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Excerpt from Canadian Rail, March 1970:
Steam in New Hampshire's Crawford Notch?
A narrow defile in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, Crawfrod Notch is a favourite route for Montrealers on their way to New England seashore summer vacations. So it has been since the Portland & Ogdensburg Railroad was opened in 1875. As late as 1949 through coaches were run between Portland and Montreal, but now most of the "Notch travellers" traverse it on the highway. The rail line is still there and is still one of the most scenic lines in the EAst, but it carries only freight trains and occassional excursion for rail enthusiasts. The popularity of these excursions may well have prompted the plan to operate steam-powered passenger trains between the old Maine Central Railroad division point of Bartlett, N.H., where most of the facilities are still available and Crawford Notch station at the crest of the long 2% grade. Trains would run a short distance father to Fabyans, where the locomotive could be turned on a reconstructed "y".
The Crawford Notch Steam Railroad Company has been organized by Messrs. Edward Clark of Clark's Trading Post and White Mountain Central Railroad (North Woodstock, N.H.), George McAvoy, Manager of the Crawford House (only a short distance from Crawford Notch station), Douglas Philbrook, Manager of the Mount Washington Summit Road (Pinkham Notch, N.H.), Ambassador Robert C. Hill (Littleton, N.H.) and James T. McFate of the Hanover Inn (Hanover, N.H.). The Company has been granted permission by the Public Utilities Commission of the State of New Hampshire to operate a train over the Maine Central Railroad between Milepost 70 (Bartlett) and Milepost 90 (Fabyans).
The train will consist of equipment leased from Steamtown Foundation's museum and will probably include 4-6-2 locomotive No. 127 (formerly Canadian Pacific No. 1271)(class G5d) or one of several other G5's at Steamtown, hauling coaches from the Central Railroad of New Jersey. It is anticipated that development costs may be of the order of $350,000 and that 75,000 passengers will be carried in the summer season. Tickets will be sold at both ends of the line. Trains will operate in the daytime only, so as not to interfere with MEC's freights, which run at night. The line between Bartlett and Crawford Notch and onward to Fabyans is sometimes adjacent to the highway, but the section between Notchland and Crawford Notch, while visible from the highway at considerable distance is only accessible (for photography) to strong climbers!