History

In the mid 1970’s rumors swirled around the railroad community that an unthinkable event may be on the horizon. The word was that the Chicago Minneapolis and Pacific Railroad aka the “Milwaukee Road” was considering the abandonment of all lines west to include the famous Pacific Extension – the main line from Miles City, Montana to Seattle, Washington. If this catastrophe was to be approved this would be the largest single abandonment of rail lines in the history of the world.  

In order to make the best of a bad situation,  A L Freed jumped into action and formed a new company modestly named “the Great Northeastern Pacific South & Western Railroad Company” and set off to ride the Pacific Extension before it would likely vanish. Almost five years of extensive planning commenced.  

After chartering the “Weed Route” the next project was to find a suitable vehicle capable of riding the rails from Montana to Seattle.  An executive decision was made to proceed immediately to find a light weight transportable machine that could ride on railroad tracks. The first idea was a velocipede but deemed impractical to pump over one thousand miles. After much deliberation the company decided on a small track speeder.  

At the time Freed was an engineer on the Chesapeake Division of the Penn Central Railroad and made local inquires but soon found out that speeders had long left the property.   It was however rumored that a bunch Speeders had of recently been decommissioned by the Maine Central Railroad speeders might still be found in the yard in Waterville Maine.   I quick call to the Yard Master indicated that yes there were a bunch of speeders in a trash heap in the lower forty of the railroad yard…