How I Got Hooked on the C&S

[Kurt Maechner]

It's always interesting to see how people got hooked on narrow gauge railroads and specifically the C&S. I think there have been posts on the topic before. My story began at a church rummage sale when I picked up a 1985 copy of the National Model Railroad Association's Bulletin with an article about an abandoned tunnel at 11,000 feet with collapsed entrances and the tracks still spiked down inside.

I scanned the article and posted it on my blog here if you'd like to give it a read. (I recently started a corresponding Substack if you're interested. The old blogger sites don't have a subscription option, but the Substacks do)

Enjoy,
Kurt

[drgwcs]

For me it was a couple of things. We had went several times when I was a kid through Colorado on vacations and went through Central City (and Nevadaville) and along Clear Creek and into Georgetown. I did not really realize about the railroad at the time aside from seeing 71 parked in Central City. I did get some good exposure to D&RGW narrow gauge though on those trips. A while later as a teenager and into HO and the Santa Fe I had ridden my bike over to a local hobby shop where they had some Gazettes on the sale table. I bought a couple of them and was introduced to Harry Brunk's wonderful series. I would scratchbuild an Argo Tunnel ore chute and would begin to drift into narrow gauge. I finally settled on C&S narrow gauge and D&RGW standard gauge. I kitbashed a Roundhouse 2-8-0 into a pseudo 71 on a desk in my dorm room in Bible college and later built my Idaho Springs modules in a tiny apartment in married student housing. Those have been a part of 7 layouts.

[Jim Courtney]

My 12th Christmas--Santa brought me a copy of Narrow Gauge in the Rockies, by Beebe and Clegg. The chapter on the C&SNG hooked me: Small locomotives, that weird spark arrestor and spectacular scenery!

[Mike Trent]

I grew up with it, following my Dad's interest having grown up in Boulder himself. The C&S was our hometown railroad, and my Dad had taken a huge interest in photography and recording the final years of steam on the C&S. He was practically adopted as the Son Road Foreman of Engines Mickey Hansen never had and was very familiar with many of the C&S enginemen and trainmen, most of which had started their careers on the Narrow Gauge.

My friends and I tramped around on the mainline around Boulder and everywhere else we could. We bonded and in later years spent hours and our own money working on cosmetic restoration and stabilization of our train in the park, C&N #30/C&S#74/RGS #74.

I'd been exposed to model railroading in about 1960, and was inspired and mentored by Dad's best friend and our close neighbor, Howard Fogg.

So, how could it have been any other way?

I have a small C&S collection of both steam and diesel HO Scale locomotives that I grew up with through High School, in addition to my On3 C&S collection.