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Aberdeen & Rockfish Railroad Company
1988 Official Guide listing
These days, the Aberdeen & Rockfish Railroad Company operates a series of shortline railroads in central North Carolina and South Carolina, including the Pee Dee River Railway and the Dunn-Erwin Railway. But the orginial AR is the Aberdeen to Fayetteville route -- 47 miles of shortline operation. Incorporated in 1892, the road operated local passenger service as late as 1951. Today the road hauls chemicals, coal, lumber, and paper.
The A&R has always been a classic southern shortline, sporting many instersting types of motive power over the years. They were one of the first southern short roads to dieselize, choosing as their first steam replacements some EMD cab units. A GP7 would come to the line in 1951 as #205 - a notable unit in that it is one of only a few non-rebuilt Geep in shortline service still owned and operated by its purchasing railroad.
In the south central part of North Carolina, the Aberdeen & Rockfish railroad has done something remarkable for over 100 years: It's trains have been fighting an uphill battle with the undulating profiles of the Sandhills country and winning freight traffic and profitability in the process. That alone is just cause for a Centennial Celebration for a 45-mile line that started as a logging road in the late 1800s, then recast itself into a mini-bridge route carrier and today serves as the healthy parent of a second profitable shortline. But what makes the A&R even more noteworthy is the kind of endearing features which inspired legendary rail author Lucius Beebe to devote five pages to the A&R in his classic 1947 short line tribute "Mixed Train Daily".
Motive Power
Aberdeen & Rockfish #205
EMD GP7 / Aberdeen, Nc / collection
used with persmission of AR management
Aberdeen & Rockfish #205
- builder:Electro Motive Divison
- model:GP7
- type:B-B road switcher
- built:Oct 1951, EMD #14572
- series:210 produced 1949-54
- engine:EMD 567B (16 cyls. 1500 hp)
- notes:
- a rare shortline Geep still in service for its orginial owner
Aberdeen & Rockfish #300
unknown / Jun 2004 / Ben Wells
Aberdeen & Rockfish #300
- builder:Electro Motive Division
- model:GP18
- type:B-B road switcher
- built:Aug 1963, EMD #28357
- series:350 produced 1959-63
- engine:EMD 567D1 (16 cyl. 1800 hp)
- notes:
- AR traded in an F3A #200 for this unit
Aberdeen & Rockfish #405
unknown / Jun 2004 / Ben Wells
Aberdeen & Rockfish #405
- builder:Electro Motive Division
- model:GP38
- type:B-B road switcher
- built:_________
- series:466 produced 1966-71
- engine:EMD 645E (16 cyl. 2000 hp)
- notes:
- ex Erie Mining 4215
ex Edgmoor & Manetta #7200
unknown / Jun 2004 / Ben Wells
Rolling Stock
Aberdeen & Rockfish #303
caboose / Aberdeen, Nc / 1999 / RWH
Locations
Aberdeen & Rockfish offices
Aberdeen, Nc / 1999 / RWH
Lagniappe
System map from AR website / used with permission
Aberdeen, NC, is well attested as a railfan paradise. Two independent shorltines -- one of them the classic A&R -- interchange with the CSX on a longstanding mainline stretch leaving Hamlet, to the south. As such, there is plenty of action to see ... such as the day my dad and I found the AC&W working the CSX interchange. Anyone who follows southern shortline action knows of the Aberdeen & Rockfish, with its history of EMD covered wagons and its classic little offices in Aberdeen, just off the CSX mainline. I hope to return to the line one day to photograph more of its equipment.
Links / Sources
- Aberdeen & Rockfish Railroad Co. - official company site
- Wikipedia article on the Aberdeen & Rockfish
- Aberdeen & Rockfish photographs by Joseph Hinson
- Edward A. Lewis, American Shortline Railway Guide - Fifth Edition (Kalmbach, 1996) 13