Grassroots Railroad Sports?

In reply to NickD :

That looks like an awesome trip!

In reply to Pete Gossett (Forum Supporter) :

Definitely an awesome trip. Reading & Northern is a terrific railroad to travel with, probably my favorite, with the Everrett Railroad in second. Where else can you go on a 120-mile roundtrip with extended 30mph+ running through rugged terrain? Strasburg is nice in the fact that if you go there on a day when they are open, you are guaranteed to ride behind steam, unlike R&N or Everrett where you have to watch to see when they are running steam excursions, but riding at 10mph for a 4.5 mile trip that's in a straight line over reasonably flat terrain doesn't hold quite the same thrill anymore. And the R&N excursions are pretty accessible, unlike the UP or the old NS corporate steam trips or some of the big NKP #765 trips, which feel like you need to be a member of some secret society to even know about and then they sell out immediately. 

Also, I said that the auxiliary tender behind the #425 was from a PRR E6 Atlantic. Not true, I learned. The R&N has two auxiliary tenders and one is indeed from an E6, just not the one they were running that day. That one is from a Reading engine of ultimately unknown heritage, although the Reading Company Technical & Historical Society has an identical tender that they know was definitely used on an 0-8-0 Camelback among other engines. The E6 tender is currently used as a billboard with the R&N logo and phone number and website for purchasing tickets. Those in the know say it has a leaky cistern, so its not in use, but the theory is that it will probably be repaired for use behind Reading #2102 on her return.

On a slightly bittersweet note, this might have been the last I see of the #425 for a little while. As I understand it, she is due for a 1472 next year, and right now all hands are on-deck to get the #2102 up and running first. Sounds unlikely that they will pull guys off the #2102 and get #425 FRA-certified at the same time. The good news is, it sounds like R&N is not replacing the #425 with the #2102. They are saying they want to use the #2102 on the longer day trips, like Reading-Jim Thorpe or the rumored Reading-Pittston trips (#2102 has more power, a larger tender and a stoker), and then use the #425 on the shorter trips, like the Lehigh Gorge trains or the Jim Thorpe-Penobscot bike trains. My guess would be: #2102 gets up and running next year and they spend the year working out all the minor teething issues and then #425 gets returned to operation either in '23 or '24. They've put a bunch of money and upgrades in the #425 (new pilot truck, roller bearing conversion, new smokebox, overhauled air compressor) fairly recently that I highly doubt they are going to stick her on the shelf after only a couple years of service, especially when nothing is wrong with her. Plus, the #425 is a pretty popular and well-known engine and has a lot of PR value.

I will say, while I have yet to see a Reading T-Hog run and that may change my mind, I prefer the #425 in terms of aesthetics to the #2102. The T-1s are aesthetically half a bubble off. The overall proportions are nice, big boiler makes it look powerful, the drivers aren't comically larger or small, good sized tender, the skirting along the running board is a nice touch. But the headlight that's just above-center, the Wooten firebox that sticks out past the cab, and the cover for the feedwater heater check valves that nearly blots out the smokestack just ruin it for me. Granted, they're still the best-looking steam engines that Reading owned. Some of their stuff, like the G-3 Pacifics or the single-cab 4-4-0s built out of Camelbacks, was shockingly ugly.

I'm unsure when #425's boiler time runs out, but hopefully there is a little bit of overlap and we get to see a doubleheader, or maybe a trip from Reading to Jim Thorpe behind the #2102 and then transfer to a Lehigh Gorge train behind the #425 next year.

Also, the conductor for my car (a one Mr. Eric Quimby, who is the quintessential conductor and a terrific guy) was selling a couple copies of a back-issue of The Bee Line, which is the Reading Company Technical & Historical Society's magazine. This issue was on the Valley Forge Scenic Railroad, which ran on the old Reading Pickering Valley Branch and used the #425 as its motive power. I purchased a copy, because there is little to no easily-found information on the VFSR.

