Anderson Park, the spot where a few year earlier, an old school house was moved as well which serves today as Idaho Springs' city hall.  This is where she is today.  In the summer of 2015 the C&S Ry. Society completely needle scaled and repainted 60's smokebox with a graphite based paint mix to reflect its appearance while in operation.  They also added coal boards to the tender.

     In the early 2000s number 60 also was taken into consideration for operation on the Georgetown Loop.  Jason Midyette, one of the directors of the South Park Rail Society, explained that, "CHS (now History Colorado) did approach Idaho Springs in 2004 about using No. 60 on the Loop and Idaho Springs was seemingly favorable to the idea. In further discussions, it was brought to everyone's attention that 60 was the only surviving C&S narrow gauge locomotive that was completely original and essentially untouched from its days on the C&S. As returning it to operation would entail changes and replacement parts, a case was made that 60 should be preserved as a record of C&S practices which would be irrevocably lost if the locomotive was operated on the Loop. CHS and Idaho Springs decided that the locomotive should be preserved and it was no longer considered for operation.  
     Today number 60, with her coach, still sits proudly on the track looking ahead down the former right-of-way on Idaho Street.

     History has led these five locomotives down a trail as serpentine as the grades they once climbed. Where will history take us? It might, like 71, take us back where we came from. We might find ourselves left behind like 74, but it could turn out better than we expect. Maybe we’ll find ourselves in a situation that requires us to reinvent ourselves like number 9. For those of us who’ve earned our keep, we may need to remember that age matters like C&S 31. Yet, no matter what life brings our way, no matter when we might finally drop off the serviceable list like number 60, there’s a calling to keep doing the work we were created to do until we change trains at that great Union Depot that awaits us all.

References

Big Train Tours: Denver, Leadville & Gunnison No. 191 - Colorado's Oldest Locomotive.  Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ct-Fzv-HPqs 

Bodiecalifornia.  (2010, 29 Nov.). C&S 9 – Where Is It Now?  Message posted to http://ngdiscussion.net/phorum/read.php?1,174896.

(n.d.) C&S Narrow Gauge Locomotive Data.  Retrieved from http://narrowgauge.homestead.com/.

“Central City’s Colorado & Southern Railroad.” (1990, Summer). Colorado Yesterday & Today: A Magazine of Adventures, 13.

Clifford, Steve. (October 2017). "Hauling C&S No. 71." The Bogies and the Loop, 9-15.

"Colorado & Northwestern #30" RGUSRAIL. Retrieved from http://www.rgusrail.com/cocrm.html

Colorado Steam. (1999-2010). Retrieved from http://www.steamlocomotive.com/colorado/.

Correspondence with the Colorado & Southern Railway Society via their Facebook page.  

Fritz, B. (2001). Surviving Steam Locomotives in Colorado.  Retrieved from http://wasteam.railfan.net/.

Griswold, P.R., Kindig, R.H., & Trombly, C. (1988). Georgetown and the Loop.  Denver: The Rocky Mountain Railroad Club.

Griswold, P.R. (1988). Railroads of Colorado: Colorado Traveler Guidebooks.  Frederick: Renaissance House Publication.

--> A Guide to the Exhibits at the Colorado Railroad Museum.  (2011). Retrieved from   www.coloradorailroadmuseum.org.

Hauck, Cornelius W.  Narrow Gauge to Central and Silver Plume.  Colorado Rail Annual no. 10. Colorado Railroad Museum, Golden 1972. 

History. (2011). Retrieved from www.coloradorailroadmuseum.org.

Jensen, Robert, F. Hol Wagner Jr., and Robert LaMassena. "Denver, Leadville, and Gunnison 2-8-0 No. 191." Colorado Railroad Museum Equipment Data Sheet No. 15.  Colorado Railroad Museum, 2010.  

Klinger, Tom and Denise.  C&S Clear Creek Memories and Then Some. 

Larson, Kurt.  "Washburn Northwestern Railroad." www.battleaxcamp.tripod.com. 2008.

