Folsom Valley Railway

Folsom Valley Railway was built in 1970 by the Sherman brothers with a funding request by Mayor Jack Kipp.  It was owned and operated by Mylan Thurley from 1978 to 1990 when it was acquired by Terry Gold who operates the train today.

Operating a steam railroad describes the 2 hour routine to start up and half-hour to power down steam engines.  As a system where steam (water) intermixes with machined metal parts a Steam Engine requires elaborate daily lubrication and chemical treatment of boilers to avoid corrosion and siezeure of moving parts (see 'stored over winter' descriptions in '3001' history). 

 Engine 'Cricket'

Engine '3001' 

Engine 'Cricket' 

The Cricket is a 12 inch narrow gauge. 4-4-0 locomotive was built in 1950 by Erich Thompson in Berkeley, California. It ran in Tilden Park for 20 years. In 1970 the engine and coaches was sold and brought to the Folsom City Park where it has been in continuous operation.

3001 is currently undergoing major rennovation by a steam engine specialist in Fresno CA.

Engine '3001'

The 3001 is a black heavy Atlantic 4-4-2 oil firer locomotive.  The Engine weighs 4,000 pounds, is 16 feet long and has 16-inch drivers 

'3001' was built in Sacramento by Alan Shelly and completed in 1949.  It is a duplicate of its older brother, a green Atlantic 3025 built in 1938.  '3001' ran in William Land Park in Sacramento 1953 for three months, but the local population in the early 40 and 50s was not large enough to support continuous train operation. 

So both '3001' and '3025' went into Winter storage for nine months. When Mr. Shelly pulled the Engines he was dismayed to find all internal moving parts had rusted and they would not run.  This was a first indicator of the challenges of maintaining and operating model steam locomotives.

The Engines were sold to private collector Gordon Bennett in Oakland as museum pieces where they remained for 27 years.  After Mr. Bennett's death his widow sold both Engines to train enthusiast Mr. Fred Simpson near Seattle Washington. 

Mr. Simpson planned to run the Engines as an attraction to his bed and breakfast hotel.  A very large man, Mr. Simpson was unable to operate 3001 himself, and so he planned for his son to run it while he would take the helm of the larger-seated '3025' engine. 

After a two year project to restore both engines father and son enjoyed a summer season, with Fred putting about 40 runs on the '3025' engine and his son accumulating five trips on '3001' in a side-by-side track operation at the hotel. 

With the long Seattle rainy season upon them the trains had to be put into storage after only three months of operation.  Unfortunately the same fate befell both engines during downtime as at the Simpson's were greatly dismayed to discover nine months later that both engines had rusted throughout and were unable to run.  Heavily discouraged, they donated the engines to a steam power plant near Seattle where they were added to Boeing Field’s steam engine collection.

Sixteen years later the owner passed away and the Engines came to the attention of restorer David Higgins.  David informed Terry Gold, who traveled to Seattle and decided to purchase Engine 3001 May 2006. 

It took Terry three months and $5,000 just to find a service to move the Engine as far as David's shop for work. Nine months and $58,000 later '3001' stood restored along with a new tender (the box located at the back of the engine that holds the water and oil) that David built for $20,000.  On February 26, 2007 Terry rented a truck for $2000 and transported the '3001' Engine all the way down to Sacramento.  '3001' went into operation on Folsom Valley Railway in April of 2007.