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PROTOTYPE NARROW GAUGE
A 1:1 Decauville Micro
Layout!
 Steve Bennett, of Black
Dog Mining Co. fame, kindly
forwarded these photos of Decauville portable railways displayed at a model railway
show. The gauge is 40 cm (15.75") and the diameter of the circles, 4 metres (about
13').
The French firm of Decauville was one of the world's leading suppliers of industrial
narrow-gauge equipment and trackage, and these carefully-restored items of prototype
"snap track" date from the 1890's.
The overall length of the Decauville skip wagon is 3' (90 cm) and the frames are
a little over 2' wide (60 cm). The skip itself is 1 metre wide (3' 3"). The
original wheels and axleboxes/journals were replaced by the British firm, Robert
Hudson, sometime in the last 20 years--but for completeness these are 9" (23
cm) diameter curved spoked, with a tread width of 2" (5 cm).
This material was displayed at a model exhibition in Leeds, England during March
2003 by the Narrow Gauge Railway Society. The equipment is privately owned.
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PROTOTYPE NARROW GAUGE
U.S. Industrial Railway
in 1915
Bill Chestnut, who lives in Bridgeton,
New Jersey, forwarded these archive photos of a narrow gauge railway serving the
Cumberland Glass Manufacturing Co. in Bridgeton, about 1915. In the photo above,
the battery-powered locomotive looks like a homemade unit. It features two large
battery boxes, a frequent feature of early battery locos. Using one box provided
slow speed, and adding the second shifted into "high"! The "train"
comprises a flat car loaded with crates of glass bottles, ready for shipment.
Bill found these glass lantern slides in the files of the Bridgeton Antiquarian League,
of which he is vice president. The photographer was Clayton
McPherson. Below are two more lantern slides from the set, which must have been used
to illustrate a lecture on the glass industry. One of the primary products of the
Cumberland plant, c. 1915, were the famous cobalt blue bottles used for Bromo Seltzer.
They all left the factory on these narrow-gauge rails (looks like about 18"
gauge)!
Anyone who has some more information about this early industrial railway is requested
to get in touch with Bill at the League's address. Meantime, he's begun a Gn15 layout
based on the little line!
 
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