Buckeye Express Diner

It's an N&W W2 2-8-0 that was one of the four "lost engines of Roanoke" for many years.  It's a home-made tender to be sure, NOT by N&W.

Wonderful serendipitous find, COHighrailer.  I love it when that happens.  Here's a link with pix for the curious:

Buckeye Express Diner, Ohio

This is another rail car restaurant pseudo "diner" not on my radar, and that is certainly one very handsome car.   I don't know whether Bellevile, OH is any where near Fremont, OH but at 216 E. State Street there is a 1920s wooden Lake Shore Electric turned into Whitey's Diner.  It's been built around and may be out of business but the car still shows up on Google maps.

More on "train" diners - Forum post for foodie railfans and modelers

Tomlinson Run Railroad

Well, my most amusing typo aside, the restaurant's website and TripAdvisor say it's located in "Bellville".   Interesting that the NS yard you mention isn't far from Fremont. Sounds like a roadtrip. :-)

TRRR

Didn't bother to check spelling when I posted.  It is Bellville. Bellefontaine, Bellbrook, Bellaire, Belle Center are scattered around the state. Bellevue is much farther into the frozen north.  Bellefontaine used to have train shows on the county FG until the Great Recession.  There is an "Amish" buffet just down the road east of the diner. Diener's and East Earl, east of Lancaster, Pa. are much better.

The BUCKEYE EXPRESS diner is near Mansfield, just off of I-71.  That WB class N&W 2-8-0 is a rare bird.

I thought that very close coupled 2-8-0 probably came from a logging road or at least an obscure shortine, vs. a Class 1 like the N&W. What made it one of the "lost four"? I guess rarity would apply if it had been one of the 4-8-0's like at Strasburg?

645, thanks for the link.  The photos in the VA scrap yard are excellent and if you poke around the website, there's also a photo showing the 917's contemporary tender.

A description with photos of the move to Ohio also reveals that the connected baggage car eating area is from 1926 and the steel caboose is from 1940.

The nearby Mansion on Rails "hotel", under the same management by Terry Byrne, claims to be the 1911 private car of railroad exec. H.E. Huntington, who rode it from San Marino, CA to NYC for his trips to Europe. 

TRRR

It's a very fun place to eat! The food is great and the portions are pretty large. You can ring the loco bell for free and blow the whistle for 50 cents.

 The Buckeye Belly Buster