The Pickering Valley Branch was originally built as the Pickering Valley Railroad in 1869, with the Philadelphia & Reading (later to become the Reading Company) subscribing to the majority of the stock and then was leased to the Philadelphia & Reading before construction was complete. This was a common game in the post-Civil War era: a railroad contemplating building an extension or branch line, but reluctant to finance construction itself, would form a new railroad company, lease the prospective railroad to the existing railroad, sell stock in the new corporation to the public, and buy the remaining stock itself. The money raised by the stock sale would then be used for the construction of the new line, which was frequently operated as if it was an integral part of the parent company. It had an interchange with the Philadelphia & Reading at Phoenixville and then ran 12 miles to Byers. It had an interchange with the Delaware River & Lancaster Railroad, mainly carried agricultural products from on-line farms, but also hauled iron ore from on-line mines to the Phoenix Iron Company at Phoenixville and served a meat-packing plant at Kimberton. The Pickering Valley Railroad was never a success, with investors as early as 1882 complaining that the stock was worthless. When the lease expired in 1906, it was absorbed into the now-Reading Company and called the Pickering Valley Branch. Passenger service on the Pickering Valley Branch was discontinued in 1934  after it made only $13.10 in seven months, and the portion of the line from Kimberton to Byers was in 1948. The Reading Company filed for, and received permission to abandon the line in 1964.

Malcolm Ottinger was the brainchild of the Valley Forge Scenic Railroad and was a bona fide steam fan. He had dreams of owning a steam locomotive and in the '50s had purchased a pair of interesting Lehigh Coal & Navigation Co. 42"-gauge industrial lokies and had them moved to Phoenixville. Ottinger envisioned a standard gauge line that would run to where he would set up a loop for the narrow gauge lokies as a sort of amusement park. He spent ten years searching for a standard gauge locomotive, looking at stuff like a logging 2-4-4-2 in the PNW, a 2-8-2T at the Wawa & Concordville and many others. In 1962, he learned about Paulsen Spence's Louisiana Eastern and how there were 37 steam locomotives ripe for the picking, as the scrapping was going to start soon after Spence's death. Ottinger traveled to Louisiana to peruse the engines on-site. He settled on the two ex-GM&N/GM&O Pacifics #425 and #426, and settled on the #425, as it was in the better condition. The #425 would be the only engine to escape the wholesale torching at the LE, and he spent 6-7 months preparing it to be moved back to PA. Illinois Central had torn up the interchange with the LE and Ottinger had to argue with the IC for months before David Page Morgan finally blasted the Illinois Central in the pages of Trains and shamed them into restoring the interchange. The #425 was then shipped up to Phoenixville and Ottinger began work to return it to operation, including purchasing never-used flues for T-1s off the Reading. At this point, Ottinger still did not have rails to run them on but was also purchasing coaches off the CNJ, biding his time to purchase track. He originally looked at the Perkiomen Branch of the Reading, but they weren't willing to sell at the time.

Six years after purchasing the #425 and beginning his plan, Ottinger struck a deal with the Reading to purchase 2 miles of the Pickering Valley Branch, from Kimberton to French Creek. In the sale, the Reading was clear to say that they did not have the title to the land that the rails ran on. (This was very important later on.) In the meantime, Ottinger and his team began repairing the rails, with help from moonlighting Reading MoW crews, and ran the early trips with leased Reading diesels. Ridership in the initial year was very strong, because while the Pickering Valley line wasn't profitable, it was pretty scenic. The only issue was the meat-packing plant at Kimberton, which treated riders to the sights, sounds and smells of a slaughterhouse. They lacked a run around track at French Creek, so the trains ran from French Creek to Kimberton with the #425 on the head-end shoving back, and a crew member riding in the rear vestibule ready to dump the emergency brake if required. There were also minor derailments, the occasional wildfire from a poorly-sealing ashpan on the #425, and occasional breakdowns.

