The following are the proposed routes. These might change as we finalize the details. The listed daily mileages are approximations. We are in the process of trying to trim the mileage. They are subject to change.

Sunday, October 25

Registration will be open from Noon to 4:00 pm in the hospitality room of the Comfort Inn. There will be an opening kick-off reception from 5:00 pm to 6:00 pm in the lobby.

Monday-October 26

Tour length is approximately 100 miles.

Late arriving participants will be accommodated by the registrar 7:00 am – 8:00 am.

Carthage: Our first day of touring takes us to Moore County and the Town of Carthage. Here we will explore the wonderful tractor collection of Ken and Patti Eder. Ken, a railroad contractor, started collecting tractors about five years ago. In that time, he has managed to amass one of the largest private collections of gasoline and steam tractors in the United States. Although tractors are the headliner, there is plenty of other things to see at the Eder’s.

Cameron: After lunch we will then tour to Cameron, population 151. Born of a plank road and a railroad and spurred on by the turpentine and dewberry industries, Cameron prospered in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Turpentine distilleries, the mercantile and hotel trades, and dewberry farming and consignment were the major industries. Though the trains no longer stop in the town and dewberries are not grown on a large scale anymore, Cameron still retains its turn of the century character and its feeling of a modest, isolated, concentrated village. The town, now listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is home to 12 antique shops.

Tuesday, October 27

Tour length is approximately 95 miles.

New Hope Valley Railway: Our first stop of the day is at Bonsal NC - home of the New Valley Hope Railway! We have managed to charter their steam train powered by their 0-4-0T steam locomotive.

The New Hope Valley Railway was begun on 15 January 1982 when the East Carolina Chapter, National Railway Historical Society purchased the tracks and right-of-way in Bonsal and New Hill from the Southern Railway. This consists of Bonsal Yard, the line currently operated from Bonsal to New Hill, and a small portion of the original 1906 trackage along Beaver Creek Road in Chatham County just north of Bonsal. This old line can be seen to the left side of the train as it passes Bonsal Junction just after leaving the Bonsal Depot. The first public ride operations were held in April of 1984, and it has been operated as a living railroad museum ever since.

Silk Hope Farm Heritage Center: Our second stop of the day will be at the Silk Hope Farm Heritage Center in Silk Hope, which contains a large array of working steam powered equipment, including a working saw mill, door and window frame shop, electric generator, planer, cotton gin, cotton bail press, and an original 1845 Grist Mill. Power is provided to these various exhibits through line shafts from a 1907 Corliss steam engine. They even produce homemade ice cream called “steam cream” utilizing steam power.

Last year a log flue cured tobacco barn and a blacksmith and wheel right shop were moved to the Heritage Park. The tobacco barn is operational and was used to cure tobacco late last summer. The Master Blacksmith, Peter Ross who was the Master of the Colonial Williamsburg Blacksmith Shop for 25 years, operates the new blacksmith shop.

For more information:
New Hope Way Railway
Engine #17
Silk Hope Ruritans

Wednesday, October 28

Tour length is approximately 75 miles.

Yates Mill Park: Our third day of touring takes us to Raleigh, the capital city of North Carolina. Our first stop will be a tour of the Historical Yates Mill Park, which is owned and operated by Wake County. Yates Mill is a fully restored, circa 1756 gristmill and is the centerpiece of Historic Yates Mill County Park. The mill is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is the only restored operational automatic mill in North Carolina and one of just a few in the country.

Mordecai Square House Park: Our second stop of the day will be to the Mordecai Square Historical Park. The Mordecai House, built in 1785, is a registered historical landmark and museum and is the oldest residence in Raleigh on its original foundation. Closely associated with the founding Lane family, the property is representative of the plantations that once dominated the local landscape. At one time the house was the seat of one of the largest farms in Wake County, encompassing more than 5,000 acres. The oldest portion of the home was built about 1785 by Joel Lane for his son Henry. Seven years later, Joel Lane sold 1,000 acres immediately south of the house to the state as the site of the new capital city of Raleigh. In addition to the house, the Park includes other attractions such as the original birthplace of President Andrew Johnson, the Ellen Mordecai Garden, the Badger-Iredell Law Office, Allen Kitchen and St. Mark's Chapel.

