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Friday, February 8, 2013

Poor Research Rant - The Switzerland Trail of America

Engine #30 of the Colorado and Northwestern Railway. She is cosmetically restored  but not to the original condition she  was in for the CNW. This is the final configuration she was in when working for her last employer as #74 for the Rio Grande Southern (RGS). Incidentally the RGS is the railroad that developed and built the seven Galloping Goose rail cars.

I was reading, with great interest, this morning about the City of Boulder sending Engine #30 and the rest of its rolling stock to the Colorado Railroad Museum for display. I was doing a little research on the Colorado and Northwestern's livery colors (Red, Light Blue and White not the prettiest colors by any means) when I stumbled across this. Now, I already knew the equipment had been moved since I had seen it there when I was at the Goosefest in 2012. What interested me was the pdf on the site that gave a brief summary of the history of Engine #30, the passenger car and the Rio Grande caboose. Then I read it and was appalled at the number of gross inaccuracies about Engine #30 (#74 on the Colorado and Southern and #74 on the Rio Grande Southern). I don't know who wrote it but I imagine it was an employee of the Boulder Parks and Recreation department. There is entire book (The Switzerland Trail of American, Forest Crossen) written about this railroad by a local resident and the last time I was at the Boulder library (something like 30 years ago granted), there were three second edition copies that could be checked out and three first edition copies in the rare books section. Even the information available on the net is more accurate than this abomination of a document! Okay, I feel better now.

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