Grassroots Railroad Sports?

Nick are you familiar with the story of the Iron Range & Huron Bay RR? I just stumbled upon this vid & it's a pretty interesting clusterberkeley. 
 

Been meaning to contribute to this thread for a long time now.  Starting to go through my dad's old photos.  He and I were both railfans back when I was younger, so I need to go through some of my photos too.

Saw these boxcars converted into a barn and a shed in summer 1988, likely in Idaho or eastern Oregon:

In reply to Pete Gossett (Forum Supporter) :

That one is admittedly a new one to me. I did a quick search on it and it was a pretty interesting read. Probably a good thing that it never operated, because it had grades reported to be as steep as 5%, although it was rumored that some sections actually were as steep as 8%. Trying to economically haul iron ore with those sorts of grades would have been impossible if it had ever opened.

The story did somewhat remind me of a local railroad, the Ogdensburg, Clayton & Rome Railroad, which was almost fully graded from end to end but never had an inch of rail laid. 

In January of 1853, construction began on the Black River & Utica Railroad, which was to extend from Utica, NY (at the time on track to be the 5th largest city in the US) north to Boonville, NY. Three months later, the Ogdensburg, Clayton & Rome Railroad was chartered and began construction as well, going from Rome, NY north to Boonville, NY as well, with eventual plans to reach to Carthage, and then Clayton and Ogdensburg someday. 

Even at the time, the general consensus was that Boonville and the settlements between weren't populous enough to support two railroads in the same region, so a race was on to see which would reach Boonville first. On paper, the OC&R had the advantage of Rome being slightly closer to Boonville but the BR&U had the lower, easier route through Holland Patent, Trenton (which would also become a popular vacation spot for it's waterfalls), and Remsen, while the OC&R was going to head up through the Lansing Kill Gorge to Boonville, almost mirroring the route of the Black River Canal.

For whatever reason, the OC&R decided to defy railroad-building convention and grade the entire roadbed first. Typically, you start at your big terminus and grade slightly ahead of the track-laying so that you can start moving traffic on the completed segment and get revenue flowing to offset further construction expenses. By grading everywhere first, you can't do that, and the Lansing Kill Gorge is also pretty rugged territory. 

By 1856, before any rail was laid, construction on the OC&R was halted due to expense. The next year, the Black River & Utica entered operation, meaning that the OC&R would have been superfluous. In 1859, the charter for the OC&R was lost and it ceased to exist. I have seen pieces of the OC&R roadbed. At Lake Delta State Park, there is a raised section with ditches on either side that I had always thought was part of the Black River Canal, but I have since learned that it was part of the OC&R roadbed, where it would have served the village of Delta (Delta was later flooded with the construction of Delta Dam, becoming Lake Delta). Some cuts were blasted out north of Houseville, which were later reused by the Glennfield & Western logging railroad, and in Lansing Kill Gorge there can supposedly be found a "long embankment running across the Nightingale farm below Dunn Brook". A portion of embankment is on the property of the Happy Hollow Campground between Lowville and Castorland. And near Pixley Falls Park someone claims to have once found the remains of a tunnel. I need to figure out where that supposedly was and go hunting for it myself in the spring.

The Black River & Utica also suffered it's issues, going into foreclosure in 1860 and reorganizing as the Utica & Black River. The line was extended to Carthage, with connections to Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River in 1883 through mergers with the Black River & Morristown Railroad, the  Ogdensburg & Morristown Railroad, and the Clayton & Theresa Railroad. Then in 1886, it was leased in perpetuity to the Rome, Watertown, and Ogdensburg Railroad. The lease was transferred to the New York Central Railroad in 1891 when the NYC took over the RW&O, and became part of the Adirondack Division. The line from Utica to Remsen that the Mohawk, Adirondack & Northern and the Adirondack Railroad operate passenger and freight service over is former Black River & Utica. The line splits at Remsen, with the Adirondack Railroad operating the ex-Mohawk & Malone rails up to Tupper Lake, while the Mohawk, Adirondack & Northern stays on the ex-BR&U up through Boonville to Lyons Falls. The NYC cut the BR&U in half, abandoning the tracks from Lyons Falls north to Lowville, but the MA&N also previously operated the line from Lowville to Carthage, although it has been idled for lack of customers.

