The construction of the Chester and Becket Railroad was done with oxen and two-wheeled dump-carts hauled by mules. In 1896 the main highway (Route 20) had to be rerouted to make the railroad and the mills all fit in the narrow Walker Brook Valley. A portion of this railroad is now a hiking trail on Hampden Street in Chester where you can see remnants of the bustling history here including the mills, the wooden train trestle and pink granite bridge abutment.

Lucian Harris, engineer of the smoke-belching, wood-burning engine drove the wooden quarry flats two at a time up and down the grade all day long. Unfortunately, the small, black wood-burner developed a habit of blackening the landscape with fires in the woods. The big Boston & Albany Railroad was bent upon giving the little CBRR a hard time. The quarry company’s equipment didn’t meet safety specifications, the B & A wouldn’t allow the little trains to use its track in Chester, so in 1905 the B & A took over. A bigger, newer, coal-burning locomotive clanked into its role. The unpainted company flats were replaced with standard main-line flat cars allowed on the B & A track. Lucian Harris went to work on the stationary steam plant at the quarry while Fred Burleigh or John Fuller ran the new locomotive.

The complete railbed can still be seen from Route 20 today from Hampden Street to Quarry Road in Becket. Yes, that shelf like road high up on the banks of Walker Brook is the Chester and Becket Railroad, a great accomplishment for just “a little railroad”.

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