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The Freight Trains Stopped in 1968. Essex Still Runs Steam to a Riverboat. · The Red Solo Traveler Podcast

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Red Solo Traveler Podcast. So I want
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: you to imagine trying to save an endangered animal, right?
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: Okay, I'm picturing it.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: But instead of actually saving it, you just like stuff it.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: You put it behind temperature-controlled glass and you read a
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: little blast plaque about what it used to do.
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: Right, like a diorama.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Exactly. And that is how we usually treat historical preservation.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: We just kind of pacify it.
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: And make it safe.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, totally. But today, we are looking at a stack
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: of historical archives, state park records, old engineering specs, and
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: we want to understand a very different approach.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: A much louder approach.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: Oh, absolutely. We're unpacking a piece of history that still
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: literally eats two tons of coal a day.
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: Which is wild to think about.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: It is. So our mission for this exploration is to
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: examine the Valley Railroad in Essex, Connecticut. And we really
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: want to ask you a specific question. What does it
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: actually mean to preserve a working lime?
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: Right, because this isn't about, you know, fuzzy nostalgia or
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: just trying to travel back in time.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: No, not at all. It's about the only remaining steam
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: train to riverboat connection left in the United States.
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: And the sources we're looking at really force us to
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: completely redefine what preservation even looks like. I mean, we're
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: evaluating a machine that still sweats, spits steam, and just
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: operates out in the elements.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: It's alive.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. It's alive. But to understand the significance of
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: this working remnant today, we kind of need to dig
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: into why the original infrastructure was built in the first place,
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: you know, going all the way back to 1871.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: Let's start there, because the origins of this Hartford to
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: Saybrook line, they aren't based on some romantic vision of
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: steam travel. It was purely practical.
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: Oh, entirely about money and efficiency.
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: Right. So a man named James C. Walkley, who was
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: actually the president of the Charter Oak Life Insurance Company,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: He secured a state charter for the Valley Railroad in 1868.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: And the route they ultimately chose to build, it wasn't just,
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: you know, a straight line drawn on a map by
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: some boardroom executive.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: No, geography completely dictated the path.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the builders intentionally chose the West Bank of the
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: Connecticut River. And the engineering specs from the time tell
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: us exactly why.
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: I mean, the river had already done all the geological
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: heavy lifting millions of years ago, right?
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: Exactly. The valley floor was naturally flat. For 19th century
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: railroad engineers, this was just the ultimate dream scenario.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Oh, I bet.
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: Because in the 1870s, blasting through solid granite required volatile
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: black powder. It was immense, dangerous manual labor.
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: Right. And spanning massive chasms meant erecting those really expensive,
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: complex iron bridges. Yeah.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: But by simply hugging the west bank of the river
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: from Hartford down to Sabre Point, they just avoided all
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: of that. Wow. There were no mountains to blast through.
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: meaning zero tunnels to dig.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: That's incredible.
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: Right. And there were no major gaps to cross, meaning
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: no massive bridges. So construction started in 1870. And because
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: the terrain was so forgiving, they were able to run
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: a 45-mile ceremonial train by July 29, 1871.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: So thinking about that geographical convenience, I like to think
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: of it this way. The train wasn't some violent industrial
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: disruptor tearing up the landscape. Right. It was essentially just
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: a physical extension of the river itself, like nature's highway,
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: just paved with steel and wooden ties.
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: That's a great way to look at it.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, because the river was already the established road for trade.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: The train simply became the year-round, all-weather version of the boat.
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: It ran parallel to the water because water always finds
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: the path of least resistance.
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: And that natural corridor worked brilliantly for a few decades.
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: The valley was just humming with manufacturing, and the train
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: moved those goods efficiently.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: But nothing lasts forever.
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: No, it doesn't. The historical archives show us that technological
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: shifts and, well, the rise of the automobile eventually eroded
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: that necessity. What we see in the records is that
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: changing modern habits didn't just hurt the valley line. They
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: fundamentally destroyed its original purpose. And this destruction happened in
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: two very distinct phases.
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: Wait, hold on. Two distinct phases. That sounds like a
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: technicality to me. Because the trope you always see in
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: movies is that when a railroad dies, it's this sudden
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: dramatic tragedy.
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: Right, for sure. The cinematic ending.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah. The final whistle blows. The station master chains the
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: gate shut with a tear in his eye. And the
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: town just turns into a ghost town overnight. So how
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: does a railroad die twice? Well.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: History lazily mashes closures into a single event, but the
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: archives demand precision here. The Valley Line really requires us
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: to look at two separate endings.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: Okay, I'm listening.
