Denver & Rio Grande Western No. 340

Design and Construction

No. 340 is a narrow gauge 2-8-0 Consolidation, one of the class C-19 locomotives that the Denver and Rio Grande Railway relied on to move freight and passengers over its three-foot gauge mountain lines in Colorado and New Mexico. Baldwin Locomotive Works built the engine in Philadelphia in 1881, originally numbering it 400 as part of the railroad’s early motive power roster. When the Rio Grande reorganized and reclassified its narrow gauge locomotive fleet in the early 1920s, the engine was renumbered 340 and formally placed in the C-19 class alongside a number of similar Consolidations still associated with the line’s most famous narrow gauge routes.

Revenue Service on the Denver & Rio Grande, 1881 to Early 1950s

For roughly seventy years No. 340 worked the demanding narrow gauge grades of Colorado’s high country, hauling ore, livestock, general freight, and passengers over lines that included some of the steepest and most scenic narrow gauge trackage ever built in North America. Locomotives of the C-19 class were the backbone of Rio Grande narrow gauge operations for decades, prized for their combination of adequate power and a light enough footprint for track that could not support larger, standard gauge motive power. No. 340 remained in that service until the early 1950s, by which point the Rio Grande’s narrow gauge network was contracting and much of its remaining steam power was being sold off or scrapped.

Sale to Knott’s Berry Farm and the Ghost Town & Calico Railroad, 1952 to Present

Rather than being scrapped, No. 340 was purchased in the early 1950s by Walter Knott, the entrepreneur who had built Knott’s Berry Farm in Buena Park, California into one of the first modern theme parks in the United States. Knott acquired several pieces of retired Rio Grande and Rio Grande Southern narrow gauge equipment to create an authentic western railroad attraction at his park, and No. 340, renumbered 40 for its new role, became the motive power for what is now known as the Ghost Town and Calico Railroad. The locomotive was converted from coal to oil firing for practical reasons better suited to daily theme park operation, and for more than seventy years it has carried generations of Southern California visitors on a loop through the park’s western-themed grounds, making it one of only a handful of nineteenth century narrow gauge Consolidations still doing regular passenger work anywhere, let alone at an amusement park.

Return to Colorado for Rebuild, 2024 to 2026

In 2024, No. 340 traveled back to its original home territory for the first time since the early 1950s, arriving at the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad’s shops in Durango, Colorado for a major mechanical rebuild. The project followed on the heels of a similar rebuild the D&SNG’s shop forces had completed on the related Rio Grande Southern No. 41 in 2023, work that had demonstrated the shop’s capability to take on contracted heavy overhauls of historic narrow gauge power beyond its own fleet. Ownership of No. 340 remained with Knott’s Berry Farm throughout the project. The rebuild was extensive enough that it took roughly two years, and by early 2026 the work had progressed far enough to allow the locomotive to operate under its own power for the first time in over seven decades on Colorado rails.

2026 Colorado Excursions and Return Home

No. 340’s reappearance in Colorado became a major event for narrow gauge railroad enthusiasts, many of whom had never expected to see a Knott’s Berry Farm locomotive running on its ancestral Rio Grande trackage again. The engine led a small series of special excursions on the D&SNG in June 2026, including scenic round trips to Cascade Canyon on June 5 and 6 and a dedicated photographer’s special on June 7, before its scheduled return to Knott’s Berry Farm in Buena Park to resume its normal duties on the Ghost Town and Calico Railroad.

Recognition

No. 340 is one of a small surviving number of Denver and Rio Grande class C-19 narrow gauge Consolidations, a design closely associated with the railroad’s celebrated mountain routes through places like the Animas Canyon and over Cumbres Pass. Its 2024 to 2026 return to Colorado for restoration and excursion service represented a rare and symbolically significant homecoming for a locomotive that spent more than seven decades of its working life a thousand miles from the rails it was originally built to run on, and its continued daily operation at Knott’s Berry Farm makes it one of the longest continuously working narrow gauge steam locomotives in the country.