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5/13/2024
On May 9, Genesee & Wyoming Inc. (G&W) celebrated its 125th anniversary with an event held at the Rochester & Southern Railroad’s (RSR) yard in Rochester, New York.
RSR is the successor to the original 14-mile Genesee and Wyoming Railroad (GNWR) that was established in 1899 by E.L. Fuller to haul salt from mines in Retsof, New York.
The GNWR marked the beginning of G&W, which reached its 125th anniversary on March 24. To learn more about G&W’s history, read this cover story in Progressive Railroading’s March issue.
The event was attended by more than 200 people, including employees from the company’s corporate support center in Rochester, members of current and past boards, a handful of retirees and select state and local government officials, G&W officials said in an email.
As part of the celebration, the company unveiled a GP-38 and a GE-9 unit decorated in a heritage paint scheme that was used after Mortimer B. Fuller III — E.L. Fuller’s great-grandson — took over G&W in the late 1970s.
The locomotives were attached to six passenger cars on loan from the Age of Steam Roundhouse Museum in Ohio. Attendees boarded a passenger excursion train that traveled from Rochester to Mt. Morris, New York, where RSR currently serves American Rock Salt — the successor to the same salt mine that G&W began serving 125 years ago.