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: The first death was the loss of people. Passenger service
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: on the line ended entirely in 1933.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: 1933, so right in the middle of the Great Depression.
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: Exactly. You have to consider that economic context. Plus, the
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: rise of personal automobiles and newly paved roads... had already
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: been eating into ticket sales. Economic crash just finished the job.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: So the human element was completely stripped from the line.
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: The passenger stations emptied out, but the physical trains were
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: actually still moving.
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: So the people abandoned the route, but the cargo kept
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: it alive.
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: For a time, yeah. And that brings us to the
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: second death, which was the loss of purpose.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: Even without passengers, the free trains kept rolling along the
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: West Bank. But as trucking became the dominant force in
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: American logistics after World War II... That freight traffic steadily dwindled.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: Right. Trucks took over everything.
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah. By the 1960s, it was down to a single
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: weekly train. And finally, in March 1968, that weekly run
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: died completely.
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: Wow. 1968. Yeah.
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: And this happened right as the New Haven Railroad, the
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: company that had been running the line for decades, disappeared
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: into the ill-fated Penn Central merger.
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: I see the distinction now. I was totally wrong about
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: the ghost town thing. It was a 35-year bleed.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: A very slow bleed, yeah.
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: The people left, and then three and a half decades
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: of slow decay passed before the cargo finally followed suit.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And when Penn Central absorbed those assets in 1968,
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: they looked at their ledgers and saw absolutely no use
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: for this failing, overgrown, 45-mile branch.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: Just dead weight to them.
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: Pretty much. From a corporate standpoint, the only value left
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: was a scrap metal. So they prepared to rip up
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: the steel tracks... sell off the iron, and just let
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: the forest reclaim the right-of-way.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: But the complete erasure of the line never actually happened, right?
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: No, it didn't.
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: Because when you look at the state park records, that
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: final death of the freight service in 68 triggered a
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: highly specific rescue mission.
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: A really localized one, yeah.
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the local volunteers in the state of Connecticut just
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: refused to let the rails be pulled up. In 1969,
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: volunteers secured a temporary lease to stop the scrapping.
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: Which was a huge first step.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: And then the state made a brilliantly forward-thinking move. Between
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: 1969 and 1970, the state took over the corridor and
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: designated it a linear state park.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: Which is such a unique concept.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: It really is. They protected the physical path. And then
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: on June 1, 1970, they leased about 22.7 miles of
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: that track, which is roughly half of the original run
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: to a newly formed Valley Railroad company.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: And the timing of what they did next is honestly
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: the most profound statement of intent ever. in this entire discussion.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: Oh, absolutely.
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: These volunteers spent a year doing heavy track work, clearing brush,
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: and repairing equipment. And they didn't just casually start running
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: trains again on whatever random Tuesday they happened to finish.
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: They scheduled their inaugural run of steam out of Essex
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: to Deep River for July 29, 1971. Which is exactly
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: 100 years to the day after the very first ceremonial train.
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: Ran in 1871. Exactly. It was a deliberate....
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: Targeted answer to the abandonment, they were reclaiming a century
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: of history on the exact anniversary of its inception.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: That gives me chills, honestly.
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: I know, right? They weren't just playing trains. They were
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: resurrecting a specific industrial corridor.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: And I want to pause here because if you are
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: listening to this and picturing a pristine, quiet museum on
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: wheels right now, you need to erase that image from
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: your mind completely.
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: Yes, please. Do not call this a museum on wheels. Never.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: If you want the indoor half of this history... You know,
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: the brass plaques, the fragile artifacts, the sterile climate control,
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: the Connecticut River Museum is a fantastic facility. It's just
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: a few blocks down the street from the Essex Station.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: Highly recommended for that specific experience.
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: Yes, definitely. But the Valley Railroad operation is absolutely not that.
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: No. Calling the Valley Railroad a museum fundamentally misrepresents the
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: mechanics of what is actually happening on those tracks.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: Totally.
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: The locomotive at the head of the Consist Valley Railroad,
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: known 40, is a massive piece of heavy machinery. It
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: is an ALCL Mikado built in August 1920.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: 1920. So this thing is over a century old. Yeah.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: And when we look at the engineering specs, the term
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: Mikado refers to its specific wheel arrangement. It's a 282.
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: Meaning what exactly?
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: It means it has two smaller leading wheels to guide
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: it into curves, eight massive driving wheels that provide the
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: sheer pulling power required for heavy freight, and two trailing wheels.
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: Got it. And those trailing wheels are crucial. because they
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: support a massive firebox. And that firebox still burns actual coal.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: Which is crazy to see in person.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the operating specs note the known 40 consumes about
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: two tons of coal during a standard working day.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: Two tons. So choosing to experience this operation in Essex
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: is honestly like choosing to adopt a working farm dog
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: instead of a pampered show poodle.