In reply to eastsideTim :

It's amazing how many freight cars, passenger cars, and trolleys escaped scrapping by being converted to storage buildings, camps, restaurants and homes. I remember reading a story of a guy who was hunting for a trolley that had survived the wholesale scrapping of the rest of it's system. There had been postcards of the trolley having been converted to a house shortly after the end of service, but when he went to the address decades later, there was a house but no sign of the trolley. He assumed that the trolley had been destroyed at some point and the house built on the spot, but no amount of research could turn up when the trolley had been removed or what it's disposition had been. It wasn't until a decade or more later, when the house was eventually torn down, that it was discovered that the trolley was actually still there, the house had just been built out and around it, hiding it entirely within.

NickD said:

Unfortunately, it's increasingly looking like the New York Central electric locomotives that were stored/abandoned at Beacon Island, NY are going to end up scrapped. A historical group had saved NYC Class S-1 #100, built in 1904 and the first electric locomotive in the US, and Class T-3a #278, the sole surviving NYC T-Motor, along with a U25B, an RS-3 and 4 ex-D&RGW/D&H coaches, and ended up moving them to Beacon Island to store them until a new site could be secured. They were then basically abandoned there for 3 decades, and in 2013 they were sold to Danbury Railway Museum. Then, this year, redevelopment on Beacon Island was slated to begin and Danbury was told that the stuff had to go, or be scrapped. The coaches were slated to be scrapped, deemed too far gone to warrant any effort, and the U25B and RS-3 were originally going to be saved, but were also found to be too far gone. Danbury Railway Museum came up with a plan to disassemble the locomotives, truck them out to a Metro North facility, reassemble them and rerail them, and then move them by rail to Danbury.

The plan has since fallen apart. First they got locked out of the site for 8 months, following a lawsuit that tied up all redevelopment efforts. Then, the original plan was to move the electrics out over the power plant property on the existing rails was halted as one of the natural gas pipeline owners did not want the weight of the locomotives going over their line buried 30 feet in the ground unless an expensive temporary bridge was built. The trucking company and the preliminary study found that the pipeline will be fine, considering it's 30 feet below ground, but the pipeline owner is standing his ground.

By the end of last week the estimated project cost was increased significantly. The consulting firm has worked with Danbury in finding an area where the locomotives can be stored until such a time they can be loaded and hauled out on the new access road, set to be completed within two months. Additional costs include cranes and matting necessary to store and later load the locomotives. They originally asked the consulting firm if instead of temporarily moving the engines at a cost of $230,000 they could just push them north on the rails, out of the way of construction of the access road. They were no, because they plan on rehabilitating the existing railroad right of way into a haul road for stone delivery trucks. Danbury then countered and tried to meet in the middle, by asking if they could move the engines, and scrap the rails north and south of the locomotives where they are spotted, freeing up their future haul road, and then just building a passing lane alongside the engines, and again the response was no, with no reason given.

At this point, everyone is champing at the bit to start construction, the original fundraising money has since been spent, costs are spiraling out of control, and pretty much every alternate plan that the museum is proposing keeps getting shot down with the other side seemingly unwilling to compromise. I call total BS on the whole notion that the locomotives can't be rolled over the pipeline. At a depth of 30 feet, you could stack a pair of Alleghenies and roll them over that pipe without it ever knowing they were there. It's just a convenient excuse to not be cooperative, especially seeing as how they have no issue with the scrappers moving their equipment in and out over the pipeline to cut up the passenger cars, RS-3 and U25B.

I can't entirely fault Danbury Railway Museum. After all, it was the historical group that moved all this stuff here in 1984, with no real plan of what to do with it someday and then pretty much abandoned it. To preserve something, you have to put forth some sort of effort and really be in the game. But also, Danbury Railway Museum has actually owned them for a decade now, and waited until it was the clock was ticking to get them out of there or face scrapping to actually start trying to get stuff out of there. 

