North Shore Scenic Railroad 30th Anniversary - How About 134th?

In the waning years of passenger trains on the Lakefront Line, before the introduction of BUDD car service, this was one of the last trains to run out of the Duluth Depot. It is DM&IR #402, a Pacific type locomotive, a passenger/RPO/ Baggage car and Solarium coach/lounge car. The train is bound for Two Harbors and the East Range. March 1957 from the W.C. Olsen collection – used with permission.

By Ken Buehler

While the North Shore Scenic Railroad is celebrating its 30th anniversary, the Lakefront line your train is running on was built by the Duluth & Iron Range Railway 134 years ago, just 17 years after the Transcontinental Railroad.

These tracks were an afterthought for D&IR. In 1884 the railroad opened its line from Two Harbors up to Minnesota’s first iron ore mine in Tower Sudan on the Vermilion Range. Similar to the Transcontinental, the railroad held a land grant earning the company a portion of adjacent property for each mile of track laid.

However, there were disagreements among the early owners of the D&IR. Out of spite more than anything, the ones who lost that argument – and the railroad – convinced the government to hold off giving the D&IR its land until tracks were laid, but not necessarily needed, between Two Harbors to Duluth. That was done in 1886, 134 years ago.

Most of the traffic on the line was lumber shipped down from Knife River off the Duluth & Northern Minnesota, a common carrier owned by the Alger Smith lumber company. There was passenger traffic up until 1961 and the last commercial freight went by here in 1982.

One of the most unique rides offered by the

D&IR was the Fisherman’s Train. It ran on Sunday mornings, after church, and would drop anglers off at north shore streams, then pick them up later in the day. In the middle of July those trains also carried women and children who would pick an abundance of blueberries, which grew wide along the right-of-way.

The flag stop at Larsmont was also unique. An unscheduled stop at a location without a regular station, where a flag is hoisted to tell the train to pick up passengers, is called a flag stop. Such an arrangement existed at the tiny North Shore community of Larsmont. But it wasn’t people that got on the train. Larsmont was a fishing village and when the flag was up the train crew knew there were barrels of freshly caught lake trout and herring on ice that needed to be transported to Duluth for sale.

Today the North Shore Scenic Railroad operates on the Lakefront line with regular tourist train service including trips to Two Harbors, our popular Music and Pizza Trains, Elegant Dinner Trains, mirth, mayhem and murder on our who-done-it Murder Mystery Trains, a beer train, Pumpkin Patch Trains, and our very own Christmas City Express.

Due to COVID-19, this schedule may change. Go to duluthtrains.com or by calling our ticket agents at 800-423-1273 or locally at 218-722-1273.