Slightly OT, But Puts Our Reproduction Efforts to Shame

Great Western · **Posted:** Mon Oct 09, 2023 4:59 pm

BM765 wrote:

I've said before, that the railway preservation industry, steam in particular, need to take a hard look at the steam traction hobby for some lessons. I like to attend a couple steam tractor meets each year. The first thing I always notice is how many young people are involved and incredibly knowledgeable. Secondly, I don't get the impression that these folks are wealthy per say. Most tend to be farmers with great appreciation for their heritage and are extremely passionate about preserving these machines. The resourcefulness they must have to pull it off is incredible. If we could find a way to cross transfer just a fraction of the skill set, ambition and resourcefulness of that hobby over to railway preservation we'd be in good shape.

The Andersons can be found at the Western Minnesota Steam Threshers Reunion at Rollag, MN every Labour Day weekend. I posted about that organization's railway operation on RYPN a few years back.
More to BM765's post above, the show at Rollag was essentially founded by farmers and is operated as a fully volunteer organization. It has a fully operating railway, as the accompanying link below shows. I was there last year and there were two steam locos in operation constantly during the event.
Rollag has plenty of young people who are very active and not afraid to get dirty! It was also the home to "The Ladies of Steam." These amazing young women formed their group to promote steam operation and knowledge for women, and they have done a magnificent job. I think other organizations could look that up and see how it is organized.
Here is the thread for WMSTR:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=38558&p=238511&hilit=western+minnesota+steam+threshers+reunion#p238511