This isn't true Frisco but I was wondering about an article or photos I ran across about a possible narrow guage operation at the Ash Grove Cement plant at Ash Grove back in the steam days. If I remember correctly, the line was used from the quarry to the crushers to haul limestone. Any truth to this or is it another example of my faulty memory? If true it would offer an excellent modeling opportunity. Thank you. Larry F.
Early Greene Cnty plats show an "internal" railroad at Ash Grove Lime. Whether it is or isn't NG will require some looking.
Ash Grove Limekiln (that's the spelling in the ETT) was located at MP C-182.2. The May 6, 1923 ETT lists a siding, connected at both ends, with a capacity of 69 cars. A 1904 Greene County Plat shows an internal railroad that carried limestone from the quarry to kilns. The Ash Grove Lime railroad had no physical connection with the Frisco which lends credence to the contention that it was narrow gauge. Note the wye at the west side of the complex. I believe that remnants of the kilns lasted into the late 50's.
Thanks Karl...for once my memory didn't fail me. If memory serves me (ha-ha), the photo I saw showed a dinky steamer (maybe a 0-4-0) coupled to some side dump rock cars of two axles. If I would ever get my act together and make a filing system, I wouldn't go through all this. Thanks again.
Let's see if I can attach an image - Sorry, but I sangged this from a 1904 MO quarry publication. But one can see the "tram" trackage up the trestle.
Thanks, Old Guy, for the photo. It must be a lot more rigid than it looks because I don't know that I would walk up it! Larry
The Sanborn fire insurance maps digitized by the U. of Missouri include some detailed maps of the Ash Grove Lime and Portland Cement Co., including its internal tramway. The facility straddled the Frisco mainline, with the quarry tramline crossing over the standard-gauge on an elevated bridge. (Just the thing to hide a transition to hidden track!) You can browse the Ash Grove (and other) maps here: http://mulibraries.missouri.edu/specialcollections/sanborna.htm The 1921 maps of the lime plant show an interesting arrangement, about a mile south of the lime plant, in which the narrow-gauge quarry tram evidently dumped coal into a bunker, from which it was carried to a powerhouse on a pond bank by a cable hoist tram. There are also indications that not all tram tracks are shown, since the 1921 map of the main facility shows a "round house" adjacent to the NG tracks with no visible tracks entering it. It might be an interesting prototype for a narrow-gauge switching layout or a G-scale narrow gauge "light railway" with a Frisco connection. Note that the 1921 map also shows what appears to be a transfer track between the different gauges, presumably for coal, equipment and supplies (explosives?) delivered in standard-gauge cars.
Bradley, thanks for the heads up on the Sanborn maps. The area was a lot more intriguing than I first thought...lots of possibilities. I find it most interesting and gratifying that somewhere there is a photo or information on any subject one can think of asking about. What I find even more gratifying is the willingness of people to share that information. Larry
Don't want to wander off topic too far, but I looked at the Sanborn maps for Joplin, 1906. On one map, that covered the area around Main 7th to 15th streets you can clearly see the StL & SF marked where it came around the "balloon" loop and split to the two westbound lines. There are two other RR's noted. The MP and what is marked "KC, FS & Mo"? 1906...obviously post-Memphis Route time. What is this? Sanborn was not inclined to err, as I recall.
It was the winter of 74-75, and we are looking South(RR) on the 1.5% climb from the Sac River valley to Ash Grove. The overpass in the image is at MP C182.1 and it carries the present named CO Road 68 over the Ash Grove Sub. Another tenth of a mile beyond (RR south) was "Limekiln" and the Ash Grove White Lime kilns and plant. When I took the photo there were but trace of the operation depicted in the previous photo and plat. The rock in the cut is the Burlington Limestone, and it shows its typical cutter and pinnacle surface.
