Steamtown's beginning in Scranton...

My buddy who works for a tourist rr told me that when the DL&W become CR in '76, CR didn't want the yard/facility in Scranton. So it sat unused until the 90s with the advent of Steamtown. Is this true? Did CR just shut the gate and that large yard and service area just rust away? Was there any activity at all?

Large parts looked like a waste land. It had been used by the Erie as a Circus ramp for piggy back until '75 or so and this was left inactive. My last two months of college seemed strange watching the rails rusting & not hearing the pushers working every evenining.

The time line pictures inside Steamtown show a picture from that time.

Steamtown came to scranton in the mid 80's, it sure was a bleak looking place back then,as it sat idle; my dad and I walked all of it just before they brought the stuff in from vermont. when the whole thing was started, it was a private company/foundation runnning it and it went belly up really fast due to mismanagment. Locals wrote a song about it called "the chapter 11 choo choo", rhymed with Chatanooga choo choo. Anyway, what you see today is nothing short of amazing, your tax dollars hard at work. Money well spent, IMHO. And some of the property is used by "the" delaware lackawanna rr.

Talk about a renaissance..

you've got an friend in Pennsylvania!!

Work safe

Derail

I have slides that I took before Steamtown started working on the site. As soon as I can dig them out, I will post them.

As a added tidbit. Steamtown ALMOST went to Kingston, New York instead, but Pennsylvania gave them better incentives.