The whole situation just really sucks. Losing both the last remaining T-Motor and the very first electric locomotive in the US is a huge blow, especially when there is so little preserved NYC electric equipment. There's two other S-motors in museums, and that's it. The R- and P-motors are all gone, and the T-motors appear about to go extinct. Compare to PRR, where there is 16 GG1s alone, and then there's a P5, a B1, and an E44

As Ross Rowland likes to say "Hope springs eternal" And update from Danbury:

DANBURY, CT - The Danbury Railway Museum (DRM) has announced a major update in their efforts to save two one-of-a-kind New York Central System (NYCS) electric locomotives.

On Monday, December 19, 2022, railroad contractor Hulcher Service, Inc., successfully relocated the two historic locomotives two hundred feet east of their present location using four “sidebooms”, tracked vehicles with side-mounted cranes. Hulcher Services transported both locomotives to a staging area in anticipation of disassembly into major components for shipment to Danbury. “This is really a pivotal moment, and the point of no return.” said DRM president Jose Alves. “For years we have worked to save these locomotives and our plans have finally begun to pay off. This could not have been accomplished without our volunteers, in particular a core group of dedicated, hardworking volunteers; Paul Marsh (who has been involved long before the DRM took ownership), Dave Pickett, and Project Manager Stan Madyda.”

Built for the NYCS in 1904 and 1926, locomotives #100 (originally #6000) and #278 represent a large period of significant electric locomotive development in the early 20th Century. #100 is the world’s first mainline electric locomotive, built by General Electric and the American Locomotive Company as the prototype for the “S-Motor” series electric engines. #100 was built for service in New York City’s iconic Grand Central Terminal in the wake of a devastating accident within the Park Avenue tunnels of the city in 1902 that stands as the worst train accident within city limits today. #278 is the successor to the #100, delivered twenty-two years after the #100 and is the most modern of the succeeding “T-Motors”. #278 is the last remaining T-Motor in existence. Both locomotives are “bipolar” electrics, referring to their rare, gearless method of propulsion.

These two locomotives have been landlocked on Beacon Island in Glenmont, New York since the late 1980s. The DRM took title to the electrics in 2013, and due to a myriad of issues and geographic features, removal of the locomotives was not possible until 2019 when the Port of Albany announced plans to develop the 80-acre site. Every conceivable option has been explored since the museum took title to the locomotives. This has provided the DRM the opportunity needed to finally relocate these locomotives. Both received slight damage in the process, as would be expected when moving 100 and 120 year old locomotives, both remain intact, and the DRM is dedicated to preserving the two units. “Now that the locomotives have been moved to a staging area, we will separate them into individual components and prepare them for shipment.” said project manager Stan Madyda. “This is a huge moment, but we are not out of the woods yet. Movement to a staging area was required by The Port to facilitate the construction of an access road which will later play a part in the removal of the locomotives.”

Additional funding is still required to bring locomotives home. The DRM extends thanks to the Port of Albany for their support of this project. Additionally, this move would not be possible without the financial support of Henry Posner, III, chairman of the Railroad Development Corporation. Donations towards the project can be made below!

In reply to NickD :

I think I remember seeing pictures of that, or a similar situation where a house was expanded around a railroad car.  I wonder how many of them are still out there.

In reply to eastsideTim :

There was a similar one fairly recently with a Subway in NJ. There had been a restaurant that had used 4 railroad cars for the dining era. Over the years, two of the cars vanished and it had gone through a few owners before it became a Subway. The railroad cars weren't used anymore, due to their condition, but Subway was still using the main building. Finally, the decision was made to demolish the building and get rid of the railroad cars, and preservationists wanted to save the cars, or any parts of them, if they could. There were the two that were left, and there was an empty section of panel track where a third had been and been removed one way or another (I believe it was determined to be scrapped) but no one could figure out where the fourth was or where it had gone on the property. When they got access to the cars and buildings, it was found that the main building had been built around the fourth car at some point. They saved one of the external cars, cannibalized the other, and the indoor car had pretty much had one entire side chopped out of it and some other irrevocable modifications that resulted in it being demolished with the building. It was one of the old heavyweights that the B&O had modernized and streamlined themselves for the Cincinattian (the B&O didn't care for the ride qualities of the new lightweight cars and so stuck with heavyweights). A pity in that those were really unique, but also, a restoration would have been a nightmare. Not only had it been heavily modified, but also, those cars had been modernized with a lot of weird non-standard parts that would have been unobtainable.

