History
The railway was built by Sylvester Marsh (1803-1884) of Campton, who came up with the idea while climbing the mountain in 1857. His plan was treated as insane. Local tradition says the state legislature voted permission based on a consensus that harm resulting from operating it was no issue — since the design was attempting the impossible — but benefits were guaranteed: The $5,000 of his own money he put up, and whatever else he could raise, would be spent largely locally, including building the Fabyan House hotel at nearby Fabyan Station to accommodate the expected tourists. The railway is sometimes called "Railway to the Moon" because one state legislator remarked during the proceedings that Marsh should not only be given a charter up Mount Washington but also to the moon. After developing a prototype locomotive and a short demonstration section of track, he found investors and started construction.
Despite its incomplete state, the first paying customers rode in 1868; the construction reached the summit in 1869. The early locomotives all had vertical boilers, like many stationary steam engines of the time; the boilers were mounted on trunnions allowing them to be held vertically no matter what the gradient of the track. Later designs introduced horizontal boilers, slanted so they remain close to horizontal on the steeply graded track.
Sylvester Marsh died in 1884 and control of the Cog passed to the Concord & Montreal Railroad, which ran it until 1889 when the Boston & Maine Railroad took over.
Control by the Teagues began in 1931 when Col. Henry N. Teague bought the Cog. In 1951 following Col. Teague's death, Arthur S. Teague, the colonel's protégé but no relation, became general manager. Arthur S. Teague gained ownership in 1961. After he died in 1967, the ownership passed to his wife, Ellen Crawford Teague, who ran the Cog as the world's first woman president of a railway. In 1983 Mrs. Teague sold the railway to a group of New Hampshire businessmen. Since 1986 the cog railway has been controlled and owned by Wayne Presby and Joel Bedor of Littleton, New Hampshire. The Bedor and Presby families also owned the Mount Washington Hotel and Resort in Bretton Woods for the period 1991-2006. Since 1995 the railway has been managed by Charles Kenison. These individuals have been responsible for a complete revitalization of the railroad. The Cog has been in continuous operation since 1869 with service interruptions only during the World Wars.
In the summer of 2008, the Cog introduced its first diesel locomotive. The late 2000s recession and the 2000s energy crisis led to fewer passengers, and the Cog sought to cut costs with the diesel, which could make 3 round trips for the cost of one steam train round trip. In 2012 the railroad had the highest passenger count in its history.
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Leaving the depot c. 1880s
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Partway up the mountain
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Arrival on the summit
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"Devil's shingles" down
Read more about this topic: Mount Washington Cog Railway
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