Trains Magazine mentions C&S

The diminutive C&S narrow gauge doesn't normally make the pages of Trains Magazine like the D&RGW does, so when it does it is worthy of some recognition.  In the May 2015 edition of Trains Magazine, Martin E. Hasen wrote an article on "West Side's wandering Shays" where a short segment mentioned the ex-C&S-turned-tourist-lines at Central City and Silver Plume.

The photos are from the net and the narrow gauge forum.  Apparently #14 was numbered 4 at the Camino Cable and Northern so when it arrived it was still in that numbering.  The Narrow Gauge forum says these photos from Central City are when it arrived in May 1974.  The Trains Magazine article claims it arrived in 1972.  I'm not sure which one is correct.

TRAINS excerpt:
"The Ashbys were assembling narrow gauge railroad equipment to run at Central City, Colo.  Given the steep grades and twisting track on the Ashby's railroad, a Shay was a perfect addition, and No. 14 arrived in 1972.  Within a few years, the Central City operation closed in favor of the Ashbys' tenure as operator of the newly restored Georgetown Loop Railroad in Silver Plume, Colo."

Elephants pushing South Park Trains, Oh My!

The C&S pulled off engineering feats that could be the stuff of myths.  I suppose, then, it makes sense that it created some myths.  Every once in a while I come across the one about a stalled circus train that used elephants to help push the train over a summit.  I read it recently in an article about modeling the C&S.  I also read about it in a book I own called Railroads of Colorado.

In Railroads of Colorado by Claude Wiatrosky there is an inset in a chapter on the DSP&P entitled "Pachyderm Pusher."  It reads as follows:

"One of the most-repeated anecdotes about the South Park concerns circus elephants.  A South Park

locomotive stalled on a steep hill in a driving snowstorm while carrying a circus to a mountain town.  Elephants pushed the train to the top of the hill, assisting the overloaded locomotive.  There are at least four references to this incident, each claiming it happened in a different place.  One story states the train failed on Kenosha Pass on its way to Gunnison in the early 1880s.  Other stories locate the stalled train just west of the Alpine Tunnel on Boreas Pass and nearer Fremont Pass.  Almost surely the incident did occur, and the story was so good that more than one storyteller adopted it."

The inset includes an illustration of the incident in a June 1941 issue of Railroad Magazine.

As anyone familiar with the C&S could point out, the phrase "just west of the Alpine Tunnel on Boreas Pass" is clearly incorrect as the Alpine Tunnel was through Altman Pass and Boreas Pass was on the line from Como to Breckenridge.

The author seems convinced that this actually occurred.  I find this hard to believe.

First, did circuses travel in the dead of winter in the 1800s?  Now, I have no idea whatsoever, so I may be completely wrong, but the idea of putting up an unheated circus tent in Gunnison during a time of year when a "driving snowstorm" was possible seems surprising.

Secondly, how would a locomotive crew and elephant trainers manage to coordinate the right amount of push-pull to not buckle the train and cause a derailment?

Who knows?  Maybe I'm wrong and this actually happened.  It sure would be fun if it did!