The issue began in 1969, when people along the right of way complained about the noise, cinders and grassfires. Several were more knowledgeable in the ways of the law and realized that the Reading had abandoned the line in 1964. That meant that the Reading hadn't owned the land, and therefore had sold something they didn't own. Also, that meant that when the line was abandoned, the right of way returned to the landowners of the adjoining property. And they wanted the Valley Forge Scenic out. After 6 years of planning, the Valley Forge Scenic was born and buried in under two years. Ottinger tried to buy the PRR Devault line, but without success. After that he decided to help bail out the floundering New Hope & Ivyland. He donated his CNJ coaches to NH&I, where they still run to this day, and many VFSR employees went to volunteer there. Meanwhile, the #425, and an 0-6-0 he purchased but never returned to operation (it was reported to be in poor condition, which turned out to be untrue) were sold to the Wilmington & Western. The #425 was never fired up at W&W, but the 0-6-0 is still in operation there. Ottinger's 42" gauge lokies, also never operated, were in Phoenixville at least as late as 2005, still sinking into the ground on the very same spot Ottinger had them delivered to. The very end of the Pickering Valley Branch was used by Conrail to serve the Phoenix Iron Co. until 1982, and then even that went out of service, and now the entire line is torn up.

In reply to NickD :

My wife tells a story about her family visiting Knott's Berry Farm with her elderly grandmother in the mid-50s when she was a child. 

Grandma Gigar had been born on a farm in the now abandoned town of Fondis, Colorado, where her family grew pinto beans and raised a few horses.  The seven children helped tend and harvest the beans.  

The harvest was then hauled in the buckboard west to the railroad - near Elbert, Colorado I believe.  Story goes that the line was abandoned after a flood in the 1930s washed out the rails and it was not economic to replace them.

While the family was at Knott's, they (of course) rode the train.  Grandma told them that Walter Knott had purchased the train she rode on as a child and that this had to be 'her' train they were on.  This is the first time I have seen anything that seemed to document her story. 

Now, I really wish I could figure out where the line actually ran.

You have made my bride's day.

Thank you!

Edit - It appears that the railroad may have been the Denver & New Orleans; that line did pass through Elbert, CO.  The flood happened on May 30, 1935 and the line was abandoned in 1936.

https://echoesofelbertcounty.blogspot.com/2011/05/denver-new-orleans-railroad-in-elbert.html

In reply to CJ (FS) :

The D&NO ended up merged with the Denver, Leadville & Gunnison to form the Colorado & Southern after the Panic of 1893. Now, the engines at Knott's are both ex-Denver & Rio Grande Western/ex-Rio Grande Southern. There is no easily-found mention of either engine at Knott's Berry Farm spending time on the Colorado & Southern but the records kept by some of those hard-scrabble narrow gauge lines aren't always the best. Further, there is a precedent for leased D&RGW narrow gauge Consolidations on the C&S, since D&RGW #346 at the Colorado Railroad Museum was on loan to the Colorado & Southern in 1936 when it was wrecked in a runaway on Kenosha Pass (it was actually rebuilt at the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy's shops in Denver, since the C&S was a CB&Q subsidiary). Knott's Berry Farm has D&RGW #340, a sister C-19 Consolidation, so there is a possibility that the #340 may have spent time on the old D&NO trackage of the Colorado & Southern and may have hauled the sugar beets out of Elbert. Or at the very least, the #340 at Knott's Berry Farm bore enough resemblance to another engine leased by the C&S.

Some other big news related to the Reading & Northern:

First, the Reading & Northern has inked a $4.7 million deal to purchase the 19 miles of trackage between East Mahanoy Junction and Jim Thorpe Junction (marked in yellow on the route map). This segment has been owned by Carbon County and Reading & Northern has operated over it for years, but poor quality rail has restricted speeds to 20mph operation. By finally purchasing this line, Andy Muller plans to drop another $5 million to have it rebuilt to allow continuous 40mph operation. In addition to the $14 million bridge he recently built at Coalport over the Lehigh River, this gives the R&N a continuous mainline link between Reading and Scranton, which R&N claims is something no railroad has ever owned before.

