Well I made a visit to the Roaring Camp & Big Trees Narrow Gauge Railroad on Saturday, and I saw old former West Side Lumber Company Shay #7 hauling the tourist. The locomotive is a 1911 3-truch-shay locomotive that was first used on the Butte & Plumas Railway in Washington as their number #4. In the later years she was sold to the Westside Lumber Company and renumbered #7 which is the number she still retains today. After the Westside Lumber Company shut down, old #7 was donated to the city of Sonora (which is the name she retains on the RC&BTNGRR), and remained on display there. She was then sold to a tourist railroad know as Westside & Cherry Valley Railroad in Tuolumne California. In 1986, #7 was finally purchased by the Roaring Camp & Big Trees Narrow Gauge Railroad, and put into use. The locomotive ran from 1986 until 1989 when she required a complete rebuild. Old number #7 was then torn down to a pile of parts and remained in the bone yard at Roaring Camp until time and money was at hand. In the summer of 1997 old #7 steamed up and entered permanent service on the RC&BTNGRR. Old number #7 was named Sonora, and there is no other name that I would rather have painted on her. Number 7 still runs today hauling tourists on the Roaring Camp & Big Trees Narrow Gauge Railroad. Number seven is the second oldest operational shay in existance after Cass #5, and the oldest operating narrow gauge shay in the world. The locomotive is almost 95-years-old (she turns 95 on July 28th), and is Roaring Camp's best locomotive. The old Westside Lumber Company #7 is a living legend that can still be seen in operation, and is my favorite shay locomotive on the Westside roster. 
