GoS Contest-- 'Monticello'

The first train of the Pioneer Line was utility at its finest. A young fellow by the name of Isaiah Cartwright heard of the newly-opened Cumberland Line in 1827 and saw a fortune to be made... if only he had some carriages! Lacking a great deal of start-up money, he called upon his blacksmithing friend John Kultz and together they cobbled together a steam engine and all of the hardware needed to complete a railroad train (wheels, axles, leaf springs, coupler hooks, and etc.) for their newly-founded Pioneer Line Trans-Portation Company. Their finished product looked something like this:

The locomotive was what future generations of railroaders would call a “2-2-0” (Kultz figured the thing would stay on the track with its wheels arranged such) and boasted a lap-seem, marine-style boiler with fully contained firebox/ashpan and a single flue and smokestack (sans smokebox). A collection of firing tools was stored hanging from a festive, wood-framed canvas roof. No one gave much thought to naming the locomotive at this time (“Why would passengers care what we call the steam-engine??”— though in the near future the line would call its second, Norris-built locomotive “Explorer” ).

The locomotive was followed by a coal tender which consisted of a wooden box for coal and ashes (the boiler’s ashpan, being small, needed to be shoveled out even as coal was shoveled in) and a wooden water barrel, sitting on four wheels and a wooden frame. Behind the tender they coupled what they considered their most ingenious creation, a kitchen on wheels complete with a coal stove and a fully-stocked pantry and storeroom. They figured that meals on the go would be a big draw to get folks into their final carriage, a crude but sturdy 20-seater boasting little more than benches and a topside luggage rack (which proved rather more popular with passengers than it was ever intended to be— turns out that fresh air beats cramped conditions inside!). The coach was given the wishfully luxurious name of “Monticello” after Jefferson’s grand estate, and was often seen wearing formal bunting (these were patriotic times!).

The whole train was lit with a collection of barn lanterns, and big nautical lamps lit the tracks fore and aft. Her crew was Cartwright, Kultz, Wilma the cook (an old freed slave), and, generally-speaking, a porter/trainman or two. (And after only a few years in the business, Captain Cartwright and Engineer Kultz were running a first-rate, Norris-hauled operation complete with an eight-wheel passenger car on trucks! But that’s another story. )


(Engine sans sign/roof tarp: [link])



_{(Now in case you’re wondering how I can enter a contest theme that I started, I figured it would work like this— entering a theme you started is fine, but if you should happen to win your own contest, the honor of choosing the next theme goes to the runner-up. That way, folks won’t have to deal with the same person’s crummy () themes twice in a row. ^^ Sound good?)}