The other big one is the continued rumors of Wilkes-Barre passenger service. According to Trains Magazine,  R&N "is also looking to begin weekend passenger excursions from Wilkes-Barre to Jim Thorpe, using cars he recently purchased from a bankruptcy sale for former Iowa Pacific equipment in Colorado." Going back to that route map, the R&N's access to Wilkes-Barre is currently via trackage rights on the Norfolk Southern. But I overheard a conductor saying that NS is looking to sell that trackage. That's part of the old D&H South Line from Schenectady, NY to Sunbury, PA (which in turn was the combination of the majority of the PRR Wilkes-Barre Branch, the Scranton to Binghamton trackage of the DL&W main line, and the D&H main line from Binghamton to Schenectady), and now is the Norfolk Southern Sunbury Line or Sunbury Subdivision that goes from Binghamton, NY to Sunbury, NY. Not sure how true it is that NS is looking to sell, but I know that NS has pretty much idled that line, so it wouldn't surprise me if they want to trim it off. Also not sure if NS would be selling them just the stretch from Dupont to Wilkes-Barre or if they are looking at buying the whole thing. If R&N ran all the way to Binghamton, that'd be pretty awesome.

It will be nice to finally have a Reading T-1 back in service though. Through the '60s and '70s, the four of them were pretty ubiquitous and involved is some pretty important events. The #2100, #2102 and #2124 all provided fans of steam one last breath of mainline steam from '59-'64 during the Reading's Iron Horse Rambles, touring all over the Reading system with corporate-run excursions (a pity that they couldn't have saved one of the G-3 Pacifics that were still in the dead lines after running out their last days on the Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines and run one of them on the Rambles).

After the Rambles ended, the #2124 went to Steamtown USA in Bellows Falls and has never run since. The #2101, held as reserve power for the Rambles and never used, got her chance in 1976, when Ross Rowland and gang rescued her from the junkyard she had been sitting in for a decade and gave her an unmatched 30-day overhaul to run on the American Freedom Train for the USA bicentennial. Afterwards, she toured the Chessie System extensively with the corporate Chessie Steam Specials before a roundhouse fire in 1979 retired her, and these days she sits in very faded AFT colors at the B&O Railroad Museum, never to be operated again. The #2102 was purchased by Steam Tours of Akron, Ohio and made numerous trips around the Mid-Atlantic, North East, and the Mid-West although she always seemed to have a black cloud hovering over her (a derailments in 1969 that led to running gear issues for years, ran out of coal on one trip, received water with an additive that raised the boiling point from a fire company another trip, was on the doubleheader trip that ended steam around Horseshoe Curve for many years), she helped D&H celebrate their 150th anniversary in 1973, and then was purchased by Andy Muller in 1986 and run on the Reading, Blue Mountain & Northern before being parked in 1991 and hasn't operated since. Ross Rowland also purchased the #2100 from the same junkyard as the #2101 and it then waved through a handful of owners, running infrequently, and then had a half-assed oil-burning conversion done in 2000, then ran (poorly) for about one minute on Golden Pacific Railroad's Tacoma Sightseer trains from 2007-2008. Probably a good thing it wasn't run much, since the oil-burning conversion was liable to kill someone or severely damage the engine. It sat in Tacoma deteriorating for 7 years, then was shipped back east and is undergoing a slow to operation in Ohio, including removal of the oil-burner.

That's 13 years since a Reading T-1 has run. The #2101 and #2124 seem unlikely to ever operate again, the #2101 due to the fire damage and the #2124 because Steamtown is seemingly unwilling to operate steam locomotives represented elsewhere. Until this spring the #2102 had been cold for 30 years. And no clue when the #2100 is going to be done.

The derailment hasn't deterred us, just leaving Havre MT now on the Empire Builder doing the whole Chicago to Seattle route.

In reply to johndej :

Nice!

I don't think I've ever heard this before, but it's an insteresting reaffirmation for the "Cheap & Nothing Wasted" line. 
 

In reply to johndej :

Cool. The Empire Builder is supposed to be a great trip. The one I would kind of like to do one day is Via Rail's Canadian. It travels 2,775 miles between Vancouver and Toronto and has skyline cars and dome cars in the consist.

