Coronado Railroad

Coronado Railroad was a gauge railroad which operated in a copper mining region of eastern Arizona.

The Coronado Railroad was the first narrow gauge railroad in Arizona, constructed by Henry Lesinsky in 1879 along Chase Creek, between mines and a smelter. Eventually the line connected mines via seven funicular railways and many miles of track. It operated 10 locomotives of, , and wheel configuration. The mines and the railway were connected in ownership, and the railroad was not separately incorporated or a common carrier. Cars used were 4-wheel minecarts and flatcars.

The railroad operated as an isolated line until 1883 when a gauge line reached Clifton to form an interchange with the Coronado. This connecting line, the Arizona and New Mexico, was converted to in 1901. Its former gauge equipment was used to widen the  line from Clifton to Shannon by 1903. This new gauge line was incorporated as the Coronado Railroad.

Steam locomotives of the gauge system continued to operate, even after expansion of electric mine railways which captured a significant portion of the ore movement. After World War I operations on the was sporadic, with the entire system being shut down in 1932 and mostly removed by the later part of the 1930s.

Several gauge locomotives and cars from the Coronado Railroad and associated copper mining companies survived into preservation. Three locomotives were left abandoned on a hilltop until 1990, when they were removed over very steep terrain by dropping down a loaded truck reinforced with a cable attached to a bulldozer. One of the locomotives, "Rattlesnake," was purchased by an old engineer and maintained as a display. It now resides at the Arizona Railway Museum awaiting restoration. The Coronado Railroad was one of the smallest minimum gauge railroads that operated in North America.