Lending a hand to restore history.
At the mouth of Cimarron Creek, just upstream from where it meets the Gunnison River, stands a reminder of bygone days in Colorado narrow-gauge railroading. Locomotive #278, its coal tender, a boxcar, and caboose stand atop the last remaining railroad trestle along the Black Canyon of the Gunnison route north of Cimarron, Colorado.
The Winslow Crane team was hired to rig, lift, swing, and set the newly renovated locomotive, coal tender, boxcar, and caboose back onto the circa 1895 trestle spanning Cimarron Creek.
Using their 300-ton Terex-Demag AC-250-6 all-terrain crane with a variety of rigging and spreader bar configurations, the Winslow Crane team was able to deftly set the 69,000 lb. locomotive, the 20,000 lb. caboose, and the remaining cars on the tracks atop the trestle.
In 1976, the trestle was placed on the National Register of Historic Places, due to its significance as the last remaining structure representing the history of the narrow-gauge railroad in the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. The lease of the locomotive, tender, and caboose was renegotiated in 1989 and extended to 99 years.
Today, the Cimarron Canyon railroad exhibit display aids in our understanding and appreciation of the accomplishments of the trains which ran the Black Canyon of the Gunnison route of the Denver & Rio Grande (D&RG) Narrow Gauge Railroad before the route was inundated by the creation of nearby Morrow Point Dam.