Loop Communication Committee.  (2005, 27 April).  Meeting Minutes. Retrieved from www.savethetrain.org. 

Midyette, Jason. (2014). Colorado & Southern No. 9: One Short Season. The Ill-Fated Return to Service of a Narrow Gauge Locomotive. South Platte Press.

Midyette, Jason. (January 2018). "Sole Survivor: the last DSP&P locomotive."  The Bogies and the Loop, 9-13.

Midyette, Jason. Correspondence via email February 2020 concerning the Georgetown Loop's interest in C&S 60 in 2004.

Digerness, David S. (1977).  The Mineral Belt Vol. 1 Old South Park - Denver to Leadville - An Illustrated History, Featuring the Denver, South Park & Pacific Railroad, and the Gold-and-Silver Mining Industry. Sundance Books.

Digerness, David S. (1978).  The Mineral Belt Vol. 2 - Old South Park - Across the Great Divide.  Sundance Books.

Narrow Gauge Discussion Forum

National & State Registers. (1999-2010). Retrieved from www.ColoradoHistory.org. 

Pictorial Supplement to Denver South Park & Pacific: Abridged Edition.  (1986). Lakewood: Trowbridge Press.

Poor, M.C. (1976). Denver South Park & Pacific: Memorial Edition.  Denver: Rocky Mountain Railroad Club.

Rhinelander Logging Museum Complex. (2010). Retrieved from http://www.rhinelanderchamber.com/.

Richardson, Robert W.  Robert W. Richardson's Narrow Gauge News. Colorado Rail Annual No. 21

Ross, D. (2009). Colorado & Southern RR Steam Locomotives.  Retrieved from http://donsdepot.donrossgroup.net/.

Ross, D. (2009). Thunder Lake Lumber Co. Robbins RR.  Retrieved from http://donsdepot.donrossgroup.net/.

Schoppe, B. (2011, January). Greetings from the President. The Bogies and The Loop, 22.

Shreiner, T. (2009, 20 July). C&S 71 Video.  Message posted to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DenverSouthPark/. 

Trent, M. (2011). Engine No. 74 – Back Home Again (1952-present). Retrieved from http://www.riograndesouthern.com/RGSTechPages/_bdwhite/index.htm Page.

Trent, M. (2011). Engine No. 74 – The Colorado & Southern Years (1921-1945). Retrieved from http://www.riograndesouthern.com/RGSTechPages/_bdwhite/index.htm Page.

Trent, M. (2011). Engine No. 74 – The Rio Grande Southern Years (1948-1952). Retrieved from http://www.riograndesouthern.com/RGSTechPages/_bdwhite/index.htm Page.

Trent, Mike (2017).  "Possible Photo of C&S 75 or 76 in 1965." Denver, South Park & Pacific Railroad Forum. Retrieved from https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/DSP-P/conversations/topics/19725 

Whetham, Bob. Correspondence via email and blog comment.  Retrieved from http://alpinetunnel.blogspot.com/2012/07/the-five-remaining-c-locomotives.html?showComment=1483821780124#c8669007517712290998

--> -->

The Swan Songs of Central City - Part 3

 

The Swan Songs of Central City

-Part 3

by Kurt Maechner

Here is Part 1

Here is Part 2

Silence, Neglect, Rebirth

C&S 71 and train-1964 with Burlington herald

Like many city railroad displays, the Central City train was greeted with great pomp and circumstance and then entered a slow descent to neglect, deterioration, and vandalism.  A plan to create a corresponding railroad museum seemed to have faded along with the train’s paint.  Surprisingly, in the 1950’s the CB&Q sent someone along to at least spruce up that paint job.  In the process, however, they added an anachronistic Burlington Route herald to all three pieces which none of the equipment had ever worn in revenue service.  What was meant to represent history came to be treated as more of a billboard.   