For more information :
Yates Mill Historic Park
Mordecai Historical Park

Wednesday Night

The Town of Fuquay-Varina will be celebrating it’s Centennial in 2009 with their gala event being Saturday, October 31. The cars of the Vintage Tour have been invited to take part in the celebration. Wednesday night Main Street will be blocked off and the cars will displayed that evening in downtown Fuquay-Varina. The Fuquay-Varina Revitalization committee will be serving a complimentary dinner. Although all the plans have not been finalized yet, you won’t want to miss this evening activity.

Thursday, October 29

Tour length is approximately 105 miles.

Tobacco Farm Life Museum: Our first stop of day four will be at the Tobacco Farm Life Museum in Kenly. This museum depicts rural life in NC in the 1880's. Besides the main exhibit hall, also featured is a restored farmstead, which is composed of a farmhouse, separate kitchen, smokehouse, tobacco barn, milk house, and pack house.

Governor Charles B Aycock's Birthplace: After lunch, we will then tour to Fremont and visit the birthplace of Charles B Aycock, NC Governor from 1901 to 1905. As governor, Aycock became known as the "Education Governor" for his support of the public school system. It was said that one school was constructed in the state for every day he was in office. He was supposedly dedicated to education after watching his mother make her mark when signing a deed. He felt that no lasting social reform could be accomplished without education. He supported increased salaries for teachers, longer school terms, and new school buildings; "690 new schoolhouses erected, including 599 for whites and 91 for blacks."

For more information:
Tobacco Farm Life Museum
Charles B Aycock Birthplace

Friday, October 30

Tour length is approximately 96 miles.

Airborne & Special Operations Museum: our last day of touring takes us at Fayetteville, the home of US Army base Fort Bragg and Pope Air Force base. Our first stop will be to the Airborne & Special Operations Museum. Opening in August 2000, the Museum tells the story of Army airborne and special operations units from their 1940 origin and movement to the Fayetteville area in March of 1942, through the present. The 59,000 square-foot, 22.5 million dollar museum houses many rare and impressive artifacts, including a C-47 “Skytrain” airplane suspended from the ceiling, complete with a paratrooper in the door. A fully restored CG-4A glider, one of only a handful that remain from WWII, is on display, along with two helicopters, a Sheridan tank, and a complete collection of uniforms, equipment and weapons spanning the sixty-year history of this exciting segment of the armed forces.

Fayetteville Area Transportation Museum: our second stop of the day will be to the Fayetteville Area Transportation Museum, which is housed in the restored 1890 Cape Fear and Yadkin Valley railroad depot. The Cape Fear and Yadkin Valley Railroad Company (CF&YVRR) opened in Fayetteville in 1879 as a reorganization of the former Western Railroad, which connected Fayetteville with the Egypt coal mines to the northwest. The depot opened in Fayetteville in 1890, the same year the railroad was connected with Wilmington.

The brick in the building was manufactured by E. A. Poe, a prominent local manufacturer. Other notable features include an onion-shaped lightning rod and steep hip roof.

Historically an important transportation center, Fayetteville was established in the colonial period at the head of the navigation of the Cape Fear River and served as a trade link between the west and the port of Wilmington on the lower Cape Fear River. The Museum traces Fayetteville's history from early Native American transportation through the colonial and revolutionary period. The museum's collection ends with the 20th century and early automobile travel and aviation.

Poe House: On August 10, 1896, Lot #2 of the former U.S. Arsenal was deeded to Josephine Poe, wife of Edgar Allen Poe. This was the land on which E. A. Poe began construction of his two-story frame house, along with a barn, woodhouse, smokehouse and wellhouse in 1897. Poe, a successful businessman, politician and civic leader, was one of several person to settle in the Haymount area at the turn of the century.

Built by Ruffin Vaughn, the Poe House exhibits rare Eastlake detailing. Other architecturally significant elements of the house include the entrance bay, a wrap-around porch, exterior sawnwork, tongue-and-groove wainscoting and bullseye molding throughout the interior. The house is owned by the Museum of the Cape Fear. Following its recent restoration, it serves as a historic house museum interpreting late nineteenth and early twentieth century social, cultural and family history.

Arsenal Park: Arsenal Park contains the remnants of the United States Arsenal. The federal government built this facility in 1836 to store arms and manufacture ordnance. At the outbreak of the Civil War, the State of North Carolina ordered its seizure and turned it over to the Confederacy. On March 11, 1865, Union forces under General William T. Sherman destroyed the facility.

For more information:
ASOM