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: That is the perfect analogy.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: Right, because it's dirty work. It smells strongly of burning
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: coal smoke, hot lubricating oil, ancient steel. It is loud.
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: You hear the rhythmic exhausting of steam and the clanking
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: of the side rods.
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, you feel it in your chest.
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: And the fireman in the cab is physically shoveling coal
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: into a raging fire to boil water and create the
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: pressure that moves the pistons. I mean, it is a
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: visceral sensory experience of heavy industry just laboring in the elements.
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: But because it is a working remnant, a rescued 22-mile
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: stub rather than the original unbroken run to Hartford.
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: There is a strict physical limitation to the journey.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: The train can only take you so far up the
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: line before the restored track simply ends.
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: And that geographical hard stop creates a really unique problem
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: for the passengers. Like, how do you continue the journey
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: when the tracks literally run out? Right. And that limitation
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: is exactly what forces the next step of this exploration,
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: which is the handoff to the water.
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So the logistics of the ride play out kind
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: of like this. You board the coach at the 1892
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: Essex Station.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: The northbound run takes about 25 minutes, and with switching,
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: your total time on the train before the transfer is
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: roughly 35 minutes.
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: Isn't that a decent ride?
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and you are deeply immersed in the west bank
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: of the river. You roll through dense woods, you hear
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: the steam whistle echoing off the trees at the grade crossings,
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: and you pass through expansive tidal wetlands.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: You see beautiful places like Post Cove and the Florence
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: Bidwell Sanctuary. It is incredibly scenic. But you are entirely
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: restricted to looking at marshland and the ghosts of the
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: old West Bank town stations.
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: Which brings us to Deep River Landing.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: Now, historically, when the old freight trains were hauling cargo
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: prior to 1968, they used to just roll right past
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: Deep River. It wasn't a major destination at all. But today,
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: it is the absolute thesis of this entire operation.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: Okay, let me stop you there, because the logistics of
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: this transfer make zero sense on the surface.
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: No, so.
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: Well, people are buying a ticket to ride a historic
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: 1920s steam train. Why on earth would the operators force
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: everyone to get off the train they just paid to ride,
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: walk down a dock, and board a Mississippi-style riverboat called
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: the Becky Thatcher?
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: Because it goes right back to the geography that James
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: Walkley leveraged back in 1868.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: Oh, the flat valley floor? Yeah.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: The train is completely geographically trapped on the West Bank.
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: If you stay in the rail coach, your view is
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: inherently limited by the trees and the shoreline.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: Right, because you're hugging the bank.
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: Exactly. You cannot fully see the Connecticut River, which is
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: the massive working natural road that made the railroad necessary
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: in the first place. From the confines of the train.
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: Wow. Okay. That makes sense.
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: So to actually consume the landscape of the river valley,
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: you have to get out onto the water.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: So the boat exists to show you everything the train
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: is basically blind to?
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: The boat exists to show you the east bank. The
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: east bank of the river features some of the most
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: significant architectural and historical sites in the region. And they
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: were intentionally designed to be read from the water.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: Because the river was the highway.
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: Exactly. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the river
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: was the primary avenue of arrival. If you had wealth
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: or power, you displayed it to the river traffic, not
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: the woods behind your property. From the train window, you
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: aren't going to get a good look at Gillette Castle,
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: for example.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: Oh, William Gillette's stone fortress in East Haddam.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: Yes, that's the one.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: For those who don't know, he was the stage actor
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: who famously defined the visual role of Sherlock Holmes for
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: early audiences. He took his massive theatrical fortune and built
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: this imposing, medieval-looking stone pile of High up on the
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: east bluff, it literally looks like a river fortress.
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: And just a bit further along that same east bank,
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: you have the Goodspeed Opera House.
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: Oh, that building is stunning.
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: It really is. It is a towering, ornate Victorian structure
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: that stages musicals right on the edge of the riverbank.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: And the architects built its grand facade facing the water
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: because the patrons arrived by steamboat.
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: That's wild to think about. Right.
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: And neither of these massive landmarks makes for a good
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: train window postcard. Hmm. They're the reason the riverboat is
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: a mandatory part of the journey.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: And the boat ride itself lasts about an hour and
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: 15 minutes. And the narration along the way really hammers
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: home the fact that this river is a working road
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: with a turbulent history.
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: Definitely.
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: You sail past Eustacia Island, which has its own weird
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: agricultural history of being completely cut and harvested for Christmas
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: trees before returning to a wild state.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: Which is such a strange visual.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: I know, right? But the really fascinating environmental marker out
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: there is Selden Neck.
