The Wolfeboro Railroad or Wolfeborough Railroad (later the Wolfeboro Branch of the

Boston and Maine Railroad The Boston and Maine Railroad was a U.S. Class I railroad in northern New England. Originally chartered in 1835, it became part of what was the Pan Am Railways network in 1983 (most of which was purchased by CSX in 2022). At the end of 1970, B ...

) is a former short line that provided service to the summer resort town of

Wolfeboro, New Hampshire Wolfeboro is a town in Carroll County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 6,416 at the 2020 census. A resort area situated beside Lake Winnipesaukee, Wolfeboro includes the village of Wolfeboro Falls. History The town was granted ...

(formerly spelled "Wolfeborough") on

Lake Winnipesaukee Lake Winnipesaukee () is the largest lake in the U.S. state of New Hampshire, located in the Lakes Region at the foothills of the White Mountains. It is approximately long (northwest-southeast) and from wide (northeast-southwest), covering & ...

History

Construction

Wolfeborough Railroad Company was founded on July 1, 1868, and it built a

standard gauge A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of . The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge (after George Stephenson), International gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge and European gauge in Europe, and SGR in Ea ...

short line from the

Portsmouth, Great Falls and Conway Railroad The Portsmouth, Great Falls and Conway Railroad (PGF&C) (later known as the Conway Branch of the Boston and Maine Railroad) is a former rail line between Rollinsford, New Hampshire, Rollinsford and Intervale, New Hampshire, Intervale, New Hampshir ...

's tracks in

Sanbornville, New Hampshire Sanbornville is a census-designated place (CDP) and the primary village in the town of Wakefield, Carroll County, New Hampshire, United States. It had a population of 963 at the 2020 census. Geography Sanbornville is in the southwestern part of t ...

(formerly known as Wolfeborough Junction) to Wolfeboro. Construction on the line began in November 1871, and the line was open for traffic on August 19, 1872. On January 6, 1872, the

Eastern Railroad The Eastern Railroad was a railroad connecting Boston, Massachusetts to Portland, Maine. Throughout its history, it competed with the Boston and Maine Railroad for service between the two cities, until the Boston & Maine put an end to the compe ...

leased the Wolfeboro Railroad for a period of 68 years.Wolfeborough Railroad: An In Depth History
. ''Lake Winnipesaukee Museum''. Accessed April 17, 2016.

B&M era

In 1884, the Boston & Maine took over operations on the Eastern, including the Wolfeboro Railroad. The tracks in Wolfeboro were extended across Main Street to a dock on the shore of Lake Winnipesaukee for easy connections to lake

steamboat A steamboat is a boat that is marine propulsion, propelled primarily by marine steam engine, steam power, typically driving propellers or Paddle steamer, paddlewheels. Steamboats sometimes use the ship prefix, prefix designation SS, S.S. or S/S ...

s, with a waiting room on the first floor of a factory. On Christmas Eve, 1899, the building burned down, and in 1900, the B&M built a new Lake Station. On June 30, 1892, the Wolfeboro Railroad was acquired by the Boston & Maine as part of its purchase of the Eastern Railroad, and it continued operating the line as the Wolfeboro Branch. Also in 1892, the first post office for Wolfeboro Falls opened in the B&M station there.Wolfeboro Historical Society. (2001). ''Images of America: Wolfeboro''. Charleston, South Carolina. Arcadia Publishing. By 1903, the B&M had headquartered its Eastern Division in Sanbornville, running a large maintenance facility there. On April 8, 1911, the Sanbornville shops were destroyed in a fire. The B&M did not rebuild the facilities, sending trains instead to

Dover Dover () is a town and major ferry port in Kent, South East England. It faces France across the Strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel at from Cap Gris Nez in France. It lies south-east of Canterbury and east of Maidstone ...

for repairs.

Decline

In 1927, the B&M began using

railcar A railcar (not to be confused with a railway car) is a self-propelled railway vehicle designed to transport passengers. The term "railcar" is usually used in reference to a train consisting of a single coach (carriage, car), with a drive ...

s on the line. In 1935, the lakefront station was closed, and on May 16, 1936, the B&M stopped running trains for passengers only, although it continued running mixed passenger and freight trains until about 1950. By the 1960s, only freight trains were running on the track. Once freight service became unprofitable, the B&M decided to close the line. However, throughout the 1970s and 1980s, several companies maintained the line as a

heritage railway A heritage railway or heritage railroad (US usage) is a railway operated as living history to re-create or preserve railway scenes of the past. Heritage railways are often old railway lines preserved in a state depicting a period (or periods) i ...

. On December 19, 1972, a new company called the Wolfeboro Rail Road Company (WRR) was founded and took over the line, running both freight trains and a tourist

steam Steam is a substance containing water in the gas phase, and sometimes also an aerosol of liquid water droplets, or air. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization ...

train and reopening the lakeshore station. On January 28, 1976, the WRR also began operation on a section of railroad owned by the State of NH, under an operating contract, on the opposite side of the lake, between

Concord Concord may refer to: Meaning "agreement" * Pact or treaty, frequently between nations (indicating a condition of harmony) * Harmony, in music * Agreement (linguistics), a change in the form of a word depending on grammatical features of other ...

and

Lincoln Lincoln most commonly refers to: * Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), the sixteenth president of the United States * Lincoln, England, cathedral city and county town of Lincolnshire, England * Lincoln, Nebraska, the capital of Nebraska, U.S. * Lincoln ...

. However, in November 1977, facing financial trouble, the contract for operations on the Concord to Lincoln line was cancelled, and a new contract was awarded to the Goodwin Railroad. In 1979, the Wolfeboro Steam Railroad Corporation bought the Wolfeboro line, running tourist trains from 1980 until 1985. In 1985, the line was purchased by the State of New Hampshire, which uses the right-of-way as the Wolfeboro Recreational Rail Trail, now known as the Cotton Valley Rail Trail. The rails are intact, and they are actively used by rail clubs.
Cotton Valley Rail Trail
. New Hampshire Division of Parks and Recreation. Accessed April 17, 2016. The rail corridor is maintained by members of the Cotton Valley Rail Trail Club. In 1987, Wolfeboro Station was struck by lightning and caught fire, and it was repaired by the town.

References

* Robert M. Lindsell: ''The Rail Lines of Northern New England.'' Branch Line Press, Pepperell, MA (2000), {{ISBN, 0-942147-06-5.
Wolfeboro Railroad forum
on Winnipesaukee.com. * R.C. Libby: ''Rails To Wolfeborough: A Condensed History of the Wolfeborough Rail Road'' Wolfeboro Rail Road (1984).

External links

Cotton Valley Rail Trail Club
Railway companies established in 1868 Predecessors of the Boston and Maine Railroad Defunct New Hampshire railroads