CASS SCENIC RAILROAD STATE PARK

'Cass Scenic Railroad State Park', in Cass, Pocahontas County, West Virginia, is a West Virginia State Park heritage railway consisting of the former company town of Cass, eleven miles of railway, and a portion of the summit of Bald Knob.

Contents

History

Shay Locomotives

Current operations

See also

External links

References

History

Founded in 1901 by the West Virginia Pulp and Paper Company, now Westvaco, Cass was built as a company town to serve the needs of the men who worked in the nearby mountains cutting spruce and hemlock for the West Virginia Spruce Lumber Company, a subsidiary of WVP&P. At one time, the sawmill at Cass was the largest double-band sawmill in the world. It processed an estimated 1.25 billion board feet (2,900,000 m³) of lumber during its lifetime.
In the 1940s, WVP&P sold the Cass operation to Mower Lumber Company, which operated the line until 1960, cutting second-growth timber off Cheat Mountain. In 1960, the Cass mill and railroad were abandoned due to rapid decline of the timber industry in the region. The rail line at Cass and the Shay locomotives (specialized geared steam engines capable of maneuvering the sharp curves and steep grades on the mountain) were due to be scrapped, but Pennsylvania railfan Russell Baum convinced the legislature to make Cass Railroad a state park. In 1963, the first train left the Cass depot for Whittaker Station (four miles up the line) with tourists, not timber.

Shay Locomotives

Ephraim Shay (1839-1916), has been credited as a schoolteacher, physician, civil engineer, logger, merchant, railway owner, and inventor. He lived in Michigan, and became a logger in the 1860s. While a logger he wanted to find a new way to get logs to the mill, besides floating them on a river. He then built his own tramway in 1875, on 26 in. track, and wooden ties. This was very efficient and enabled him to beat his competitors because he saved so much money with the tram. Two years would pass before he would invent the Shay Locomotive. In about 1877 he developed the idea of having an engine sit on a flat car with a boiler, gears, and trucks that could pivot. The first Shay only had two cylinders and operated through a series of gears over the inside portion of the rear truck. It did not take long for this idea to become popular. When Lima Locomotive Works received the Shay idea it was not impressed, but a man by the name of John Carnes influenced the company to take the idea and expand upon it. What resulted was the classic Shay design we see today. During its lifetime, Lima Locomotive Works manufactured nearly every Shay, including the last and largest Shay Western Maryland Shay #6, which is still in operation at Cass.

Current operations

Today, riding on historic converted log cars, pushed along by the powerful Shay locomotive or the similar Heisler, you can take a step back into time. Traveling on 11 miles (18 km) of track laid in 1901 by immigrant workers, you will be traversing the steep grades of Back Allegheny Mountain. The railroad owns eight Shay Locomotives, one Heisler locomotive, and one Climax locomotive, which is being restored by volunteer's of the Mountain State Railroad and Logging Historical Society. The Heisler and the Climax were competing geared locomotive designs to the Shay during the age of steam.
Three trips are available: a two-hour round trip to Whittaker Station, a five-hour round trip to the abandoned site of the ghost town of Spruce (once the coldest and highest town east of the Rockies), and a five-hour round trip to Bald Knob, the third highest point in the state.
Former company houses have been refurbished for your enjoyment and are available for rent by visitors.
Town and shop tours are available daily to visitors who would like to learn more about the town and its lumber industry and how the rare geared locomotives,ranging in age from 60 to 100 years, are maintained by the Cass crew. A tour of a recreated logging camp is available at Whittaker.

See also

★ List of heritage railways

★ List of West Virginia state parks

★ Bald Knob

★ Leatherbark

★ Pocahontas County, West Virginia

★ State park

External links

★ Official website

★ Fan website

★ Cass Railroad Photos

★ Mountain State Railroad & Logging Historical Association

References

★ Withers, Bob (August 25 2005), ''Cass railroad line to mark birthday''. Retrieved August 25 2005.

★ Roy B. Clarkson (1990), On Beyond Leatherbark