Full steam ahead: Second steam engine with Great Smoky Mountains Railroad to be restored

By REX HODGE

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    DILLSBORO, North Carolina (WLOS) — Not long ago, the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad restored an old steam engine. It’s being credited with increasing ridership for excursions through our mountains. Now, there’s work under way to restore a second steam engine.

Crews at the Dillsboro work yard of the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad have a destination in mind.

“We’re going from the ground up,” says Steam Shop Foreman Marshal Harris. “Everything on it is going to be refurbished.”

He’s heading up restoration of steam engine 722.

“It’s a passion. It’s not just a job,” he says.

Built more than a century ago, 722 belonged to Southern Railway and hauled freight between Asheville and Murphy into the 1950’s. The Great Smoky Mountains Railroad secured the engine in 2000, to add a second steam engine to its fleet of mainly diesels, and to complement the relaunch of steam engine 1702, seven years ago.

For now, 722 is in pieces — both the cab where an engineer would blow the whistle, and the tender that held fuel and water sit outside, while the frame inside the work shed is getting a facelift.

The wheels and the boiler have been shipped off to a Pennsylvania company.

“They have the tooling to do it,” says Harris.

Eventually, all parts will come back together, with a fuel conversion from coal to oil.

“Once you see it move on its own, it’s kind of surreal,” Harris says.

For Harris and his colleagues, it’s a labor of love.

“You consider it part of you,” says Eddie Morrow. “You get to come home, sometimes take a little bit with you. It could be some of the smoke. It could be some of the dirt, grease.”

“Where else can you work on something–going to be 120 years old next year and watch it come back to life?” questions James Taylor.

Harris says a steam engine becomes family. He figures his great-grandfather-in railroading in Asheville knew this one.

“His hands have probably been on this engine,” he says.

Harris says the lore of a steam engine with the whistle and chug adds romance. 1702 is proving to add more ridership for the railroad, and 722 is on track to arrive soon.

“We’re going to use it as an excursion engine to broaden our capabilities to haul more passengers,” Harris says. “We want to offer more steam excursions and maybe eventually get into year-round steam locomotive excursions.”

Harris says the engine’s return will remind many of the important role trains played in the mountains, before big highways, bringing supplies, and even comfort to those struggling.

“They would come along the railroad tracks and the firemen would pitch them some coal to give them a little help, keep their houses warm in the wintertime,” he says. “This right here signified like, ‘Hey, I can go out and see the rest of the world.’ Really, this built the country.”

When the restoration is done, Harris says train traditions will be followed.

“There’s a little superstition–involved that it won’t fire good for you if you don’t give it a little snack. Oh, if you have a sausage biscuit you better give it piece,” he says.

The destination for is for 722 to be chugging along sometime in 2026.

“The reward outweighs the hard work ten-fold,” says Harris.

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