OTHER Logging Railroad in Eureka Montana area

Hello

I have been curious about some history of a supposedly logging railroad SE of Eureka MT, namely a trestle over Frank Lake. When I was young, my family would go to Frank Lake for the great rainbow trout fishing. Across the upper portion of the lake was an old abandoned railroad trestle. My grandfather said it was a line out of Eureka from the mill to the woods. I searched quite a bit on the web and haven't found anything at all and I'm currently living in Louisiana so going to the local libraries isn't very easy. The coordinates are:

Latitude 48°48'30.19"N
Longitude 115° 0'42.53"W

I'm curious if anyone has any information at all about this railroad. BTW the old GN mainline is just to the north. Thanks in advance.

 

Thanks Ken, thats more information than I had before. Its definately a rr trestle, I wish I had a picture of it from the boat launch, I wass there about 6 years ago but didn't have my digital camera, I may have something on video, I need to look around.

 

Ken
Thank you very much, the history link on the FH Stoltze website contained some hints that to me are most likely the answer.

"
In the fall of 1923 State Lumber acquired a 32-ton Shay manufactured by Lima Locomotive Works from the Brooks – Scanlon Lumber Company in Eureka , Montana . This Shay was purchased new on September 19, 1914 by the Great Northern Railroad for the Somers Lumber Company. Estimated cost was $100,000. This Shay was a standard gauge engine and ran on 60 pound per foot track. The Eureka Lumber Company purchased the Shay in 1916 from the Somers Lumber Company along with eight log cars and enough steel to construct seven miles of railroad. .

With the purchase of the Shay, grade and tracks were immediately laid to gain access to the 10,000 acres of timberland owned in the Haskill and Trumbull Creek drainages. There were 5 camps established in this ownership. With the establishment of the railroad, logging could continue during the summer months. In the early years steam donkeys were used to pull the logs to the landing, which were located along the tracks. Then a Lidgerwood loader was used to load the logs on the railcars. This loader would be carried to the loading spot on an empty railcar and then blocked up so the empty cars could pass beneath the loader. The logs were loaded onto the cars and then the loaded cars moved ahead."


The old grade goes down the Haskill Creek drainage, and the beginning grade in Eureka starts at the location of the old mill (from my memory") I think it's safe to say the it was a Eureka Lumber Company railroad grade.I'm sure there are some pictures tucked away somewhere in an attic or closet, waiting to be discovered. I need to search through my Dads old videos too see if there is a picture I can fetch of it. In the late 60's-early 70's you could still stand on portions of the trestle.

 

Personally I have never seen a book dedicated to NW Montana, just a few pictures of a J Neils crummy in books like "Logging Railroads of the West". Matter of fact very few pictures in total. The Heritage museum in Libby has a lot of information I suspect but limited resources to do anything with it except archive it. The person who ran the Lincoln county library (Inez/ cant recall her last name) for years spent all alot of time interviewing old timers about the local area. She interviewed my grandfather and great grandfather several times, I just wonder what became of her work, I believed she helped start the Heritage museum, its probably all in boxes somewhere in that building.
I have not read the Big Blackfoot book, I assume it is about the MILW branch line from Bonner? How is it?

I just spent the evening scanning fathers old 8 mm videos, the only picture of that trestle I could come up with was very bad quality, but here it is. I will search some more for a picture, I'm sure I had a VHS camcorder with me the last time I was there (1996 ?)

At the very top of the picture you can see it. (We were ice fishing, this was around 1968)

 

Ken
I'm working on obtaining a copy of the Timberjack movie now, I will let you know. Whats the complete name of the Big Blackfoot book? Big Blackfoot Railway?

 

Now Dean, how far is it between (48°48'30.19"N 115° 0'42.53"W) and (48°53'42.28"N 115° 7'44.08"W)?

Sorry, just had to smile when I saw how close both these locations are to each other...

:tb-wink: :tb-wink: :tb-wink: :tb-wink:​

 

LOL!!!! Darren

About 10 miles maybe? Actually it was that thread that got me thinking about this thread. But hey, if you rotate that Custer Creek location, it looks pretty close to the Rexford doesn't it? :mwink:

 

The tressel at Frank Lake was built but not finished by the Brooks Scanlon lumber mill at Eureka. The mill burnt in 1923 and the mill decided there was not enough timber past the tressel to warrant the cost of rebuilding so the Eureka mill was shut down and the tressel never finished. It was great for fishing from. My family has owned land on Frank Lake for seventy years and have watched the tressel decay for years.

 

history
That is great information, thank you very much and welcome to Trainboard.
Yes the fishing was very good at Frank "back in the day". We practically spent every weekend there in the summer. We always camped about half way down the lake on the NE side, the grassy area with the bay full of stumps. I hear the water is low and the bay is high and dry. I wished I had property on it.

 

I made the journey today with the family and relived old times, plus I have some pictures!!

 

Trestle Approach from ROW



ROW