The Cocheco Railroad revisited

Ridge Road crossing. There was a bridge here originally to cross a cut but, long after the Cocheco was abandoned, is was eventually removed and the cut filled in.
Ridge Rd. bridge over the Cocheco back in the day. Photo courtesy of the Farmington Historical Society.
Ridge Rd. crossing today.

The Cocheco had to create a cut through a granite outcrop, which you can still see today although it's been partially filled in with water and leaves from 8 decades of autumns. Here are several shots of the cut today from the north side of the Ridge Rd. bridge location.

Train approaching the Ridge Rd. bridge from an old postcard. The back of the postcard states "Perkins bridge" which the photographer is obviously standing on. The Farmington Historical Society has no record of or reference to a "Perkins bridge". However, the map two posts previously does show a "C.E. Perkins" residing close to the Ridge Rd. bridge.
I'm standing where the Ridge Road bridge used to be. You can still see part of the rocky outcrop but it's mostly obscured by trees and leaves today.

Some shots taken on a beautiful fall day last year of the ROW beyond the Ridge Road bridge location, heading towards the New Durham border .

Wreck somewhere in Farmington.
Nancy's Crossing, New Durham. There was a Nancy's Brook as well. It is still not known who Nancy was.
Old postcard of Nancy's Crossing.

Nancy's Crossing today. Actually, the crossing would be right behind me on what is now RT. 11.
Standing on the ROW, looking at the junction of Quaker Rd. and RT. 11. where Nancy's Crossing would have been. Here, the Cocheco ROW merges with and becomes RT. 11 at this point, all the way to the Alton traffic circle.

Nice pictures, it's great to get into the woods to document stuff like this.

Yeah, given how much NH has been developed over the years, I'm just happy there's something left to document. There have been several relics, for example, bridges or stations that I didn't get a chance to photograph before they were removed or torn down.

A few more shots of the ROW just south of Nancy's Crossing.

The quality of the workmanship of these granite block culverts certainly started to decline as evidenced by this example which looks more like a cave a wild animal would live in.
The back of this old photo is captioned "pearl cut". I don't know where it is, I'm just guessing it's somewhere around Nancy's Crossing.

Davis station location at what is now the junction of Davis Crossing Rd. and RT. 11. No longer standing. Photo courtesy of Matt Cosgro.

1892 map showing the location of the New Durham station.
Early cabinet card of the New Durham station from the late 1800s. Note the lack of the semaphore signal pole.
This shot of New Durham station must have been taken near the end of the Cocheco judging by all the weeds encroaching on the rails.

New Durham station circa 1908.
New Durham station location. The depot stood on that patch of grass right in front of me at the junction of Berry Rd. and RT. 11. The angle is roughly the same as the vintage photo above.
As a point of reference, the same house on Depot Rd. indicated by the red arrow in this photo and the vintage photo above.