Another Steamtown question from Oct of 1980

Hi all
I am writing up an article for the 470 railroad club, on one of the Steamtown railfan weekends, from Oct 1980. At that time I was taking slides and ran out of film at Summit, Vt on the trip.
The train was pulled by CPR # 1293 & 1246, along with seven pieces of equipment, which consisted of a baggage car, combine, and five coaches.
OK, this is the part I don't remember, at Summit, Vt, there was no way to turn the train, they was only a passing siding. This is the part I hope someone can answer, Did Steamtown run tender first all the way back to Riverside, with both locomotives????? Or did the Green Mountain Railroad have diesels waiting to pull the train back to Riverside? ????.

Pat,

Relations with GMMRC were not great at the time, so I would suspect it was a tender first return to riverside ( I did rail fans w/e in 1979 and 1981). at this time I believe if for some reason there was no steam available they did not run. this was the last year of Barbera. dramatic change once Don ball came on board with diesel rail fans w/e in 1981. if I recall correctly the agreement with GMRC to operate was often not consummated until hours before the first train was scheduled to run.

Al P.

Hi
I visited Riverside on Friday 10 October 1980. I have slides of some of the static displays but shot super8 film of the returning train as it arrived. Although I haven't seen my footage in years I'm fairly sure 1246 came in tender first by itself. I have a VHS copy of it, which is just as inconvenient!!
Cheers
Steve