The Sandy River and Rangeley Lakes Railroad (SR&RL) was a narrow gauge common carrier railroad that operated approximately of track in Franklin County, Maine. The former equipment from the SR&RL continues to operate in the present day on a revived, short segment of the railway in Phillips, Maine.

History

Josiah S. Maxcy, a Gardiner banker who had recently financed construction of the Kennebec Central Railroad, obtained legislative approval for consolidation of the Sandy River Railroad and Phillips and Rangeley Railroad (P&R) on 10 March 1891. Maxcy purchased controlling stock of the Sandy River Railroad in 1892, and then obtained controlling stock of the Franklin and Megantic Railway (F&M) in 1897.Crittenden 1966 p.91Crittenden 1966 p.95 Under Maxcy's direction, F&M purchased the Kingfield and Dead River Railway (K&DR) at auction on 2 August 1898; and the F&M, K&DR, and Sandy River railroads operated under common management until formally merged as the SR&RL in January 1908. Under Maxcy's direction, SR&RL purchased the Phillips & Rangeley Railroad (P&R) and the Madrid Railroad at auction on 12 June 1908 Crittenden 1966 p.134 and the Eustis Railroad at auction on 24 August 1911.Crittenden 1966 p.142

Maine Central control

As part of the New England transportation monopoly organized by the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad, the SR&RL operated as a subsidiary of the Maine Central Railroad from 1912 until receivership in 1923. Maine Central built 37 box cars, 37 flat cars, 3 cabooses and a baggage-RPO car in their Portland Terminal Company shops for the SR&RL between 1912 and 1917.Jones 1980 pp.355,375,385&387 SR&RL locomotives 15, 16, 17 and 18 were reboilered in the Maine Central Waterville shops during the same period, and a freight branch was built from Perham Junction to Barnjum.

Outbound lumber traffic declined from 50,000 tons in 1906 Maine Railroad Commissioners 1906 pp.81&156 to 11,000 tons in 1919.Crittenden 1966 pp.171-2 Pulpwood traffic increased as smaller spruce trees were harvested. The Phillips shop converted two-thirds of the flat cars for loading with 4-foot-long (1.2 meter) pulpwood logs by installing high, slatted sides and ends loosely resembling a stock car with doors and roof removed.Crittenden 1966 pp.200-203

Federal railway post office service between Farmington and Phillips ended 13 March 1917.Crittenden 1966 p.168 Freight traffic peaked at 157,809 tons in 1919; but 84 percent of that freight was pulpwood, and demand for pulpwood declined dramatically when federal paper contracts were canceled at the end of World War I. 1919 was the last year of service on the three miles of the former Eustis Railroad beyond Langtown.Crittenden 1966 p.174

Various curtailments of winter service were tried over the following years to reduce operating costs. Winter service was discontinued on the former K&DR north of Kingfield from 21 December 1921 to 1 May 1922. Winter service on the former P&R was discontinued from 15 December 1922 to 1 May 1923.Crittenden 1966 p.175 Eight of the railroad's thirteen operational locomotives were damaged when the Phillips roundhouse burned on 12 February 1923. Josiah Maxcy and Kingfield mill and hotel owner Herbert Wing were appointed receivers when bond interest went unpaid.

Receivership The receivers took control on 8 July 1923 and discontinued freight service north of Perham Junction on the former P&R from 24 November 1923 until 1 June 1924, but passenger train service was continued over the entire system through that winter.Crittenden 1966 pp.177-8 For the next five years, winter freight and passenger service on the former P&R north of Phillips was discontinued from December through May.Jones 1980 pp.215,221,230,233&235 The former F&M remained in service for receiver Wing's mill in Kingfield, and for a Carrabasset wood veneer mill built by the Lawrence Plywood Company in 1924. The veneer mill used surplus World War I tanks to haul logs out of the woods.Jones 1980 p.244

The Phillips shop built internal combustion railcars numbered 3 and 4 in the spring of 1925. These passenger rail motors substituted for steam passenger trains during the summer months until October when snow and ice removal required daily operation of steam locomotives with pony plows.Crittenden 1966 pp.180-1 Railcar number 5 was built during the winter of 1926-27.Crittenden 1966 p.182

Rails were removed from the 1.9-mile (3-km) Mount Abram Branch to Soule's Mill in November 1924 Crittenden 1966 p.179 and from the northern 4.4 miles (7 kilometers) of the former K&DR from Carrabasset to Bigelow in the summer of 1926. In 1927, rails were removed from the P&R extension formerly serving the Rangeley Lake House hotel.Crittenden 1966 pp.183

In 1928 Oxford Paper Company began shipping pulpwood from Barnjum to their mill in Rumford Falls. The receivers operated extra winter trains to Barnjum, and were encouraged to resume full year service over the former P&R commencing 20 May 1929.Jones 1980 p.237 The last steam train left Rangeley in May 1931 and railcar service over the former P&R north of Phillips ended in the autumn of 1931. Following a precedent set three years earlier on the Kennebec Central Railroad, Maxcy suspended all train and railcar service when the last mills shipping their products via the SR&RL transferred their business to highway trucking firms. Two SR&RL highway trucks began carrying express shipments on 8 July 1932, and no trains operated over any part of the railroad through the following winter.