The weary years then stretched on for the train.  The once sought-after piece of history, now surrounded by a chain link fence to deter vandals and avoid accidents, kept up the silent memory that there once was a railroad here in Central City.  

The silence was finally broken with the arrival of a young couple.

SUMMER 1967
OPERA FESTIVAL WEEKEND
CENTRAL CITY, COLORADO

Rosa and Lindsey Ashby’s Jeep rolls past endless lines of parked vehicles on the hilly streets of Central City.  It is the mining hamlet’s annual Opera House festival and, as usual, the streets are packed beyond capacity with visitors eager for the unique combination of history and art in a rugged gold mining camp.

The Opera House is staging a number of productions this summer including The Merry Widow, Don Pasquale, A Masked Ball, and Cactus Flower, but the Ashbys did not come for entertainment.

They are looking for a spot with easy access to the old narrow gauge C&S railroad grade which sits at the top of a zig-zag switchback the railroad used to reach the 8,510 foot-high town from the much-lower town of Black Hawk.  

They find a spot that looks right and the Jeep comes to a soft stop.  Lindsey steps out and quietly shuts the door so as not to wake Leah, their three-year-old sleeping daughter.  The plan is for Lindsey to walk the old switchback downgrade to Black Hawk and for Rosa, with sleeping Leah, to meet him at the bottom.  This is not to say that Rosa is only a helpful bystander; quite the contrary.  Rosa and Lindsey are a team, ready to tackle a surprisingly daring dream, fully in and fully together.

With the sound of the rolling Jeep wheels moving away, Lindsey walks to the old railway roadbed and pulls out a map of the switchback that he got from M.C. Poor’s book of the history of what eventually became the Colorado & Southern narrow gauge.  Lindsey also brought something to write with, as he plans to make notes along the way, including where trestles once stood.  He, a petroleum engineer, and Rosa, a school teacher, are contemplating what some will surely call a foolish idea: The two want to rebuild an abandoned railroad to haul tourists, one of the first to do so in the state of Colorado.  

Lindsey, map in hand, takes his first crunching steps today downgrade on the old C&S right-of-way.  With these steps, he and Rosa enter a completely new chapter in their lives from which they will never look back.

Meeting the Colorado Narrow Gauge...in Chicago

Lindsey Ashby, born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1933, saw trains roll by day after day on the Louisville & Nashville mainline outside of his grammar school in Kentucky where his family lived with Lindsey’s grandparents after his father’s passing.  Those L&N trains were not what truly hooked him onto railroads, though.

In the mid-1940s Lindsey and his family moved to Chicago, the railroad capital of the United States.  Yet, even being around all that railroad activity didn’t fully take hold of the young boy’s interest.  The real hook happened at, of all places, a fair.

The fair that became a catalyst for Lindsey Ashby was not the type with tiny coasters and spinning rides.  No, this was a much grander affair.  In 1948, 38 railroads joined together to host The Chicago Railroad Fair.  The large event included train pageants, historic equipment, innovative locomotive design displays, concessions, and, of course, rides.  A wide-eyed 15-year-old Lindsey would go down in the evenings to the fair to experience the sights and sounds of railroad history, from its rugged past to its potential innovative future.  When it came to the railroad bug, according to Lindsey, “that’s where I got really nailed.”

C&S 9 at 1939 NYC World Fair

This railroad bug narrowed to a Colorado narrow gauge bug when, far away from Colorado, Lindsey got his first taste of the Colorado & Southern narrow gauge at that Illinois fair.  When most of the South Park Line was abandoned in 1938, the company kept engine No. 9, a 2-6-0 Mogul, Railway Post Office (RPO) car No. 13, and coach No. 76 for exhibition purposes.  This little train had been sent as a static historical exhibit to the 1939 New York World’s Fair.  At the end of that fair the train was stored at the CB&Q Aurora, Illinois shops.  Less than a decade later, the train was resurrected, this time for operation as a carnival ride at the Chicago Railroad Fair, dolled up as an old-time western train.  

