Which railroads thought so highly of their retired motive power that they kept a preserved representative collection for posterity? A short list of my own would includes: Union Pacific, DM&IR, B&LE, PRR, B&O, and Santa Fe.
I still find it amazing that Santa Fe didn't recognize how much the warbonnet ALCO PA represented their company, at least enough to keep a pair.

glueck@maine.edu

> Which railroads thought so highly of their
> retired motive power that they kept a
> preserved representative collection for
> posterity? A short list of my own would
> includes: Union Pacific, DM&IR,
> B&LE, PRR, B&O, and Santa Fe.
> I still find it amazing that Santa Fe didn't
> recognize how much the warbonnet ALCO PA
> represented their company, at least enough
> to keep a pair.

They may not have kept them on the property, but the C&O ended up with many examples of their steam power preserved via the B&O museum or presentation to various on-line communities.

TKMSMullens@wmconnect.com

Discovered this photo which shows the tender of EG&F #4. I know there was some question here as to where her tender came from, but I don't remember exactly what the discussion was about.

Hope this view helps.


SJHussar@aol.com

One railroad which did NOTHING to preserve it's heritage was my beloved New York Central. Only two mainline engines survive, both Mohawks, and both only through the efforts of others, not the railroad. Our loss, for sure.

fitzrr@pioneer.net

It is my understanding that prior to the N&W merger, the Virginian set aside several steam and electric locomotives including a 2-6-6-6, and a 2-8-4. They were promptly send to the scrap yard by N&W President Stuart Saunders shortly after the merger.

The only surviving VGN steam locomotive is 0-8-0 #4, which was donated to the City of Princeton, WV before the merger, and later ended up at the Virginia Museum of Transportation after Saunders left the N&W to wreck the Penn Central.

kevin.r.gillespie@verizon.net

> Discovered this photo which shows the tender
> of EG&F #4. I know there was some
> question here as to where her tender came
> from, but I don't remember exactly what the
> discussion was about.

> Hope this view helps.

Where is she currently located?

midlandblb@cs.com

The New York Central may have had a poor record as far as preservation of its locomotive types goes, but the assertion that they did nothing is wrong. Mohawk #2933 at the Museum of Transportation in St. Louis was donated directly by the NYC in 1963, along with S-motor #113 of 1906 vintage. The Mohawk was the only modern steam loco they donated anywhere, but it did not come via a second party, as did the one now at Elkhart.

Museum of Transportation
rdgoldfede@aol.com

> Which railroads thought so highly of their
> retired motive power that they kept a
> preserved representative collection for
> posterity? A short list of my own would
> includes: Union Pacific, DM&IR,
> B&LE, PRR, B&O, and Santa Fe.
> I still find it amazing that Santa Fe didn't
> recognize how much the warbonnet ALCO PA
> represented their company, at least enough
> to keep a pair.

My understanding of the Santa Fe diesel preservation is that it was fostered by mid-management. The individuals sent certain units off to storage and not to scrap. It was not until they moved the 1010 2-6-2 from LA to Albuqureque that all of this come to the attention of upper managment. At that time it was tacidly blessed by the line's president.

After this there was investigation into putting one of the big steam engines back into service with a heritage train. But this did not develope.

In time, the company realized that it was in the transportation business and not best suited to preserve this collection of steam and diesel. I am told that it looked at various existing on-line railway museums before deciding to present the collection to CSRM.

> Where is she currently located?

On static display in Gorham, NH, masquerading as this engine, Grand Trunk 0-6-0 #7531, which apparently was scrapped.

http://www.steamlocomotive.info/vlocomotive.cfm?Display=826

SJHussar@aol.com

According to the Official Steamtown Loco Guide Volume I from 1970, her tender is from B & M mogul 1364.
Other data
Baldwin Loco #35821 Jan 1911
drivers 51"
Cylinder 21x26
Boiler 175 psi

JP


bigboy4884@charter.net

> Would one of you posting here who
> self-identifies as a "museum
> professional" please define what you
> mean by the term? This should go a long way
> in avoiding misunderstandings in future
> discussions of the issue.

