Hey Yall, Glad you are likin' the video on Tweetsie, I reckon it's a part of my heritage in blood.... Let me tell you a short story that my Grandpaw told me. Now my grandfather was young, very young in this time period... The last ET&WNC narrow gauge train left Elizabethton on Oct 16, 1950. He was born in 1945, any ways he told me he faintly remembers the old trains. The railroad track was so close to his house that when the train passed the windows rattled. He said, for such a small engine they sure did have alot of pep in their step! He told me that he and his older brothers used to hobo the train to get to Johnson City to watch cartoons on Saturday mornings. The crew never seemed to care... When they'ed get through they'ed just bum a ride back home in someones car... Its hard to imagine being able to do stuff like that these days, but back then it was just as accustom-able as getting in your own car and going to town...
Incredible footage. I'm from Western NC and grew up going to Tweetsie. I love researching the history of the ET&WNC. I can only imagine what it must have been like to take the train through the mountains 100 years ago; so awesome. Thank you for sharing this.
Awesome. Do you know of any places besides the Doe River Gorge area that you might be able to find some remnants of this railroad? Maybe towards the state line area or in North Carolina?
SolaVirtusInvicta26 there's a boxcar in Elizabethton TN. There's an entire trail that is the old ET&WNC road bed from Johnson City to Elizabethton. If I'm not mistaken there's a caboose in Elk Park NC
A real treasure was truly lost when eastern Tennessee and western North Carolina railroad ceased operation, sure would have loved to have seen it in it's prime!!
My wife and I rode behind #12 at Blowing Rock, NC on our vacation in 1972. In 1979 I was track foreman on the Huckleberry RR in Flint, MI which was using #2 or Alaska Engineering Commission #152 built by Baldwin in 1919 for use on the Tenana Mines RR at Fairbanks, AK until the standard gauge Alaska RR bridged the Nenana R. and came into Fairbanks. ET&WNC No12 was built by Baldwin in 1920. The only real difference between the two locos is one inch in driver diameter.
Unfortunately, the E.T.&W.N.C. standard gauge, said to be "now running" is also closed. The tracks have been removed and the route converted to a scenic trail in Tennessee's Rails-to-Trails program.
I hiked through Tunnels 1,2 and 3 on 9/27/23. #4 is a bit trickier to get to across old trestles, but doable. #5 sand tunnel, the longest, is covered on the south end and has a few feet of water in it.
@ 03:49 and again at 04:04, the 4th boxcar in the consist is sheathed in aluminum siding with a blue horizontal stripe down the center line, #443. Was this car specially designed/insulated for use as a "Milk" car or another purpose? @14:20 the video shows 2 such "special" cars, how many of these did the ET&WNC have? I can find no roster information about them.
Willie Vance interest. My gggrandfather most likely rode that train as he settled in Shell Creek from Chatham County NC around 1870. He was a well known circuit riding Christian preacher in the area. A historical insight into that era via video is amazing at least to me. Thank you for posting the video.
I believe my Grandfather and uncle rode on it when they were in school, they were in the first class with the boy school, which is now Les McRae college in Banner Elk when the train came over this way prior to the 1940 flood. A neighbor of my dad in Foscoe NC, when he was a child put lard on the tracks to watch it slide back down the hill and not get traction.
