Steam at Parnassus

Mount Parnassus in Greece was the mythical site of the fountain Castalia, a nymph whom the god Apollo transformed into a fountain at Delphi, at the base of mountain, and the home of the Muses: the home of poetry, music, and learning.

Those who pass through Parnassus, a locality of about 900 people, in north Canterbury probably wonder why it was so named: apparently a local sheep farmer thought a hill nearby looked like Mt Parnassus.

The railway reached Parnassus from the south in 1912 and was known as the Parnassus Branch, until the rest of the line, the Main North Line of the South Island Main Trunk was completed to the north in 1945.  In the photo an A class steamer sits at the station with livestock wagons in 1917.