SPENCER — Only in downtown Spencer can one find a train chugging around a track, a parking lot full of flashy antique cars with open hoods and lines of revving motorcycles hauling burly men in leather.
All within one block of each other.
Over thundering bike exhaust and the occasional, cautioning hoot of a train whistle Saturday, hundreds of people descended on this northern Rowan County town for Steamfest. The annual festival continues today, noon to 5 p.m.
A parade Saturday morning attracted trucks from most of the county’s 27 fire departments.
“It turned out a lot better this year,” organizer Margaret Waddell said as the sun began to set over groups of people sitting on bales of hay around tables and talking, U.S. flags waving from poles and car antennas.
“I think people wanted to turn out because of everything that’s happened,” she said, speaking of the recent terrorist attacks. “It was a good tribute to the firefighters.”
The event has drawn hoards of bikers, car enthusiasts and craft peddlers. To a backdrop of live music in the Park Plaza parking lot, visitors have gawked over such vehicles as a 1932 Ford convertible to a 2001 Porsche convertible.
Across the street at the N.C. Transportation Museum, volunteers hauled children around on a train of five cabooses led by Engine 604, an antique steam engine. To celebrate the 80-ton engine’s 75th birthday, the museum gave visitors slices of cake in the yellow depot known as Barber Junction.
Several showed off one-piston “hit-and-miss” engines.
Tom Foss of Hickory visited the museum for the first time Saturday and was impressed by the collection of history there.
“This state’s really been built on transportation, so it’s good to see that they’ve preserved it,” he said.
Steamfest started out as a Labor Day event that Spencer held when workers still repaired train engines for Southern Railway at the old Spencer Shops, now the N.C. Transportation Museum.
Contact Brad A. Hodges at 704-797-4266 or bhodges@salisburypost.com
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