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Lets Talk: The C&O 1309 Restoration

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C&O 1309's sister locomotive 1308 as seen in this public domain image. Flashback: its the summer of 2013. I am on a family vacation in Pennsylvania visiting the famed railfan sites there. Steamtown, Horseshoe Curve, etc. In a gift shop (I think at the Railroader's Memorial Museum in Altoona?) I pick up Kalmbach Book's Tourist Trains Guidebook Fifth Edition. I had been out of the country for quite some time, and flipping through its pages I found an advertisement: "NEW in 2016! The No. 1309 in operation on the WMSR! The last locomotive built by Baldwin Locomotive Works and the largest regularly scheduled articulated steam locomotive in the USA! Join us in 2016 as we welcome 1309 to the WMSR." (p. 323) I was honestly, rather impressed. I knew of the plans to restore UP 4014, but I wasn't aware of this east coast based restoration project. I thought it sounded pretty cool and then sort of forgot about it. My next reminder of the project other t
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Why This Blog Exists

It doesn't take long for any railfan to realize, as a community we are a crazy bunch (crazy in a good way most days, but crazy in a bad way sometimes). It seems we get into petty arguments over bygone mergers, steam locomotives, etc. on a regular basis in our online interactions with other railfans regularly. Names such as E. Hunter Harrison and Ed Dickens are taken in vain as if they were some swear word regularly in railfan chats. When we get into scale modeling, we aren't much better. For example we argue over what layout directions are better (prototype or freelanced?). The internet has propelled our hobby to a new crowd, yet also made it a site of flame wars and vitriol that previously were only privately held sentiments in local railfan circles.  Some of you may know me for the blog posts, photos, and research I am doing elsewhere in the railfan community. A few months back an article I helped research that was published by a friend of mine, was heavily criticized by t
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