In reply to Pete Gossett (Forum Supporter) :

Interesting. I've also heard it's advantageous in several areas on the C&NW's east-west oriented lines, the prevailing winds reportedly come from the north in the wintertime. Left-hand running places the inbound track on the north side, where waiting houses and station buildings provide windbreaks for commuters waiting for the train to downtown in the morning. And in the evening, the passengers didn't have to stand around and wait for the train to leave the station to get to the parking lot, they could just head for their homes.

In reply to NickD :

I think you can take that train all the way to Halifax, or at least connecting service - I've seen those long VIA consists in Halifax, complete with domes.

In reply to NickD :

Oh yeah, that's a really good point too!

In reply to Pete Gossett (Forum Supporter) :

Its a little hard these days to believe a railroad would be that thoughtful but I know when Boston & Maine was looking at purchasing new passenger cars back in the day they had a Harvard professor at a station measuring thousands of passengers to determine the optimal seat spacing for comfort.

Saw on the local railfan Facebook page where the Lake Shore Limited had a 1948-built Frisco passenger car, Cimarron River, in the consist. And it was tucked up at the front behind the locomotives, which is unusual. Usually Amtrak tacks the private cars on the back of the train.

Some really big news was that this weekend, for the first time in nine years, East Broad Top Railroad hauled members of the general public from Orbisonia roughly four and a half miles north to Colgate Grove picnic area near Shirleysburg, PA, about half way up the line to Mount Union.

All of the trackage north to Mount Union is still present, as is all the track west to Broad Top Mountain, although in a state of severe disuse, with it all having been out of service since 1956. In it's tourist operation days, the trains only went to Colgate Grove, where they constructed the picnic area and a wye to turn the to head back to Orbisonia. A short section of line to Shade Gap is in use, though as a standard gauge trolley museum, but the rest of it is gone.

This is the first step in the new East Broad Top Railroad's future. They wanted to be able to run service over the old route from Orbisonia to Colgate Grove. The next step is getting the two steam locomotives that they have chosen, #14 and #16, operational (right now they are running 47-ton diesel M-7 and their Brill motorcar M-1). And then after that is where things get really interesting. They want to rehabilitate 20 miles of the 33 mile line headed southwest to Broad Top Mountain, which has not seen service since the railroad ceased operation as a common carrier in 1956. For a start, they want to begin service to Saltillo, which is just short of 8 miles from Orbisonia/Rockhill Furnace. This weekend they announced that they would begin to raise funds immediately to rebuild a demolished passenger and freight station and an arson-destroyed water tank in Saltillo.  The general manager has said that the railroad is ready to start work on the southern segment of the main line. For the stretch to Saltillo, there are six bridges, including the 275-foot-long 1904 steel trestle over Aughwick Creek at Pogue (largest on the EBT), all of which have been found to be in surprisingly good shape for being basically abandoned for 70 years, about a dozen grade crossings, and a partially intact wye to turn the train. Farther down the line, the railroad’s two tunnels at Sideling Hill and Ray’s Hill are described as “not great, but not terrible,” and EBT has a tunnel contractor lined up for the day when work can begin.

The site of the former Saltillo Station has a road next to it named EBT Station Road. That gray spot is where the station was, and shockingly there are rails and ties still present between the sign and the site of the station. They are that overgrown.

As it sits, there are no plans to go north all the way to Mount Union. There are apparently some issues with trackage rights and who owns the right of way north of Shirleysburg, and there is also not much to actually see at Mount Union anymore, other than some hopper cars returning to the earth. The timber transfer is long gone, the engine house is falling in, and the standard gauge 0-6-0 stored there is up for sale.

In reply to NickD :

Wow, it'll be incredible if they can pull that off!

