By James Benetzky/photos as noted
Cooperstown & Charlotte Valley Railroad held its annual “Railfan Day” in Milford, N.Y., Saturday, August 6, 2022. C&CV, operated by the Leatherstocking Railway Historical Society, and is an all-volunteer operation. The event started at 9:00 a.m. and ran through the afternoon. A day pass ticket gave attendees access to all activities scheduled throughout the day, such as speeder rides, a “big hook” crane demonstration, and an afternoon photo freight. In addition, LRHS’s narrow-gauge Milford Park Railway was operating all day.
The first equipment demonstration of the event took place at 10:00 a.m. and featured Delaware & Hudson 160-ton “Big Hook” 30021. Attendees boarded the C&CV passenger train and were taken to a field ¼ mile north of the Milford depot where they disembarked for the crane demonstration. After the passenger consist cleared, Canadian National MLW S-7 8223 did a quick photo run-by with the D&H crane and two D&H gondolas, 30088 and 30117. The crane hoisted a set of trucks out of one of the gondolas, set them on the ground, and then pulled them back into the gondola. At 11:30 a.m., there was a demon-stration of C&CV’s D&H air activated side-dump gondola 32176 and a hi-rail MOW truck in the Milford yard.
The main highlight of Railfan Day was the photo freight that ran from Milford to Cooperstown in high sun 1:00 p.m. The photo freight consisted of CN MILW S-7 8223 with some of the C&CV’s vintage rolling stock consisting of a D&H flat (ex-RDG), an ex-CP ballast hopper, a D&H “covered wagon” type boxcar (ex-PRR) and the D&H side dump gondola. Railfans were also treated to photo run-bys of the regular C&CV passenger train consist pulled by C&CV MLW S-4 3051 (ex-CN 8181), painted in a D&H tribute livery…