I also remember as a kid, my father was trying to locate the old New York, Ontario & Western depot in Sylvan Beach, NY. He had read that it still existed, and so every time we went through Sylvan Beach (an we went through there a lot), he would try to look for it but we never saw a building that resembled an NYO&W depot. The problem was, it wasn't as simple as following the old roadbed, because development over the years had obliterated every trace of the old roadbed through Sylvan Beach. He spoke with friend/author/NYO&W historian about were it was and he told him it was right off 16th Avenue and that the easiest way to recognize it was the unique bay window that had overlooked the tracks. It took a couple more tries before we finally found it, partially because the bay window was on the side facing away from the road, but also because the building had been so extensively remodeled and added onto, that the wall with the bay window was the only part of the original structure visible.

Speaking of the Utica & Black River, a local got some photos of the Mohawk, Adirondack & Northern running freight on the old U&BR with C425 #2453 and new BCRail heritage unit #2455 last week. I really need to catch one of the runs north to Boonville someday.

A lesser known SP train- the Sunbeam.

Recon1342 said:

A lesser known SP train- the Sunbeam.

A streamlined locomotive with a Vanderbilt tender is a weird mix. The Sunbeam was officially operated under SP's subsidiary, the Texas & New Orleans (not to be confused with Southern's subsidiary, the Cincinatti, New Orleans & Texas Pacific). Neat-looking little train though, with a P-10 Pacific streamlined to match a GS-2/GS-3 Golden State.

NickD said:

A Northwestern Pacific GE 44-tonner unloading a Santa Fe car ferry at Tiburon, California in 1958. Car float operations were definitely an odd little corner of the railroading scene, often overlooked. Note the three flatcars behind the switcher, which were used to "reach" out onto the barge and collect the cars without putting the load of the locomotive on the barge. Also note that the tugboat is wearing ATSF warbonnet paint.

This picture is an example of how wherever there was some sort of strange operation, odds were good that a GE 44-Tonner would be in use.

For another example, you have ATSF #467. Taken off the regular roster in 1967, ATSF reassigned it to their own tie-making plant in Somerville, TX. It had the drawbars and couplers removed and replaced with a larger plate for shoving the 2-axle carts loaded with untreated ties into pressurized cylinders for treating them with creosote.

T.L. Miller Co. was a lumber products company in Brewton, Alabama, and had this 44-tonner with a weird pushbar on the one end for shoving lumber buggies into the kilns.

Sacramento Northern #143 returns to Walnut Creek, CA with an excursion that was run to Concord and back in memoriam of the soon-to-be-abandoned section of rail in April of 1964. I can't for the life of me figure out what the blue car is on the left (the grille says '64 Galaxie, but nothing else is right) but I see it has the inner headlamps deleted. Somebody's hot rod, perhaps?

Still labeled for Pennsylvania Railroad, this is actually Penn Central #9999, the highest numbered unit on the PC roster. Due to the fact that a diesel under 45 tons didn't require a second crewman under ICC regulations, the PRR purchased a number of GE 44-tonners, classed as GS4m (General Electric, 400hp, modified), with multiple-unit connections on one end, on the idea that they could hook two together to form an 800hp unit that could be crewed by one man. For reasons I've never been able to unearth, that concept never quite worked out, and the 44-tonners usually just worked branch lines and yards by themselves. In this photo, PC #9999, on loan to the Union Transportation Company, heads north over the Lahaway Creek trestle north of Hornerstown, NJ en route to Agrico at the railroad's Shrewsbury Road terminus

St. Paul Union Depot #441 shuffles around ex-CB&Q stainless steel baggage car Silver Express (interesting that CB&Q even went the distance of naming baggage cars) at St. Paul, one month into Burlington Northern's brief spell of passenger operation before Amtrak took over.