In reply to Pete Gossett (Forum Supporter) :

The Kovalchick family deserves a lot of credit for their forward-thinking mentality. Its pretty shocking, when you consider that they ran a scrap yard.  When they purchased the entire East Broad Top Railroad after it shut down in '56, they just as easily could have sent everything to the mill, every inch of rail and locomotive and hopper car. There was a lot of money sitting there. And then even after they started up the tourist operation, they held on to the entire line to Broad Top Mountain, even though they never used it. Most people would have sold off everything but the line from Orbisonia to Shirleysburg, since that was all they were using, or at least pulled up the rails on all the other trackage that they weren't using and had no plans to use. Because of that, there is a preserved intact narrow gauge railroad of pretty good size. All the locomotives and rolling stock, the roundhouse, the various shop facilities, the yards, bridges, tunnels, are original to the railroad. That's why people have worried over the fate of EBT since it shut down in 2011 because they didn't want to see something intact for so long get scattered to the winds. And now, thanks to the new non-profit and guys like Wick Moorman and Bennett Levin, we have #16 being returned to steam for the first time since 1956 and a future return to Saltillo and beyond, all because the Kovalchicks had the foresight to hang onto almost everything.

In reply to NickD :

Orbisonia is less than 3 hours from where I live, I might have to take a trip out there sometime.

The East Broad Top Mikados, when compared to D&RGW's Mikes, almost look like an amusement park engine. The D&RGW engines were short and squat with tall smokestacks, all the spring rigging exposed due to the outboard frame construction, and cluttered with appliances and big snowplow pilots. The EBT engines were more traditionally-proportioned, and as a result taller and more upright, along with using inboard frame construction. They have a very clean, uncluttered appearance, aside from the pair of air pumps tucked under the running board, with brass bands along the boiler jacket seams. Still, they aren't exactly slouches. The smaller Mikado's, #14 and #15, were on par with D&RGW K-27s, while the "big" engines, #16, #17 and #18, generated 30,600lbs of tractive effort, making them second to only the D&RGW K-36/37s. They also used a 48" driver on both classes, which gave them a larger driver diameter than all of the D&RGW narrow gauge engines other than the D&RGW T-12 Ten-Wheelers.

In 1915, before purchasing the batch of "big" superheated engines, Baldwin actually submitted a proposal for a narrow gauge 2-10-2 for the EBT's next motive power. With 22"x24" cylinders, 85% cutoff, 185psi boiler pressure and 48" drivers, they were rated for 38,000lbs of tractive effort, which would have made them impressive little engines. Somebody came to their senses though and realized that a ten-coupled engine on a twisty narrow gauge line was probably not a good idea and the plans were changed to a larger, superheated 2-8-2. As it was, the big Mikados had flangeless drivers on the second and third axle to negotiate curves.

As far as I know, there were no ten-coupled narrow gauge engines built for US usage. When D&RGW was looking at bigger power for their narrow gauge lines, they were looking into articulated 2-8-8-2s that were essentially two K-36s mated together.

How do the engines compare to the White Pass and Yukon engines?

The earlier 1938-built WP&Y Class 70 Mikados (#70-#73) were smaller than a D&RGW K-27 or East Broad Top #14 and #15. They were 230,500lbs total, had a 55.71 foot wheelbase, 44" drivers, 205psi boilers, and generated 25,179lbs of tractive effort. The later 1943-built WP&Y Class 190 Mikados (#190-#200) were actually originally designed by Baldwin for the military to use in India and eleven were diverted by the US military to Alaska. These were even smaller and lighter than the Class 70s, at 218,600lbs with a 54.25 foot wheelbase, 48" drivers, 185psi boilers and generated 20,128lbs of tractive effort. This makes them even smaller than East Broad Top #12 Millie and roughly on par with the D&RGW C-19 Consolidations.

During WWII, D&RGW K-28s and a couple of the East Tennessee & Western North Carolina's Ten-Wheelers were requisitioned by the military and sent up to Alaska to run on the WP&Y. The K-28s never worked particularly well there, largely due to their outboard frame construction causing the counterweights to want to climb snow and ice buildup along the track. The Tweetsie engines ran there for about a year and a half before being damaged in a roundhouse fire and scrapped.

None of the EBT engines were sent up to Alaska. My guess is, the EBT's coal-hauling was viewed vital enough to the war effort that the government didn't want to interfere and the EBT's roster was pretty lean, not a whole lot of spare engines kicking around. The D&RGW had received the K-36s and K-37s by that point, so aside from the branches with lightweight bridges, the K-28s were secondary power. And the Tweetsie was on death's door and had idled most of their engines other than #11, so they didn't need the #10 and #14.

