Funds needed to continue historic locomotive project   Adam Wright, a Michigan Tech mechanical design and engineering technology student, poses with Old # 3 in the locomotive’Äôs temporary home at Universal Metal Works in Calumet. Wright has spent countless hours rebuilding the vintage steam locomotive, fabricating many of the parts needed.   By Karin Emond   for Keweenaw Today 02/28/01   CALUMET ’Äì A re-birth is underway in the dark, cavernous interior of the former powerhouse of the Calumet and Hecla Mining Company in Calumet. Since April 1999, a vintage steam locomotive, affectionately called ’ÄúOld Number 3,’Äù or officially Calumet and Hecla Engine # 3, has been slowly coming back to life ’Äì and with it, a piece of Copper Country railroading history lost to the area since the late 1940s.   On Saturday, March 3, local residents will have a chance to help support the Houghton County Historical Society and its locomotive restoration project by attending a pancake and French toast breakfast being held from 9 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. at the Copper Country Masonic Lodge, located on U.S. 41, 1.3 miles north of the Quincy Mine Hoist.   In this 1920s photo, the late Elmer Dupuis, left, formerly of Lake Linden, and the late Chris Moehrke, formerly of Hubbell (father of Jim Moehrke of Lake Linden and grandfather of Lake Linden Fire Chief Chris Lajimodiere), sit on the front of Old # 3. (Photo courtesy Jim Moehrke) Calumet is a fitting place for the restoration, since Old # 3 was built for the Calumet and Hecla Mining Company in 1915. She served that company well at its stamp mill in Lake Linden from the date of her construction until 1935, delivering cars full of mine slag to the slag dumps and cars of ore from the stamp mill in Lake Linden to the smelter in Hubbell.   The exact history of Old # 3 after her retirement has been lost in the stamp sands of time. She may have sat idle for years, parked in one of the mining company’Äôs many buildings.   In 1949, Old # 3 appears in a local parade disguised under an artificial new look. A fake cowcatcher and imitation diamond stack had been added to the locomotive. Who made the changes and why remains a mystery, although the locomotive may have been loaned to the Duluth, South Shore & Atlantic Railway for the parade.   At some point, ownership transferred to the Arcadian Mine in Ripley. Although he’Äôs not sure of the exact year, Richard Taylor, Lake Linden resident and Houghton County Historical Society board member, recalls seeing the engine in front of the mine-turned-tourist-attraction as a child when he and his family would travel to the area for vacations in the late 1950s.   The year 1978 brought a homecoming for Old #3. The Arcadian Mine closed, and the Houghton County Historical Museum in Lake Linden became the locomotive’Äôs new owner. Calumet & Hecla # 3 was moved to the museum complex located on the very property where she had spent her youth.   When Old #3 arrived at the complex, the effects of twenty-plus years of constant exposure to the elements while on display at the Arcadian were beginning to show. Her new caretakers quickly took steps to help slow the ravages of time.   Old # 3, her saddle tank in the foreground, is a work in progress at Universal Metal Works in Calumet. In the background is a Copper Range Railroad caboose, found near Gay and rescued from the elements by Dave Sladek, owner of Universal Metal Works. First, they put the saddle tank back in place. It had suffered a lot of moisture-related damage after being removed from its place over the engine boiler and stored on the ground for a time. Next, Plexiglas was placed in the cab window to prevent visitors from touching, playing with and possibly damaging the gauges and levers inside. Coats of new paint kept Old # 3 spruced up. Although the non-authentic cowcatcher was left in place, the fake diamond stack was removed.   However, since the society had only planned to put the locomotive on display, not restore it to running order, certain steps which would have helped preserve # 3 to this end were not taken. Water-caused pitting inside the boiler continued ’Äì fed by moisture entering through the still un-capped boiler stack. Since the locomotive was not covered during the winters, she was left unprotected from snow and ice.   For years Old #3 sat on display in the complex, passing on her history in a quiet way. Her passivity might have continued for years, had not fate stepped in to change the course of her life.   One day, in the summer of 1996, the locomotive caught the attention of Adam Wright of Fenton, Mich. A train buff from a very young age, the 19-year-old Wright, at the behest of his father, was in the area checking out Michigan Technological University as a possible college choice. During a visit to the Houghton County Historical Museum Complex in Lake Linden he saw the locomotive on display. He recalls thinking, as folks sometimes do when looking at historical items, ’ÄúWouldn’Äôt that be neat if someday ’Ķ’Äù But he quickly tucked the idea away as wishful thinking.   In the fall of 1997 Wright began attending MTU. Over Christmas break, he applied for work at the Huckleberry Rail Road, a narrow-gage railroad near Flint, Mich. It was then that his wishful thought became a concrete call to action.   Richard Taylor, Houghton County Historical Society board member, shows the extensive amount of deterioration to the Old #3 locomotive’Äôs cab. The entire cab is being reconstructed not only to repair the damage, but also to accommodate today’Äôs taller people. ’ÄúThe idea (that I could actually do it) sort of just came out of the rough,’Äù Wright recalls.   When classes resumed, he approached his father’Äôs friend Richard Taylor, owner of RailDreams, a model train design business in Lake Linden, and, quite fortuitously, a board member of the Houghton County Historical Society.    Through Taylor’Äôs association with the society, Wright’Äôs dream started to become reality almost immediately.   Wright was so excited about starting the project that he started crawling around under the engine to start checking things out in the middle of that winter. Luckily, it was a year with relatively light snowfall.   