Robin Bowers, David Pressley and I left the Tweetsie Railroad and embarked on an about an hour's drive to Newton, North Carolina.
Southeastern Narrow Gauge & Shortline MuseumThe southeast's history is diverse, rich and firmly rooted in business and personal identity. Known to produce agriculture, textiles, timber and furniture, its industrial legacy was built upon a backbone of steel rails and wooden ties. From the 1830's until the present day, small railroads and narrow gauge lines provided critical arteries for passengers, freight and materials required for commerce. Along these rails are also scattered memories - loved ones embarking upon a new adventure, the soldier hero returning from war, or perhaps a simple visit with favorite cousins.
This museum - the only railroad museum in the south with a concentration of narrow gauge railroading - houses a collection of vintage railroad equipment that dates as far back as the Era of Reconstruction, days when primitive iron rails endeavoured to connect the cotton fields of lowland farms to the vast timber resources of the Appalachians. This collection includes boxcars, log cars, passenger cars, cabooses and a steam locomotive housed in our open-air pavilion. This is the largest collection of vintage narrow gauge equipment in the south.
Newton was served by the narrow gauge Chester and Lenoir Railroad, which arrived in 1882 then was folded into Southern subsidiary Carolina & North Western and converted to standard gauge in 1902.
The Newton Depot Authority was created in 1995 to save the depot. It was on the property of Norfolk Southern and they had plans to demolish it due to liability issues. The restoration was funded through the Depot Authority with help from donors, grants and the City of Newton and completed in summer 2005.
Next came the Alexander Railroad Pavilion, located across the still-active Norfolk Southern tracks. It was started in autumn 2012 and opened to the public in October 2016 and funded entirely by the Alexander Railroad.
The depot authority's partner is the Alexander Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society, which owns a majority of the equipment and museum artifacts and performs the restorations. Under the pavilion is a mixture of local standard gauge and southern narrow gauge rolling stock.
Our VisitWe started to explore and while the station museum was closed, the grounds were open. I would visit here again in January 2023 and had the opportunity to go inside the museum at that time.
Newton's Southern Railway station built in 1924 at the junction of the Southern Railway and Carolina and Northwestern Railroad. It saw its last passenger train in 1975 and last freight agent in 1985. A restoration project commenced in 1995 and after ten years, the building was moved half a mile south and restored by volunteers.
East Tennessee and Western North Carolina box car 434, one of the two remaining box cars from this railroad, which ran from Johnson City, Tennessee to Boone, North Carolina. It was among the largest narrow gauge box cars built and constructed around 1916. It served the railroad until the narrow gauage was discontinued in 1950 and used as a storage shed on a farm in Tennessee until 1961. At that time, it was donated to the New Jersey Museum of Transportation and remained in their collection until 2011 when it was donated to the museum and restored over the course of the next three years.
Virginia-Carolina Chemical Company 2-6-0 50, ex. City of Lakeland, Florida 50 1961, exx. Virginia-Carolina Chemical Company 50, exxx. Osceola-Cypress Company 50 "E.T. Summerhill", nee Cia. Azucarera Saramaguacan 1, built by American Locomotive Company in 1922. It was one of three engines of this class built for the Cuban sugar plantations, but the order was cancelled when the sugar market collapsed.
Carolina & North-Western wooden box car 401 built circa 1875 and plied the rails between Chester, South Carolina and Lenoir, North Carolina via the heart of Catawba County. It is believed to be the oldest narrow gauge boxcar on the east coast and oldest piece of Southern Railway equipment.
Clinchfield Railroad caboose 1023 built by the railway in 1920.
East Tennessee and Western North Carolina gang motorcar/railbus 2.
The Alexander Pavilion.
Future restoration projects.
Norfolk Southern caboose 346 built in 1940, minus its wheels.
Former Georgetown Loop Railroad open car 7, nee Denver and Rio Grande Western high-side gondola 1880, built by American Car and Foundry in 1902. In the 1940's, it was one of several cars rebuilt by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy for use at the 1948 Chicago Railroad Fair. The Alexander Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society purchased this car in January 2015.
Former Georgetown Loop Railroad open car 5 "Saxon Mountain", nee Denver and Rio Grande high-side gondola, built by American Car and Foundry in 1902. It was acquired in 2015.
We said our goodbyes to David then followed him back to Interstate 40, where he went to Winston-Salem and we made our way to Spencer.
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