The East Tennessee & Western North Carolina is, like the Ohio River & Western, one of those much-lamented lost narrow gauge lines. It ran up through the Doe River Gorge in the Blue Ridge Mountains from Johnson City, TN to Cranberry, NC to serve the iron mines and timber industry in that part of the Blue Ridges. Perhaps unique to the ET&WNC was that it was originally built as a 5-foot broad gauge line, then immediately went bankrupt before hauling a single train, and was rebuilt as a 3-foot narrow gauge, with a dual-gauge (3-foot/standard-gauge) line from Elizabethton to Johnson City, with interchanges with both the Southern and the Clinchfield. It later added an extension to Boone, NC called the Linville River Line. It was famously backwoodsy, running mixed train services, taking passengers and their moonshine to market. One local said the ET&WNC was "the onliest railroad we ever had." When they made the extension to Boone, NC, the mayor of Boone pronounced that it used to be the only way to get to Boone was to be born there.

Originally it was referred to as the Stemwinder, due to its high level of polish and punctual operation. Local children nicknamed it the Tweetsie due to the shrill whistles, while others jokingly called it the Eat Taters & Wear No Clothes due to the abject poverty of the locals. Others more fondly referred to it as the Every Time & With No Complaints or the Exquisite Trains & What Nice Conductors. and it used the unoffical tag line of "the railroad with a heart" and used heart-shaped punches on its passenger tickets. During the Great Depression, passengers were frequently allowed to ride for free, with conductors quipping "We're headed that way anyway." Motive power was little Baldwin-built Ten-Wheelers, which were painted green with gold and silver trim and red cab roofs, similar to Southern's big PS-4 Pacifics and Ts-1 Mountains.

The Tweetsie was never particularly profitable but, like most narrow gauge railroads, the '30s really took what little wind it had out of the sales. Passenger service, always sporadically run but popular with tourists, was cut off and most of the passenger cars sold off. The iron mines and timber industry wound down. A bad storm wiped out most of the Linville River Line and led to the Tweetsie abandoning it. During WWII, two of the locomotives were sent north to Alaska and never returned. The government did force the Tweetsie to reinstate passenger service so that workers could catch a ride to the American Rayon plant in Elizabethton, as the rayon plant was viewed vital to the war effort. After the war, its fortunes continued to get worse, despite such innovations as being one of the first to run piggyback operations (and possibly the only narrow gauge Trailer-On-Flat-Car service in the US). Things weren't helped by management making such decisions as starting a freight truck company and setting the railroad's rates artificially high to encourage shippers to use the trucking service instead. By 1952, it was all over for the narrow gauge line, despite the pleas of locals that it served. The rails were pulled up, and the ET&WNC fell back to operating just the 9-mile standard-gauge line between Johnson City and Elizabethton using a pair of ex-Southern 2-8-0s, #630 and #722. The ET&WNC still had three remaining narrow-gauge 4-6-0s, #9, #11 and #12 and offered the #9 and #11 to Johnson City and Cranberry, only to have them turned down, so they were scrapped, while Gene Autry (yes, that Gene Autry) purchased the #12 and saved it.

The real estate for the Doe River Gorge mainline was just too invaluable to let sit unused, since it was all graded and the only flat territory in the area, so today's Highway 19-E is laid over the top of the Tweetsie roadbed. There is just a small amount of the narrow gauge roadbed left, which was operated as Hillbilly World amusement park for a brief time, and now is part of a private Christian camp that plans to run a Crown 4-4-0 park engine over it. The #12 is at the Tweetsie Railroad amusement part, running on a three-mile loop of track, joined, ironically, by a White Pass & Yukon Class 190 Mikado. The standard gauge line continued to run steam power into the mid-'60s, when Southern traded a pair of RS-3s to get back the #630 and #722 and run them in their corporate steam program. Then Green Bay Packaging bought it all up and renamed it the East Tennessee Railway. Most of it was cut back in 2003, and in 2012 it was converted to a rail trail.