Returning after spending the summer of 1998 in Flint, again working as a fireman for the Huckleberry Railroad, Wright was anxious to resume work on the restoration. He recruited a number of fellow Michigan Tech students to help him, and the project kicked into high gear with the engine undergoing a thorough inspection.    The abuses suffered in the 50-plus years since her retirement had taken their toll on the stalwart little engine and were evident during the inspection. At some point and for a lengthy amount of time gauging by the damage on the firebox, coal had been left in her cab. The sulfur in the coal reacted with water to form sulfuric acid, which in turn corroded the firebox. A half-inch hole was left in the front left corner of the firebox where grate holders had held the coal more tightly against the metal. Unremoved magnesium silicate insulation inside the cab resulted in pitting of the boiler shell. The smoke box was extremely pitted because it had not been properly clean out or capped off.   Limited by the open-air working conditions and Wright’Äôs summertime absences, the restoration crew realized they needed an indoor facility ’Äì especially since the locomotive would have to be almost entirely torn apart and stay that way for a long time in order to restore it.   Enter another area train and local history buff, David Sladek. A member of the board for the Coppertown Museum in Calumet and owner of Universal Metal Works, Sladek was glad to help the project by donating the use of his facility.   ’ÄúThey needed a place to work; I had it,’Äù he says of his decision.   On April 24,1999, the train was hoisted from its place on the museum grounds and taken to Sladek’Äôs shop in Calumet for the next step of the restoration. The facility provided not only a heated, indoor work area, but all the heavy equipment needed to hoist and move the locomotive’Äôs heavy pieces. The giant lap-seam boiler was the first part of the locomotive to receive attention since Old # 3 would not be allowed to operate without a state-certified boiler.   Adam Wright makes an adjustment to one of the control gauges on the locomotive. After being removed from the locomotive, steam cleaned, sand blasted and pressure tested, the boiler was sent to Escanaba for refurbishing by Pentecost Construction of Marquette.   Meanwhile, work on the rest of the locomotive continued in Calumet.   Memorial Day 2000 was a big day for those associated with the project. The 85-year-old locomotive moved 20 feet! Not with the help of a truck or a crane, but ’Äì for the first time in many, many decades ’Äì on her own. Since then, the restoration has slowly but steadily been progressing.   Like any project there have been setbacks when volunteer labor or funds dried up or budgeted items ended up costing more than expected, but so far the society has been able to keep the project pretty much on track.   ’ÄúMany, many times the project could have stalled or fallen completely, but being a man of God, I’Äôve lifted my concerns up to God. Not only had He come through, but in more ways that I thought possible,’Äù says Wright of the way things have managed to work out for the project.   The firebox of the fully restored, state-certified boiler. Each of the 65 tubes contained in the boiler was hand-welded in place. When the boiler refurbishing ran more than 200 % over budget and it looked like the project would have to be put on hold waiting for more funds, a significant unexpected donation was made.   As the restoration of # 3 to her youthful appearance and performance nears completion, there is still plenty more that needs to be done. The cab still needs to be rebuilt, and a tender and rock-car-replica passenger cars need to be constructed. The track bed and rail needs to be laid and the engine house built.   ’ÄúThere’Äôs another five years of work to be done,’Äù says Taylor, ’Äúand if we don’Äôt get grants or volunteers to get stuff done, we’Äôre looking at many more years.’Äù    Volunteers, money and donations of necessary materials such as rail track or construction materials can always be put to good use. A $10,000 grant from the Upper Peninsula Power Company will help pay for the construction of the engine house behind the Mineral Range Rail Depot already on the complex, and a $20,000 grant from the Houghton County Board will provide seed money to obtain matching grants.   Although Calumet and Hecla # 3 will be on hand to welcome visitors to the museum this summer, the failure to secure key grant monies means that plans for the summer 2001 opening of the Lake Linden & Torch Lake Railroad as a fully operational tourist steam train have had to be curtailed. While the goal is to have 1.2 miles of track touring the 19-acre Historical Museum Complex, the rail bed and track for the line will have to be put in as donations of material, money or labor allow.   ’ÄúThere were lots of nay-sayers. It is terrific getting this done,’Äù says Taylor, for whom this project is as much a diversion as a mission.   He and other Houghton County Historical Society members see the Lake Linden & Torch Lake Railroad expanding into the neighboring Village of Lake Linden Park and providing visitors with a unique way to travel between the village campground and park areas and the museum complex. Looking even further down the track, they hope that the railroad can grow into a line running from the museum in Lake Linden to the Quincy smelting complex in Ripley. If accomplished, this would successfully bring about a re-birth of steam-powered rail transportation in the area, something not seen since 1952 when the Copper Range Railroad retired its two remaining steam engines.   Who knows, with your help, maybe someday the chug of a steam-powered train and the wail of the whistle will again echo through the valley along the Portage Canal. Anyone interested in making a donation of labor, material or money to the restoration of Old # 3 and the Lake Linden & Torch Lake Railroad projects can contact the Houghton County Historical Society at (906) 296-4121 or Taylor at (906) 296-0462. The Society’Äôs address is 550 M-26, Lake Linden, MI 49945.   Editor’Äôs Note: Karin Emond of Green Bay, Wis., is a guest writer for Keweenaw Today. A former reporter and photographer for The Daily Mining Gazette, Karin enjoys returning to the Copper Country to visit her old haunts.