Inter library loan

[Mike the Choochoo Nix]

We all would like to have access to every book on railroads that was ever printed, but none of us has the money to buy them all or the space to keep them. The answer to that is to use the inter library loan system. You can get just about any book to read for two weeks just for the cost of the postage to your local library. It is an inexpensive  way for all of us to increase our knowledge about the trains we like.
Of course we should buy our "keepers" from the museum.

I've used this system many times, especially for out of print books.

Mike Nix

[Bernie Perch]

I have used this system to borrow the books "Rails Around Gold Hill" and "Colorado Midland" among others.  The system works very well, but one should have someone at the receiving library note the condition of the books when they arrive.  The above mentioned two, and "The Shay Locomotive" were published by the same outfit and the binding tends to break and the covers come off.  I believe at least one, if not both the above came to me that way.  I own a copy of "The Shay Locomotive" (purchased new at Seashore Trolley Museum for about $20--that really shows my age), and it is well used and highly patched in these areas.

Bernie Perch

[Ed Lecuyer]

Thanks Mike for a great tip!

What resources are "must reads" for the Maine Two Foot/WW&F enthusiast who wants to know as much as possible about these little railroads?

I nominate:

"The Maine Two Footers" by Linwood Moody (2nd Edition)
"Two Feet To Tidewater" by Jones (2nd Edition)

Both would also make excellent Christmas gifts and can be ordered through our museum store.

Any others?

[Duncan Mackiewicz]

How about 2 feet between the rails...if you can find a copy.
Duncan

[Dana Deering]

"Busted and Still Running" is a nice introduction to the Bridgton & Saco River and "Big Dreams and Little Wheels" is a great read about the WW&F.  The chapter entitled "Stories Told and Retold" is priceless.  Another great book is "My First Sixty Years in Harrison, Maine" by Ernest Ward, a one time B&SR brakeman.  There are some nice, but all too short, personal reminicenses (sp) of his time on the railroad (working the log train, getting pinched between two boxcars while coupling on a curve with link and pin, number 5's wreck at Perleys Mills, etc.).

[Keith Taylor]

The Maine Scenic Route by H. Temple Crittenden. H.T. Crittenden was a prolific writer on railroad topics, and his drawings of Maine Two Foot Guage equipment have been re-printed in most of the scholarly volumes on the topic ever since. Crittenden interviewed many of the SR&RL's employees, in the days when quite a few were still alive. His storytelling ability is very engaging, but he also did the research on political and financial doings on the roads. Other works by him tend to cover narrow gauge and industrial lines. Another non Maine and non Two Foot Gauge book he wrote was, "The Comp'ny" the story of Virginia's Surrey, Sussex and Southampton, RR a 3' gauge lumber road, owned by the Surrey Lumber Co. Also a good read; and two of that lines steam locomotives (both Baldwins) still exist.