GRAHAM COUNTY SHAY STEAM LOCOMOTIVE TO VISIT
GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS
RAILROAD
DURING RAILFEST 2003
"The Great Smoky
Mountains Railroad's third annual RAILFEST, a weekend of excitement
for history and railroad buffs alike, will host a visit from a historic
steam locomotive September 12-14th.
Graham County Shay No. 1925 will be on loan from the
North
Carolina Transportation Museum during the festival in Bryson City.
It will carry passengers on the "Kituwah Excursion" to the Homeland of the
Cherokee. Shay No. 1925 will make school trips out of the GSMRR depot in
Dillsboro on Wednesday, September 10th.
In a sense this is a homecoming for the Shay No. 1925. During the
"hay days" of lumbering in Western North Carolina, these geared steam
engines carried the harvest out of the mountains. The logging
industry created jobs for the mountain residents of Jackson, Swain,
Transylvania, Haywood, Macon, Clay and Cherokee counties. The Graham
County Shay traveled the 12.6-mile Topton to Robbinsville short line for
almost 50 years. The "little engines that could" were a necessity to make
the sharp turns and 6% grade.
Saturday and Sunday, September 13th and 14th the Shay No.
1925 will be on display at the Bryson City Depot of the Great Smoky
Mountains Railroad. A limited number of seats are available for some of
the Shay excursions those days. Tickets are available by reservation at
1-800-872-4681.
Numbered for the year she was built at Lima Locomotive works in Ohio, the
No. 1925 Shay went to work on the Bemis Lumber Company's Graham County
Railroad. The fuel capacity for the 53-foot long steam engine is 5 tons of
coal and 3,500 gallons of water. Its working weight is 87 tons.
On the final run in 1970, North Carolina native, CBS reporter Charles
Kuralt, put the Shay No. 1925 in the national television spotlight. Then
in 1988 the Shay was donated to the North Carolina Transportation Museum
Foundation. It was in need of a complete restoration. Volunteers and
professional craftsmen rebuilt or replaced countless parts as the entire
3-cylinder drive mechanism and gears were overhauled. The boiler was
rebuilt; a new water tank and coal bunker fabricated. Ed Collins who was
an engineer on the Shay No. 1925 for 37 years donated his personal whistle
for the steam locomotive and was honored when the little geared engine was
named for him. The Collins family will be in attendance at RAILFEST 2003.
This rare steam locomotive visit to the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad is
a living reminder of a time when these little engines moved mountains and
the short line railroads were small town America's best friend.
RAILFEST 2003 is an opportunity to experience that time again with free
entertainment including the Buckingham Lining Bar Gang and The Depot Band,
a railroad swap meet, Mountain Craft Fair, and motor car exhibit - all at
the GSMRR Bryson City Depot.
For more information on the event, call the
Great Smoky Mountains
Railroad at 1-800-872-4681. Tickets are available for
excursions through the colorful countryside of North Carolina, across Lake
Fontana, and into the serene Nantahala Gorge during the RAILFEST 2003
weekend and all year long."
News written by and provided
courtesy of:
Jim Wrinn ~ Staff writer and assistant
bureau editor for
The
Charlotte Observer