November 4: Today we had sad news at Black Butte. Our caretaker, Walter "Gonzo" Lemanski passed away of natural causes. He was 54 years old, a retired tramp who loved the Black Butte area. Originally from Detroit, Michigan, he lived in Odgen, Utah, Roseville, CA, and Santa Cruz before coming to the Dunsmuir/Black Butte area where he was our caretaker for the past two years. He was a good friend to us all and will greatly missed. An informal memorial service was held for him on Saturday, November 15 at noon at Black Butte.
October: This month we successfully moved our two newly acquired historic railcars to Black Butte. We have located these steam-era wooden cars right in our main compound on some newly laid track segments. The cars will form the basis of a library/resource center/info shop project that we plan to develop in 2009 and beyond. See our boxcar/reefer project page for more details.
August 15: Added a page showing caboose rehab work done during our second summer, 2008.
August 6: Added numerous revisions to the "Bird List", "Tree and Shrub List", "Small (Non-woody) Plant List", and added a new "Black Butte Critter List" to the "Local Ecology" page
July 27: BBCRC makes agreement to acquire historic railcars in McCloud
In mid-July the BBCRC made an arrangement with the Heritage Junction Museum in McCloud to acquire two historic pieces of rail equipment - an ex-Sacramento Northern wood boxcar and an ex-Pacific Fruit Express iced refrigerator car. Both cars date from around 1912 and are in reasonably good condition. We plan to move both cars to Black Butte later this year. The boxcar is intended to become a resource center/library/info shop and arts/project space for visitors to Black Butte. To make this happen, we need to raise several thousand dollars over the next 2-3 months. Check out how you can help and see more photos of the cars on the "Boxcar/Reefer Project" page.
May 20: Added a page devoted to Railroad Tattoos!
April 13: Added a link to a page of Pacific Northwest Train schedules to the bottom of the Trains page.
April 6: In early 2008 the Black Butte Center for Railroad Culture received our official designation as a US government recognized 501(c)3 non-profit corporation. This means we are now eligible to receive tax-deductible contributions from the public, corporations and other grant-making institutions. Let us know if you have any potential contributions (books, films, 'zines, artwork, historical photographs, cash, etc.) related to our mission of documenting nomadic railroad culture and the railroading history and local ecology of the Black Butte area. Also, we are looking for a boxcar or similar railroad car that could be brought to our site for use as a resource center/art space.
January 31: Bad news on the local railroading front. In mid-January the CORP line began phasing down its south end operations. By mid-April the plan is to completely shut down the route over the Siskiyous from Black Butte to Medford. This follows on CORP's shutdown of its Coos Bay line late last year. It's all due to CORP being taken over by the greedy "Fortress" investment company, a company that appears to have as its only agenda squeezing out short-term profits for its investors. It is a blow to the workers who have worked hard to keep the CORP line going as well as to our local community. Hopefully another operator, one with a little more integrity and a longer term view than Fortress, will be able to take over the south end and resume operations. In the meantime, we will see CORP reduce its operations (local customers around Weed will still be switched) and, most likely, fewer UP trains stopping for work at Black Butte.
January 1: Added a page showing photos of the rehabilitation work done on the caboose during the Summer of 2007.
December 15: A unique six-person railbike, donated to us by the WP Museum in Portola, has now arrived at Black Butte. Thanks to everyone you helped facilitate this donation. Check out a photo and description on our bike project page.
December 12: 2007 Summary
During our first year of operations we had an large turn-out of volunteers and contributors from our extended network of friends, local people around Black Butte, Dunsmuir, Mt. Shasta, and Weed, and some folks who just sort of came out of the bushes (literally)... and ended up helping out for a while. Thanks to everyone for making it happen!
Over the course of the year we rebuilt the main fence and cleaned up the site - going a long ways toward turning what was a local eyesore into a positive addition to the area:
We built track:
moved the caboose:
...and started its rehabilitation process including completely replacing the roof:
We built a large outdoor kitchen for feeding visitors and volunteers:
We completed rehabilitation of the yard shack:
...fixed up the barn and added a tool shop, got our stable of loaner bicycles going, did a lot of basic infrastructure work:
...adding plumbing, electrical connections and environmentally friendly recycling and greywater systems:
We acquired the semaphore and other historic items. We did restoration work on our pond and Black Butte Creek and did major trash pick-ups in the area. We removed invasive non-native vegetation from our site and planted some new trees. We drank buckets of beer, swapped tons of stories, played music, hosted lots of visitors and had a great time!
Even trying to put together a list of everyone who contributed something or helped out in 2007 is daunting, but, in no particular order, here it goes:
Thanks to Gonzo (our caretaker and spiritual advisor), Jimmy (our caretaker's caretaker), North Bank Fred (jack of all trades and webmaster), Jacquelyn, Hobo Lee, Wrong Way Dre; Coffey, Henry from Portland (hey we didn't get your contact info, get in touch!), Cricket from Portland; Broke Toe Rezo and Toby "Flange Squeal" (wouldn't have a new roof on the caboose w/o you guys!); Photo Bill; Emilyn, Quentin, and the Bike Church in Santa Cruz (the bike project and bike tools among other things!); Emrys, the Black Butte Dump; Rattlesnake Avery, Glenn Shoe, Railhed, Jason and The Curse is Cast band, Angela from Santa Cruz; Claryss; Larkin; Niko, Roseville Melissa, Crazy Angel, Silver Miner Larry, Bert, Jeff from the trailer park, Rick (for the drumming... yeah man!); Tigger; Joe; Josh; Rabbit, Ed from San Jose (t&g for the caboose!), Carlton Crane, Jim and Marty Nile; Rabbie; Free Tacos Melissa; Peggy Baltar (the semaphore!); local crew from the Central Oregon and Pacific Railway; Matt Shuman and the Shasta-Cascade Rail Historical Society; Michael "Train on Fire"; Okra P. Dingle; Tall Paul the Bike Pirate; Moss; Brian Bubbles; Forest Ranger Deb; Holly (caboose sketch/tattoo inspiration!); Train Doc; Bruce Petty (Black Butte historical info and photo); Joe, Josh and Ron from the other side of the tracks; McCloud Railway Co.; Luke; Joey Alone; Jason the 12 oz. Prophet; Julianne; Western Pacific Railway Museum over in Portola; Cody the Hub City Kid; Croatian Mike (bad jokes and good plaster work); Points West and Gerri (east side jungle clean-up!); Jenna; Dritz; Jet Set; Baltimore Red; Ryan; Feral; Brakeshoe, Sarah (Slaughterhouse Sal); Sin, Yarik, Keeeth; Auberry Steve & Linda; "Uncle Pete"; Widerstand; Chaos Krista; Banjo Fred; David E (who never made it there but we watched "Long Gone" at least a dozen times); the Grinch; Z Wooden Spike; Nicolas and Laura from the beer city; Mt. Shasta Fish Hatchery; Rob Menzies; Griffin; Ray's Market; Bob Morris (historical photos on website); Larry Tuttle (semaphore advice) and ???? Let us know who we've forgotten to include!