Winchester & Western Wardensville

[mudchicken]

Lumber / "temporary" tracks

Again - the thing was poorly documented. What little I've seen talks about three separate alignments out into the woods and little else in detail.

[CNW_4009]

What towns did the Lost River RR go through or was it just a railroad to nowhere?

[mudchicken]

(Paraphrasing boats) A tunnel is a hole in the ground railroads pour major buck$ into.

There would be tax records and state railroad commission records that would show that. The original owner took forever to build to that end of the line (1916-1925) as it was and it never paid off. So they pulled back. (Poor's wasn't kind to them. The temporary narrow gage lumber lines (Lost River RR) at the Wardensville end, poorly documented, fared even worse.)

FD-10371 (1934) 202-ICC-401

FD-7995 (1930); 162-ICC-544

[BaltACD]

CNW_4009

I don't mean to disregard the historical fact, but what if there just wasn't any record of the tunnel IF there was one?

A tunnel would be documented in too many ways to count - even way back then.

[CNW_4009]

I don't mean to disregard the historical fact, but what if there just wasn't any record of the tunnel IF there was one?

[Savage Tunnel]

You obviously don't wish to listen to historical fact, so go right ahead and believe there is a tunnel, after all I wouldn't want to disrupt some millenial's fantasies. You've probably never been to this area and probably never will.

[CNW_4009]

I followed this line on google maps. At this location: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Wardensville,+WV+26851/@39.1527128,-78.4707107,508m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x89b5a11fab424087:0x47abcb61db96593c!8m2!3d39.0751067!4d-78.5977903 the swerve in the Back Creek Road is hill, I believe that the railroad followed the road when it gets to the hill does it go into a tunnel? I have no idea.

[Savage Tunnel]

There is no record of a tunnel, the correct dates for abandonment are: Wardensville-Rock Enon, 1934 (this part used only for 13 years)
Rock Enon-Gore, 1944
Tracing the line using historic aerials shows a lightly built right of way that followed natural valleys and streams for most of the route.

The sand mine at Gore still ships, there is a new enginehouse at Gore, but most of the business is on the Winchester-Hagerstown line (x-PRR)

[CNW_4009]

Did the old W&W line to Wardensville, WV(abandonded in 1949)have a tunnel?

Thank you for any information you can provide.