Re: Montana southern #1.

From what I can find, I think the short answer is that no one really knows precisely when the Montana Southern locomotives were scrapped, who scrapped them or what became of any remains thereof. What is known is that the Montana Southern ceased operations sometime in the later 1920's and everything was left where it sat. Several freightcars survived out on the line into the 1960's (the stripped boxcars and gondola 302 now in Nevada City Montana along with the boxcar at the CRRM). As to the locomotives, the best that Tivis Wilkins (author of Colorado Rail Annual 13) could come up with is a photo of a rather derelict F&CC 12 / MS 2 in Allentown Montana in 1931 and a statement (presumably based on talking with locals who were around at the time) that both locomotives were "scrapped in the 1930's".

As a side note, the story of how the cars survived does possibly offer some insight into the fact that there does not seem to have been a concerted and/or official effort to scrap the Montana Southern, the scrapping seems to have been done piecemeal by individuals over a long period. (The cars now in Nevada City survived until about 1942 on a siding somewhere out on the line. Some patriotic local folk came along, flopped the bodies off the trucks, cut anything metal off the underframes, carted the trucks and other metal parts off to a local scrap drive and left the bodies where they lay. Around 1964, collector of everything Montana Charles Bovey located the carbodies and brought them to Nevada City. The car at the CRRM was originally with this group of cars, but sometime before the scrap drive festivities it had been taken for a joyride until it derailed Safely out of sight and mind of the scrap drive enthusiasts, the car remained intact and in place until Bob Richardson brought it to Colorado)

I suppose the short version of this tangent is that no one knows for sure and just about anything may be possible.

Jason Midyette