A make-believe railroad, running the length of the fairgrounds and dubbed the Deadwood Central, hosted C&S No. 9, with a fake old-time, large smoke stack, red painted features, and a name, “Chief Crazy Horse.”  Besides some open-air gondolas made from Rio Grande cars, the train also pulled the two saved C&S cars, RPO 13 and coach 76, plus one more, C&S business car 911, also saved by the railroad in the 1930s, in this case due to low scrap prices at the time of its retirement instead of by historical intent.

C&S 9 at Chicago Railroad Fair

It seems almost prophetic that young Lindsey Ashby, in this formative time of railroad love, rode behind a C&Sng locomotive and possibly on the C&S cars.  To add to the uncanny connection, one end of the quaint fair railroad included a western-style depot with the name “Central City.”  Little did Lindsey know what role that railroad and that town name would play in his life roughly two decades later.

A New Career Path

After the fair, passion for Colorado’s narrow gauge railroads stayed in Lindsey’s blood.  His curiosity was fanned into flame again when he went to college at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden and eventually made the Centennial state his permanent home with Rosa, whom he married in the early ‘60s.  The two began a lifelong partnership for railroad history that was just beginning when Rosa, with their sleeping daughter, dropped Lindsey off in Central City to walk the length of the abandoned C&S switchback from there to Blackhawk.

At the time that the 34-year-old Lindsey met back up with Rosa and their daughter at the bottom of the switchback in Black Hawk, the couple had already been looking for a change in their life.  Living just over 30 miles away in Golden, Rosa worked as a teacher and Lindsey as a petroleum engineer.  Despite this stability, something seemed lacking in their lives.  They had been holding out hope that Lindsey’s completion of an advanced degree attained through night school might bring the change they hoped for.  Unfortunately, the degree provided no new vistas in his oil company career.  Together, Rosa and Lindsey determined to find a new direction for their lives and it started by charting out the Central City switchback in hopes that they might be able to do what almost no one in Colorado had ever done before: bring a dead railroad back to life.

Cripple Creek & Victor Narrow Gauge

The Ashbys did have some inspiration in a man who had just recently done what they hoped to do.  Over in Cripple Creek, Colorado that same year, 1967, John Birmingham, who had bought two tiny German steam engines, built a 2-foot gauge tourist line on the abandoned standard gauge Midland Terminal right-of-way.  The Cripple Creek and Victor Narrow Gauge Railroad opened up on June 28th and was doing well hauling tourists with a small train and giving riders a taste of the old mining days.  Lindsey had visited the line and this got Rosa and him thinking that one could possibly make a business out of a tourist railroad.  

The couple began to analyze the possibilities before them.  They noticed that the 2-foot gauge of the Cripple Creek line definitely limited the number of passengers the line could haul.  A 3-foot gauge line, they surmised, could haul many more.  After looking at the Central City switchback and the number of visitors Central City received—on Opera Festival weekends, they estimated, four times more than the city could reasonably hold— the Ashbys considered that the short 3 1/2-mile route between Central and Black Hawk was a line where someone with very little money could make a profitable railroad come to life.

Their dream started to become clearer, but there were serious risks.  Nearly all of the land the old railroad bed was on consisted of mining claims.  In order to build across it, as well as to gain credibility in the eyes of the towns of Central City and Black Hawk, they felt the need to acquire these claims.  Where would the money come from?  The Ashbys made a surely heart-wrenching decision for a young family: they would sell their home.

Lindsey put the situation this way: "We had to ask ourselves: Do we want to continue? We decided we would rather go ahead and risk failure - face whatever. It would be better to have risked doing it than to spend the rest of our lives wondering 'What if?'"

This sacrificial action would kill two birds with one stone.  First, on a practical level, it would provide the funds to buy the mining claims at an auction.  Secondly, it would make it very clear to the city governments, from whom they desperately needed approval, that they were not merely tinkering with a pipe dream, but were absolutely serious about the project. 

The Ashbys decided against living with ‘What ifs’ and sold their home.