McCreary County is a county located in the U.S. state of Kentucky. As of the 2020 census, the population was 16,888. Its county seat is Whitley City. The county is named for James B. McCreary, a Confederate war soldier and two-time Governor of Kentucky. During his second term as governor, McCreary County was created by the Legislature and was named in his honor.
Stearns is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in McCreary County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 1,365 at the 2020 census. It was founded by Justus Smith Stearns.
The Big South Fork of the Cumberland River is a 76-mile-long (122 km) river in the U.S. states of Tennessee and Kentucky. It is a major drainage feature of the Cumberland Plateau, a major tributary of the Cumberland River system, and the major feature of the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area.
The Tennessee Central Railway was founded in 1884 as the Nashville and Knoxville Railroad by Alexander S. Crawford. It was an attempt to open up a rail route from the coal and minerals of East Tennessee to the markets of the midstate, a service which many businessmen felt was not being adequately provided by the existing railroad companies. They also wanted to ship coal and iron ore to the Northeastern US over the Cincinnati Southern Railway, which was leased to the Southern and operated as the Cincinnati, New Orleans and Texas Pacific Railway (CNOTP), through their Cincinnati gateway. The N&K was only completed between Lebanon, where it connected to a Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis Railway branch from Nashville, and Standing Stone.
The Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum is a railroad museum and heritage railroad in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
The ALCO RS-1 was a 4-axle diesel-electric locomotive built by Alco-GE between 1941 and 1953 and the American Locomotive Company from 1953 to 1960. ALCO subsidiary Montreal Locomotive Works built an additional three RS-1s in 1954. This model has the distinction of having the longest production run of any diesel locomotive for the North American market. The RS-1 was in production for 19 years from the first unit Rock Island #748 in March 1941 to the last unit National of Mexico #5663 in March 1960.
The East Tennessee & Western North Carolina Railroad, affectionately called the "Tweetsie" as a verbal acronym of its initials (ET&WNC) but also in reference to the sound of its steam whistles, was a primarily 3 ft narrow gauge railroad established in 1866 for the purpose of serving the mines at Cranberry, North Carolina.
The ALCO S-2 and S-4 are 1,000-horsepower (746 kW) diesel electric switcher locomotives produced by ALCO and Canadian licensee Montreal Locomotive Works (MLW).
The ALCO Century 420 is a four-axle, 2,000 horsepower (1,491 kW) diesel-electric locomotive. 131 were built between June 1963 and August 1968. Cataloged as a part of ALCO's "Century" line of locomotives, the C420 was intended to replace the earlier RS-32 model.
The Lake Superior and Ishpeming Railroad, is a U.S. railroad offering service from Marquette, Michigan, to nearby locations in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. It began operations in 1896. The LS&I continues to operate as an independent railroad from its headquarters in Marquette.
Southern Railway 4501 is a preserved Ms class 2-8-2 "Mikado" type steam locomotive built in October 1911 by the Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as the first of its wheel arrangement type for the Southern Railway (SOU). In 1948, the locomotive was retired from the SOU in favor of dieselization and was sold to the shortline Kentucky and Tennessee Railway (K&T) in Stearns, Kentucky, to haul coal trains.
The ALCO FA was a family of B-B diesel locomotives designed to haul freight trains. The locomotives were built by a partnership of ALCO and General Electric in Schenectady, New York, between January 1946 and May 1959. Designed by General Electric's Ray Patten, they were of a cab unit design; both cab-equipped lead FA and cabless booster FB models were built. A dual passenger-freight version, the FPA/FPB, was also offered. It was equipped with a steam generator for heating passenger cars.
The Southwestern Railroad started a 5 ft gauge spur line from Sparta, Tennessee to McMinnville, Tennessee to connect with the McMinnville and Manchester Railroad. The Southwestern Railroad Company was chartered in 1851–52 to build a railroad from Danville, Kentucky to McMinnville in less than ten years. The company received several extensions to complete the road during and after the American Civil War. Former Confederate general George Gibbs Dibrell served as president. The company went bankrupt in 1871 having constructed only a small part of the road from McMinnville to Sparta. Nashville, Chattanooga & St. Louis Railway (NC&StL) purchased the assets. In 1884, NC&StL finished the 26-mile (42 km) segment to Sparta to reach the coal mines at Bon Air, Tennessee.
The 45 class are a class of diesel-electric locomotives built by AE Goodwin, Auburn for the New South Wales Department of Railways between 1962 and 1964.
The Buffalo Creek and Gauley Railroad (BC&G) was a railroad chartered on April 1, 1904 and ran along Buffalo Creek in Clay County, West Virginia. The original Buffalo Creek and Gauley ended service in 1965.
Constructed in 1907, the McCreary County Museum is housed in the former Stearns Coal and Lumber Company corporate headquarters in Stearns, Kentucky. The building served as the company's office headquarters in the Southern United States, and maintains the company president's office as an exhibit. The town where the museum is located was called the Stearns Empire of the South, and the museum continues to preserve and display the area's history from the Indian and pioneer times into the town's peak at the height of the coal and lumber industry boom. The exhibits include significant coverage of Appalachian life in McCreary County, including an exhibit on moonshine.
Blue Heron, also known as Mine 18, is a former coal mining community or coal town on the banks of the Big South Fork of the Cumberland River in McCreary County, Kentucky, United States, that has been recreated and is maintained as an interpretive history area in the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area.
Tombstone Junction was a small, Western-town-themed park located on Kentucky Route 90 in McCreary County, Kentucky near the Cumberland Falls State Resort Park. It began operating in the 1960s and continued uninterrupted until it was heavily damaged by fire in 1989. The park continued with limited operation until it was completely destroyed by a second fire in 1991. The venue featured a recreation of a small, Western frontier town complete with train station, working saloon, dance hall, jailhouse, shanties, and shops. There was also an outdoor amphitheater that hosted live shows featuring country and western music of the period.
Southern Railway 630 is a 2-8-0 "Consolidation" type steam locomotive built in February 1904 by the American Locomotive Company (ALCO) of Richmond, Virginia for the Southern Railway as a member of the Ks-1 class. It is currently owned and operated by the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum (TVRM) in Chattanooga, Tennessee where it resides today for use on excursion trains.
Barthell is a former coal town in McCreary County, Kentucky, United States. It was established in 1902 and was the first of 18 mining camps to be built by the Stearns Coal and Lumber Company. It now serves as an open-air history museum, which is open from April through Thanksgiving.