Dismantling After observing reliability of winter truck traffic over Maine State Route 16, the Lawrence Plywood Company petitioned the railroad to resume service from their Carrabasset mill to Farmington. Operations resumed on 17 April 1933, with sale of unused equipment as scrap to meet operating costs. Dismantling of the former P&R began during the summer of 1934, but service to Phillips was required to reach the railroad machine shops; so the receivers petitioned for abandonment when rail removal reached Phillips in April 1935.Jones 1980 p.253 A scrap metal firm purchased the railroad at auction in May and service ended on 2 July 1935.Crittenden 1966 pp.185-9 Remaining rails were lifted for scrap metal in 1936.

Revival

In 1970, a group of local railfans at the Phillips Historical Society formed a project to document the SR&RL. This group eventually formed a separate non-profit organization, the "Sandy River and Rangeley Lakes Railroad", to preserve remaining equipment from the railroad. As of 2023, the non-profit heritage railroad on the trackbed of the original SR&RL at Phillips continues to operate today.

Locomotives NumberBuilderTypeDateWorks numberNotesJones 1980 pp.350-3511Hinkley Locomotive Works Forney locomotive18771251ex-Sandy River Railroad No. 1. Scrapped 1912.2Hinkley Locomotive Works Forney locomotive18771261ex-Phillips and Rangeley Railroad No. 4. Scrapped 1912.3Hinkley Locomotive Works Forney locomotive18841664ex-Franklin and Megantic Railway No. 1. Scrapped 1912.4Baldwin Locomotive Works Forney locomotive18868304ex-Franklin and Megantic Railway No. 2. Scrapped 1912.5Portland Company Forney locomotive1890616ex-Sandy River Railroad No. 4. Scrapped 1919.6Portland Company Forney locomotive1891622ex-Sandy River Railroad No. 5; sold to the Kennebec Central Railroad 1925; preserved as WW&F #97Portland Company Forney locomotive1890615ex-Phillips and Rangeley Railroad No. 1.8Baldwin Locomotive Works Forney locomotive190731826Ordered for the Sandy River Railroad but delivered to the SR&RL. Burned 1923.9Baldwin Locomotive Works Forney locomotive190933550Built new for the SR&RL. Scrapped 1936.10Baldwin Locomotive Works Forney locomotive191642231Built new for the SR&RL. Used on the Farmington to Rangeley main line only. Scrapped 1936.15Baldwin Locomotive Works tender189111706ex-Phillips and Rangeley Railroad No. 3; rebuilt in 1912 as a 2-6-2. Retired 1923.16Baldwin Locomotive Works tender189212964ex-Sandy River Railroad No. 6; rebuilt in 1915 as a 2-6-2. Scrapped 1935.17Baldwin Locomotive Works Forney locomotive189313276ex-Phillips and Rangeley Railroad No. 2. Scrapped 1936.18Baldwin Locomotive Works tender189313733ex-Sandy River Railroad 2nd No. 2. Rebuilt in 1916 as a 2-6-2. New tender built by Baldwin Locomotive Works in 1926. The last locomotive to run on the SR&RL. Scrapped 1936.19Baldwin Locomotive Works tender190423874ex-Sandy River Railroad No. 8. Scrapped 1935.20Baldwin Locomotive Works Forney locomotive190323245ex Eustis Railroad No. 7. Wrecked 1922.21Baldwin Locomotive Works Forney locomotive190423754ex Eustis Railroad No. 8. Scrapped 1935.22Baldwin Locomotive Works Forney locomotive190423755ex Eustis Railroad No. 9. Scrapped 1935.23Baldwin Locomotive Works tender191340733Built new for the SR&RL. Used on the Farmington to Phillips main line only. Scrapped 1936.24Baldwin Locomotive Works tender191951803Built new for the SR&RL. Scrapped 1937.

See also Maine Narrow Gauge Railroad Co. & Museum Brecon Mountain Railway Sandy River and Rangeley Lakes Railroad - heritage operation in Phillips Narrow-gauge railroads in the United States

Notes

References

1895–1914.

External links Sandy River & Rangeley Lakes Railroad web site