Jul 19, 2015

Not RGS - but interesting NG stuff - Quincy & Torch Lake RR

Some photos from a recent visit to the Quincy Mine, and the remains of it's 3' NG railroad.  This railroad ran only 6 miles, and existed from 1888 to 1945.  It had 6 locomotives, 4 of which remain.  The one being restored (cosmetically) is the outside-frame #6.  The other two are #1 and #5.  #3, as I understand it, is over at the Huckleberry RR in Flint MI, in pieces.

The enginehouse here is being restored, and has a number of service trenches, and also a belt-driven machine shop.

The building w/ the track runnign through it is the remains of the boiler house for the huge #2 hoist, which provided cables to lower men & lift rock down the 9000' foot #2 shaft (which is located a 1/4 mile from this location).  There were a number of these boiler houses, for the various shafts, and it appears the tracks ran thru each, to facilitate dumping coal there (brought up from Torch Lake, below the mine).  The #2 hoist used 6900 tons/ month of coal, as I understand it.

Rock Down, Coal Up is a book w/ more details.