The sunken loco- anything ever come of this?

Steve,

The guy who was organizing the dive posted an update over on the Chaski form a couple months ago. The project seems to be bogged down in permits and paperwork for some reason.

There has long been a legend about an NP or LS&M locomotive or train lost in Devil's Lake at Pine City, Minnesota, in the 1800s. I know of no documentation, but one of the handed down accounts said something like this: "We heard the train blowing the whistle south of town, but it never arrived. So we walked down the tracks to see what happened. When we got to Devil's Lake, the land had shifted so the track went right into the lake." That was an account by a woman who was told that by her grandfather. Although there is a strong implication of what happened, the account kind of leaves it hanging. There must have been more to the account because if there were a suggestion that an approaching train dove into the lake, it would have been easy enough to confirm a lost train with the railroad company and include that important affirmation.

Adding veracity to that account, however, is the fact that there are newspaper articles on the peculiar unstable ground along the west side of the lake where the railroad ran. They speculated that a large area of ground appeared to be sliding into the lake. They suggested that the railroad post a watchman at the site 24 hours a day in order to protect trains from the hazard of shifting ground.

Devil’s Lake is probably only about ten acres, but it is over 80 feet deep. It is right at the southern edge of Pine City. I was told that the railroad skirted the lake on a trestle during the 1800s. In modern times, there was a high fill along the lake. This legend heated up about ten years ago, and some very professional divers went right over there to take a look. They dove through the ice in several spots but did not find anything. They said the water was quite dark and spooky. There seemed to be whole trees submerged. They did not find anything, but they unable to make a comprehensive search due to the poor conditions. I would guess that if a locomotive or rolling stock is there, it is probably buried in the bottom or even in the fill that replaced the trestle. There were other stories about how some divers in the 1950s found boxcars sticking out of the mud bottom.

RTK

I just got way too busy this season to go check out if the rumors were true or not. The little freetime I had was generally spent at the OHCR working on #33 to get her out there. This Quarry project is #1 on my hit list as soon as the ice breaks this spring.

Ryan P.

Thanks for the info folks. With the recent discovery of the Baldwin compound steamer buried in China, you just never know what might be hiding somewhere.

Ryan,

I don’t know much about that quarry, but I understand that it is quite large, like many acres if I remember right. Do you intend to search that whole area or do you have the target location narrowed down? I understand there might be quite a bit of equipment left in the quarry since it filled unexpectedly and quickly. What would be the tentative plan if there were a locomotive sitting down there? Good luck with the dive.

RTK

Well, the plan is first of all to just see if there is any truth whatsoever to the rumors of a sunken engine. No extended plans have been made at all if anything is found. I am not really holding my breath here, but it will be fun to look. Size of the quarry is not really an issue. We will initially just attempt to find the railbed and follow it to any equipment. My friends and I are all technical divers and carry several times more breathing gas into the water than the average diver. If need be we will employ the use of search patterns and even use diver propulsion vehicles if necesarry. Covering a large quarry is pretty easy to do. Staying warm is the hard part. I feel bad saying the same stuff I said this time last year, but I just could not get there this season. We'll see what happens...

Ryan Parkevich

Hi all,
I was talking to a local in that area about two mouths ago. He told me his Grandfather was a formen there and he told me that the Quarry is a deep one. broke down in three parts, Pt. one is 175`, Pt. two is 100` and Pt. three is 75`. He also told me that the Quarry closed down in the late 40`s because of hitting the large spring.
I was talking to this man before writing this reply he asked me not to revil his name, just to say it`s from Joe of Monocacy Station, Pa.

Leonard.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.