Note from moderator:

We're getting a bit off of preservation here and into railfan information exchange.

Tom Gears
Moderator

My apologies.

The section between Ashland and Coalton I think will be around for a long while. CSX is running scrap to Kentucky Electric Steel and trash from New York to a landfill close to Coalton. The entire line was almost preserved in '85. As the story goes (as told to me by 2 very reliable sources in the society) the group, C.P. Huntington RRHS, had it all lined up. A state senator was going into the Kentucky legislature to push through a bill to have the state purchase the line and have CPH run I know the tourist part of it. Not sure about the freight side. The group had 3 C&O steamers lined up, 2 K-4's for sure. Unfortunately, may he rest in peace, the senator had a heart attack the morning of and passed away. So it wasn't pushed through and the line was cut up. I can't make this up folks. Imagine that. Oh well. At least we can still dream about the 11 remaining miles.

How crazy and unfournate. :(

I call "Balderdash."

Someone with a grand total of THREE posts puts a "too good to be true" story up here, and we're supposed to buy it?

No.

Name the senator. His date of death will easily help ascertain the veracity of this story.

Identify which C&O Kanawhas (K-4's) and other steamer were identified for service on this line.

I find it hard to believe that this could have been advanced very far without a fair number of the CP Huntington Chapter/RHS knowing about it, so it would show up in the newsletters of the Chapter/RHS--and I have access to a pretty good run of those.......

I'm not trying to embarrass anyone here, but we have enough "tall tales" and outright falsehoods in railroad history without having to add to them with creative writing.

As a Kentucky native, who has a good grasp of the political and economic history of the Commonwealth, I too will have to push the "piffle" button. I'm suspicious, if for any reason, that having a group based in West Virginia would have had trouble getting traction with the Kentucky General Assembly to pass a bill.

Nice story, but probably just that.

"Balderdash"--ADMIV

"Piffle"--Wilkin SD

I'm not so sure. I'd heard that story quite a few years ago from someone who said he had been involved in it (sadly, it was so long ago I do not recall his name, or even the occasion of meeting him, other than to note that it was in regard to Amtrak expansion--i.e., modern rail service).

Although I have not yet been able to find a reference to the death of a state senator in 1985, I did find some references to the preservation effort. See these pages from "When The Railroad Leaves Town;" this particular section of the book deals with Morehead, Ky., and the Morehead & North Fork. The C&O reference is on pages 96 and 97.

http://books.google.com/books?id=To0W-S ... 85&f=false

From the C&O Historical Society Newsletter (hard to read, but it's there):

http://books.google.com/books?id=9PtWAA ... CEwQ6AEwBQ

Working on this sort of thing tickles my brain cells, though--and that tickling seems to dredge up a memory that the person who died wasn't necessarily a state senator, but somebody from the C&OHS, or some other backer, who was supposed to deliver some papers on the subject to the Kentucky legislature, and he died that day. Darn, I wish my memory was better!!

Perhaps a reader from Kentucky can recall names and dates and other things.

Edit: Sleeping on the subject brings up what I speculate--speculate--would have been the three locomotives:

1. Chesapeake & Ohio 2700, the first K-4, Alco, 1943, which at the time was on display in St. Albans, W.Va., and was owned by a private individual there, who bought it from the local fire department after the department had lost interest in it and neglected it, and who was seeking some way to restore it to operation. I actually did meet this person.

2. Chesapeake & Ohio 2716, from the same order, which had been operated a few years before in the Southern Railway steam program; this locomotive was and still is owned by the Kentucky Railroad Museum.

The third engine is an unknown. Possible choices at the time could have included Ross Rowland's 614, but given that Ross had other projects in the fire at the time (notably the ACE 3000 program), my best guess would be either L&N 152 (a light--too light?--4-6-2 also owned by KRM), or C&O 1308, a Baldwin 2-6-6-2 built in 1949 specifically for secondary and mine-run service. This locomotive, preserved in a park in Huntington, W.Va., is the second-to-last steam locomotive from a commercial builder to a common carrier road in the United States; sister 1309, the last engine, is on display at the B&O Museum in Baltimore. If (big word!) this locomotive was the third engine, it would have been at least the second time it had been nominated for operation; the first that I'm aware of was a proposal for a tourist road out of Thurmond, W.Va., that would have gone up the now abandoned branch to Minden, a coal mining town and interestingly, a main car shop for the New River and Pocahontas Coal Company, a Berwind-White subsidiary and one of only two private hopper car lines that I know of that ever existed (the other being Berwind-White itself).

