Quincy and Torch Lake
The Quincy and Torch Lake was a 3 foot gauge railroad that hauled copper ore from the mine on top of the hill in Hancock, Mich. to a mill in Lake Linden. It was abandoned on Aug. 31, 1945 (or so I've been told, if I remember correctly), and for many years everything just laid there rotting away in the weeds. There was even a brand new boiler on a flat car just left to decay. By the time I was there for the first time as a Michigan Tech student in 1967, there was still quite a bit of equipment still somewhat intact, but I would doubt that much, if anything, remains of it now.
NEW! I just rescanned all of my Q&TL slides (all 20 of them!) - some of them had not seen the light of day for decades.
Here's a link to the Quincy Mine Museum - they have done some great restoration work: http://www.quincymine.com/
Would you like prints of most any of these slides? Go to Desert-Rails.com for details!
This Web Page and all Photos on it are copyright ©1967 - 2009 by Ted Ellis. All Rights Reserved.
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It was only a couple of weeks after I first arrived in Houghton as a MTU student that I had to go see what was here. No car then, so I had to walk from the MTU campus downtown, cross the lift bridge and then up the side of the hill to the railroad, but it was well worth it. Sept. 29, 1967. |
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Another view of the ore cars. Sept. 29, 1967. |
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Wonder how this car got burned? Lightning, or Toots???? Sept. 29, 1967. |
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Near the hoist house. Sept. 29, 1967. |
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An old caboose just rotting away. Sept. 29, 1967. |
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Just a few days later I had to go back there and take more photos...Oct. 1, 1967. |
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A different view of the caboose. Oct. 1, 1967. |
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An old plow and spare wheels. Oct. 1, 1967. |
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It would be a few years later before I got back to the Quincy - after all, I did have to study for school and so on! This day I walked from the mine quite a ways east and then back, wasting film along the way. May 5, 1971. |
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Looking back towards the mine. May 5, 1971. |
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A view of Houghton and Ripley. May 5, 1971. |
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Overgrown right-of-way. May 5, 1971. |
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A washout...May 5, 1971. |
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And another washout. May 5, 1971. |
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I guess it was easier for the road people just to push the rails out of the way. May 5, 1971. |
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Here they just laid the roadway on top of the rails. May 5, 1971. |
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10 years later I was back in the Copper Country for the 10th anniversary class reunion, and of course I had to see the Quincy again...August of 1981. |
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Not much left. August of 1981. |
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More debris. August of 1981. |
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Looking out from inside. August of 1981. |