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: Oh, Selden Neck is amazing. It's the largest island in
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: the Connecticut River. Today, it is a state park accessible
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: only by boat, completely devoid of major structures.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: But its geography is a testament to the sheer uncontrollable
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: power of the environment here. The narrators on the boat
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: still talk about the 1938 hurricane.
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: And for very good reason.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: You know, a hurricane in New England sounds almost out
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: of place, but the impact was just devastating.
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: Unbelievably so. The 1938 storm was a Category 3 hurricane
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: that pushed a massive storm surge straight up the Connecticut
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: River estuary.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: It didn't just flood the valley. The sheer volume and
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: velocity of the water violently rearranged the sandbars, eroded the banks,
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: and permanently altered the navigation channels around Selden Neck. The
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: storm literally reshaped the island.
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: That is terrifying. Yeah.
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: So when you are standing on the top deck of
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: the Becky Thatcher... feeling the wind, and looking at those
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: carved shorelines, you are looking at the aftermath of natural
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: violence that the railroad had to survive alongside.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: Right, because the tracks were submerged, the riverbed shifted, and
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: the environment dictated the terms of survival.
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: Completely.
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: So after you take in that hour and 15-minute cruise,
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: the boat brings you back to Deep River Landing, you
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: wait on the dock while the schedules overlap, you watch
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: the next group of passengers step off the incoming train,
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: and then you climb back aboard your coach, the crew
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: throws the switches... And the ALCO Mikado works in reverse,
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: pulling you back south through the woods to Essex.
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: And that entire synchronized loop takes about two and a
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: half hours.
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: Which brings us to the defining question of this entire exploration.
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: When we evaluate the sources and the physical reality of
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: the Valley Railroad today, did Essex actually save the Valley Railroad?
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: Or did they just save a ride that happens to
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: use the Valley Railroad's leftover track?
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: Well, if we are looking at the evidence objectively... It
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: is absolutely the second thing.
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree.
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: They saved a two and a half hour ride that
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: utilizes a 22 mile remnant of the original 45 mile infrastructure.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: But here is the crucial distinction. They do it honestly.
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: Yes, exactly.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: They aren't selling a fake sanitized illusion of a 19th
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: century journey to Hartford that doesn't exist anymore. The product
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: they are selling is the handoff at Deep River.
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: You're selling the physical dirty sensation of burning coal, the
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: mechanical reality of the 1920s, and the geographical reality of
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: the river valley.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: And that honesty is why the ticket still holds its value.
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: If you want to understand the river as a working road,
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: this handoff is honestly the most authentic way to do it.
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: But if you are looking to understand the broader story
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: of this shoreline, you know, you do have other historical options.
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: You just need to be smart about how you pair them.
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: Right. We mentioned the Connecticut River Museum right there in
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: Essex earlier. That is your pairing for the indoor, deeply
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: explained history of the river itself.
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: Right, if you want the artifacts and the quiet reading experience. Exactly.
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: And if you want to dive into the eccentric architecture
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: of the East Bank, you make Gillette Castle its own
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: dedicated stop across the water. Or you could explore Mystic
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: Seaport to understand the coastal maritime history of the state.
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: But the one piece of logistical advice to really take
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: away from these travel notes is, Do not attempt to
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: stack the steam train, Gillette Castle, and Mystic Seaport onto
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: one exhausting single-day itinerary.
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: Oh, you would be miserable.
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: You really would. Mystic is a sprawling village you have
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: to walk. The Valley Railroad is a linear corridor you
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: have to ride. They require entirely different paces and mindsets.
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so just let the train and the riverboat be
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: their own distinct, immersive experience. As we wrap up this
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: discussion for you today, we really want to leave you
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: with a thought to mull over. We've spent this entire
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: journey talking about how Essex preserved a piece of industrial history,
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: not by cleaning it up and putting it in a
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: glass case, but by forcing it to keep working.
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: Sweating, burning coal and facing the elements.
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: Exactly. And it makes you wonder if the truest, most
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: honest way to preserve the past is to keep it
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: laboring in the real world. What other saved pieces of
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: human history are we secretly ruining right now?
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: That is such a good question.
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: Right. Like what machines, what buildings, what mechanical tools are
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: just slowly dying because we've trapped them safely behind museum
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: glass instead of just letting them do the jobs they
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: were built to do?
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: Because the impulse to protect history often strips it of
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: its context.
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: You know, we like things categorized and clean, but the
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: reality of human progress has always been dirty, loud, and
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: constantly moving. Definitely.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Keep that in mind next time you look at a
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: perfectly polished artifact. Thanks for joining us on this journey.