Again, it would be good to hear from somebody with other details to confirm or correct any of this.

Try "Ghost Railroads of Kentucky":

http://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Railroads-K ... 0253334845

Okay, now we have two sources. The question is, what do they tell us.

The first is an excerpt from Volume I of the excellent book When the Railroad Leaves Town, from Truman State University Press.

This tells us that there were individuals interested in purchasing the line, but funding was a problem.

The second, is a newsletter from the C&O historical society stating that preservation of the line was unlikely, given a lack of funding.

This is significantly different than the alleged first hand stories that the two posters have stated. Yes, I am sure there were many who felt that "wouldn't it be nice if we could preserve the line, restore 3 C&O steamers and run tourist trains on the line." I'm sure even some organizations looked at "I wonder what it would take to acquire the line and run tourist trains on it."

However, that is significantly different from "The fix was in, a State Senator was going to get the Kentucky General Assembly to buy the line and name XYZ organization the tourist train operator, but he died the morning he was to introduce the bill." Or the modified "Some person was going to deliver papers to the Kentucky General Assembly, but died on the day he was supposed to."

My comment that the story was "piffle" was not directed to the fact that there may have been sentiment to save the line. It was that there were allegedly solid, in hand plans to save the line, restore three steamers, and operate tourist trains, but they were thwarted by death of a sole, key individual at the wrong time. I'm not blaming the OPs for posting this story. I can see, how over the years the story balloons from "We couldn't save the line because we had no avenue of funding." to "We were 'this close' to saving the line, but a key individual/state sentator/sugar daddy/NRHS official died at the last mintue, forever derailing hopes of saving the line."

Considering that the line wasn't pulled up until 1986, I find the untimely death unlikely.

Oh, and one more thing. Until 1998 or so, the Kentucky General Assembly didn't meet on odd numbered years, save for a week or so in January as a organizational session, where no legislation was passed. The "big sessions" were on even numbered years, so the untimely death of a powerful state senator in 1985 failed to let a bill get pushed through is unlikely. Even if there was a special session that year, the subject matter is set by the governor. During that time, if there was a special session, the topic would have probably been educational reform.

I'm still willing to consider this if better evidence is brought forth.

I remember reading in the Lexington Herald-Leader at the time, the state approved $10,000 for a "study" for feasability of running the line as a tourist RR with the eventuality of possible passenger service between Louisville and Catlettsburg. As a side note I rode the SR 2839 over the line in what I think was the last public passenger train to make the trip over the line. 2101 did a round trip from Huntington to Lexington previous to that but I think they ran out of coal on the return.

Today, of course, that same study would cost $10 million. And be just about as effective.

This is more interesting, and fruit bearing as far as proof goes.

I can see how interest by groups into running passenger service, the state kicking the tires on it, but declining, can turn into "We were 'this' close to running, etc."

I mean, the fish I caught years ago keep getting bigger in each subsequent retelling....

There is a guy on YouTube that has some footage of CP 2839 going throught the Lexington Sub, and through Olive Hill, KY. Link. Just to put it out there, if anyone has any kind of railroad photos or videos of Carter County, KY. Please let me know.

Thanks,

Wow! I didn't know I was going to stir up this much interest :) I may be wrong about who was supposed to do what to make the state purchase it. I do remember that the person responsible to making sure it got pushed through the legislature passed away before it could. If I can find out the name of the person, I'll repost. If I caused any problems, I apologize as I really enjoy this forum. To answer the question of why a group from West Virginia would look at a Kentucky railroad? The society is located in Huntington, WV. The eastern terminal of the Lexington Sub is Ashland, KY. 15 minutes apart. Not a long drive. Plus the cities were connected via the Kanawha Sub. I'll do my best to find out the name (maybe a representative instead of a senator. I'm not sure now.) and repost. I had it written down at one time. It won't make that big of a difference anyways: the line is still gone ;(

Here's a YT Video that someone has posted that does feature CPR 2839 running over the Lexington Sub. My favorite part is when it ran through Olive Hill (~04:13) since I'm from that area. There's a user on flickr who has pictures (primemover88), I grateful that he has pictures. Olive Hill seems to lack pictures, as well as Hitchins. I just wish they would have just the line, even if they never used it. It would probably would have buisness in this region, maybe not at that, but now.