We have a small tourist railroad here called the Port Stanley Terminal Railway that runs these and even smaller locomotives pulling their trains. We took my niece to ride it this past summer, as a ten year old we went for my birthday and I got to ride up front with the engineer on the way back.

https://www.pstr.on.ca/engines.htm

NickD said:

Sacramento Northern #143 returns to Walnut Creek, CA with an excursion that was run to Concord and back in memoriam of the soon-to-be-abandoned section of rail in April of 1964. I can't for the life of me figure out what the blue car is on the left (the grille says '64 Galaxie, but nothing else is right) but I see it has the inner headlamps deleted. Somebody's hot rod, perhaps?

Looks like someone was trying to make their Fairlane look like a Thunderbolt.

I really like the way the 44 tonners look, had one on my HO layout when I was a teenager.  Was a simple way to get around union rules for crew count.

NickD said:

Sacramento Northern #143 returns to Walnut Creek, CA with an excursion that was run to Concord and back in memoriam of the soon-to-be-abandoned section of rail in April of 1964. I can't for the life of me figure out what the blue car is on the left (the grille says '64 Galaxie, but nothing else is right) but I see it has the inner headlamps deleted. Somebody's hot rod, perhaps?

That's a '63 Comet, Nick.

Springfield Terminal's GE 44-Tonner emerges from a customer's spur in North Charlestown, NH, after dropping off a car. At the time ST #1 was the sole locomotive on this former interurban line that ran 6.5 miles between Springfield, VT, and Charlestown, NH. Springfield Terminal became infamous in the early '80s, after Timothy Mellon bought up the nearly-defucnt ST and tried to sell equipment and trackage from his three Class Is (Boston & Maine, Maine Central, Delaware & Hudson) to the Springfield Terminal, so that he could try and force the unions to work under short line rules, rather than Class I labor agreements. The trick was off dubious legality (can you really sell three Class I railroads to a shortline and then still call it a shortline?) and sparked fierce pushback from unions, of the violent and destructive kind, which threatened to shake Guilford Rail apart and cast the D&H into bankruptcy.

You can see that Springfield Terminal #1 is of an earlier production run, where the radiator grilles were on the sides of the hoods, rather than the nose. There were something like 12 different phases of GE 44-tonner over it's 16 years of production, and it takes a real expert to be able to tell all of them apart.

Springfield Terminal #1, looking like it's completely lost it's way. Yes, there are rails somewhere in the weeds there.

The American flags in the flagholders are a giveaway that the year is 1976, and Springfield Terminal #1 has just picked up three cars at the interchange with the B&M at Charleston, NH and is off to make deliveries.

Springfield Terminal GE 44-tonner #1 is seen crossing the dual-use toll bridge over the Connecticut River and arriving at Charlestown, NH from Springfield, VT. The toll bridge was actually owned by the Springfield Terminal, and the highway tolls were supposedly a large part of ST's revenue. While this bridge still exists, the entirety of the ST's trackage was abandoned during the Guilford era, and the bride was converted to a regular automobile-use bridge at that time. Also, an array of neat vehicles to take in: we have a Fiat 124 Spyder poking it's nose out from behind the toll booth, the back of an International Scout barely visible behind the telephone pole and toll booth, a big C60 box truck coming off the bridge, and I think that's a 1968 Rambler American in the foreground with the crumpled door.

Springfield Terminal #1 at the shops in Springfield, VT. Note the hydraulically-actuated remote control coupler on the end. ST #1 originally built in 1942 for the San Francisco & Napa Valley, then moved onto the Sacramento Northern roster as #141 when the SN bought out the SF&NP in 1946. In 1956, it was sent back to General Electric, completely overhauled and resold to the Springfield Terminal as they ended electric interurban service. Some time in the 1980s, it was sold off the the Claremont & Concord Railroad, who cannibalized it to keep their other GE 44-Tonners running and it was finally scrapped in 1997.