The restored train depot in Old Fort, North Carolina. Built in 1881, it was used for passenger service until the early 1970s. Along with a caboose (X-581), the depot was donated to the town of Old Fort by Southern Railroad in 1985. The depot was meticulously restored and now houses a small museum, a realty company, and a large space for events. Part of the original walls were left exposed inside to show graffiti that dates back to 1886. The Norfolk Southern railroad main line still runs directly next to the restored depot.
The famed "Molly" Norfolk and Western steam engine "Rides the Storm Out" in Abingdon, Virginia. Built in 1907, this 4-8-0 class M steam locomotive is only one of two survivors from over 100 of this model that Norfolk and Western had in the days of steam. No. 433 was retired in 1958 and donated to the town of Abingdon, Virginia, where she resides today at the trailhead of the Virginia Creeper Trail.
Rio Grande 484, a Mikado 2-8-2 narrow gauge steam locomotive, originally built for the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad in 1925. It now pulls excursion trains on the Cumbres and Toltec scenic railroad out of Chama, New Mexico. The Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad was originally constructed in 1880 as part of the Rio Grande’s narrow gauge San Juan Extension, which served the silver mining district of the San Juan mountains in southwestern Colorado. With the repeal of the Sherman Act in 1893 and its devastating effect on the silver mining industry, traffic over the San Juan Extension failed to warrant conversion to standard gauge. In the decades that followed, the railroad was mostly stagnant, although its last major upgrades in equipment and infrastructure happened in the 1920s. A post-World War II natural gas boom brought a brief period of prosperity to the line, but operations dwindled to a trickle in the 1960s. Finally, in 1969 the Interstate Commerce Commission granted the Rio Grande’s request to abandon its remaining narrow gauge main line trackage, thereby ending the last use of steam locomotives in general freight service in the United States. Most of the abandoned track was dismantled soon after the ICC’s decision, but through the combined efforts of an energetic and resourceful group of railway preservationists and local civic interests, the most scenic portion of the line was saved. In 1970, the states of Colorado and New Mexico jointly purchased the track and line-side structures from Antonito to Chama.
