Restored to its breathtaking beauty, steam locomotive Glenbrook is unveiled

Train buffs and dignitaries gathered at the Nevada Rail Road Museum under rainy skies, Saturday for the unveiling of the Glenbrook, a historic locomotive that once hauled lumber from Lake Tahoe sawmills to Spooner Summit.

“Nowhere else can you see an event like this,” said Peter Barton, Administrator of the Division of Museums and History. “We’ve done research before we started restoring, we spent months with historians and researchers. The locomotive has been painstakingly restored, no where else can you find a locomotive that has had so much time spent working on it.”

By 1943, it was saved from scrap and donated by the Bliss Family to the Nevada State Museum, where it pleased countless youngsters who crawled all over it outside the museum’s doors on Carson Street for four decades. Restored by the Nevada State Railroad Museum, it is under steam again.

It worked Nevada lumber mills in the 19th century, carried tourists to Truckee and Tahoe City in the 20th and graces the Nevada State Railroad Museum, Carson City in the 21st. The 30 plus year restoration of The Glenbrook, an 1875 narrow-gauge steam locomotive critical to Nevada’s development was revealed Saturday, May 23 with a special opportunity to photograph the jewel alongside its standard-gauge sister, The Inyo.

Special guests important to The Glenbrook’s past gathered at 11 a.m. for a public dedication ceremony at the railroad museum. Both locomotives were on static display and under steam from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m. Viewers were able to take rare photographs of the two engines.

“It has come together wonderfully,” said Christopher de Witt, Supervisor of Restoration at the Nevada State Railroad Museum. “What we have represented today is more than we could’ve done 30 years ago. The Glenbrook is spectacular and represents a pinnacle.”

The Glenbrook first came to Nevada in 1875 and worked as a Carson & Tahoe Flume & Lumber Company narrow-gauge steam locomotive that hauled lumber from Lake Tahoe sawmills to Spooner Summit. In 1898, it became the power of the Lake Tahoe Railway & Transportation Company, operating on 15 miles of track between Truckee and Tahoe City.

By 1943, it was saved from scrap and donated by the Bliss Family, which had been involved in both ventures, to the Nevada State Museum, where it pleased countless youngsters who crawled all over it outside the museum’s doors on Carson Street.

After 39 years in the courtyard, it was sent for restoration to what is now the Nevada State Railroad Museum, Carson City in 1982, where the prized piece was painstakingly restored with authenticity and historic accuracy via a generous grant from the E.L. Wiegand Foundation.

“This restoration has been very close to our hearts at the railroad museum. The Glenbrook is such a rare find. Bringing it back to its full glory to tell a tremendous Nevada story has taken our staff nearly a generation,” Barton said. “Its restoration will help museums continue to tell the story for many generations to come.”

A genuine memento of the Comstock, the locomotive sports its original riveted steam boiler, fired with wood, and its original paint scheme, hand lettered and striped. For certification, it was tested and steamed in November 2014 for the first time since 1925, just a short distance from where it started.

“The Glenbrook is a piece of magic, it is of international class, one of a kind and represents life, energy and our state’s history,” said Robert Stoldal, Chairman of the Board, Nevada State Museum and Historical Society.

The Inyo, the museum’s standard-gauge 1875 steam locomotive, normally only operated on Fourth of July, will be fired up alongside The Glenbrook for a rare chance to see two 1875 steam locomotives together at once. Guests will ride in historic cars behind V&T Locomotive #25 throughout the holiday weekend.

Visitors can view The Glenbrook whenever the museum is open. The locomotives will also operate on special occasions. Regular admission is $6 for adults; children 17 and younger are free. For more information, contact the museum at (775) 687-6953 or visit the museum on Facebook.

The Glenbrook’s full history is featured in the May/June issue of Nevada Magazine. The unveiling event was part of the Nevada Division of Tourism’s popular “Discover Your Nevada” program that spurs in-state travel during the spring and summer travel months. The annual TravelNevada campaign is designed to educate Nevadans about the variety of adventures available throughout the state and ultimately encourage travel within it.