There won’t be planes or automobiles, but there will be plenty of trains at this weekend’s Steaks, Oysters, Ales and Rails fundraiser for the Timber Heritage Association. The event takes place at the Samoa Roundhouse which was built in 1893 by John Vance, and is a piece of history itself, along with the many treasures inside.
“We’ve been active since the 1970s preserving and sharing the timber and rail history of the north coast,” says Timber Heritage Association vice-president Pete Johnston. “We have eight historic logging locomotives from the local woods, local companies of pacific lumber company number 29,” Pete says of the association’s collection. The roundhouse was a critical piece of local logging until the industry moved from trains to trucks in 1961. Many much older locomotives now rest at the roundhouse. “We have some historic passenger cars from the early 1900s of 95% restored interiors are beautiful. The outsides are awaiting paint and funding. the cars are the beautiful dining car and parlor car and business car really the gem of our collection and we love showing them off.”
You can see all of that this weekend.
“We’ve been having this summer celebration barbecue oysters for quite a few years now. Very popular, will have hundreds of people here,” he says of this weekend’s upcoming event. “And it’s just a chance for us to show off our site, show off our equipment, our speeder, our locomotives, all the fun things that we have to share with the public. It’s such an amazing, engaging history that we have here that nowhere else has the rail history that we brought alive with our speeder rides. We love giving, giving our speeder rides on the local trails.”
I asked what a speeder ride is.
“A speeder ride is a little 12 person unit that rides on the rails they used to take loggers and employees out to the woods,” Pete explains, “and we’ve adapted them to, to give the public rides on the rails and it’s extremely popular whenever we have our speeder out on the tracks, it’s a, it’s a wild day.”
This weekend’s event promises much more than speeder rides, but it’s all in the name of preserving history.
“We’re always saving for our roofs and paint and siding and equipment repairs, track repairs. Nothing we do is cheap and easy, but we like the challenge,” Pete continues. “We have an amazing volunteer network that we rely on. We’re an all volunteer organization. So we’re really looking forward to Saturday.”