I don't self-identify as a museum professional, since I don't work at a museum in my workaday career. That said, I think the other posters are onto something when they cite pay and academic training in museum studies as the two hallmarks, but I'd actually say it's something broader than that.

I would point to a fault line between those who embrace and advocate the kind of conceptual tools and procedures and perspectives taught in museum studies programs and museum professional meetings like those run by AAM or ARM, and those who feel that most of these concepts have little application to railway preservation.

A good example is the donneybrook that breaks out over the concept of "conservation of original fabric." This idea (that a museum's job is to alter the physical condition of an srtifact a little as possible, so as to preserve it for future study) amounts to "received wisdom" in most museum studies programs, but it's highly controversial within our field. Many people feel that it violates the nature of railroad artifacts not to restore them to operating condition, and that the concept of original fabric is therefore silly applied to, say, a steam locomotive.

I guess I'm trying to say the two sides of the debate are drawn up along friendliness vs. hostility to some concepts of what a museum is and what it should do, and that this goes beyond paid vs. volunteer or academic training vs. OJT/self-taught.

eledbetter@rypn.org

Sending the whole collection to CSRM was probably a good move, considering the ATSF was not a rolling musuem, and had to show a positive balance sheet in the end. As far as railroads are concerned though, ATSF at least had some sense of history where steam was concerned. The change over from one entire form of motive power to another marked the historical awareness. Most companies would never say, "hey that's an FM unit, we should save one of those, and we should represent an RS-2, and a Baldwin switcher!" Diesels can still be regarded, largely, as "cookie-cutter" designs, modified for specific roads, only for specific reasons. Witness the repainting of BAR F-3's and BL-2's, to represent what they truely ain't.

glueck@maine.edu

Ron, your loyalty to the Central does you a credit, but face it; here was a company with one of the two most popular locomotives in American railroading history the Hudson, and they cut all of them up!
Going to the next level, here is the Niagara fleet, only 7 years old, and it's wiped out because it's regarded as "junk", by the company President. This guy even turns down a straight request from the Smithsonian. Ugh.

glueck@maine.edu

Great photo of the EG&F locomotive. Sometimes its hard to imagine such battered industrial cadavers ever had an active service life, but such photos definitely help. Incidently, though I don't have my exact number info handy, at least one of the Grand Trunk (New England Lines) USRA 0-6-0s went to Paulsen Spence and ended up in Louisiana, before being scrapped after he died. These were used in the yard at Island Pond, VT until the GT was dieselized in 1956. The GT is now owned by Genessee & Wyoming and all but the depot is gone at Island Pond.

http://www.yesteryeardepot.com/louiest.htm
ryarger@rypn.org

> No. Cabooses are classified as freight
> equipment,
> They wouldn't handle well. Most modern
> freight trucks, unless equipped with special
> damping equipment, tend to hunt badly above
> 70MPH.

PRR and probably other roads had "passenger
equipped" cabooses to use instead of a coach as
a "rider car" on a solid train of "passenger
equipped" express, mail, refrigerator, and/or
baggage cars. They had passenger compatable
signal and steam lines, trucks, and brakes.
ConRail and/or Amtrak probably got some since the
last Railway Post Office train on the NorthEast
corridor outlasted PennCentral by 3 months! This
was the era when PRR's "Special Instructions for
Trains Authorized to Operate Over 80 M.P.H." only
went up to 90 or 100 mph. I don't recall
cabooses in the list of permitted equipment, but
I'll check again.
In the mid 1980s, New Hope & Ivyland tried to
find out if ConRail had any left, but the PRR N5c
cabooses available had gone through Reading Shops
in 1978 and emerged with standard freight
equipment, no matter what they might have had
before. Maybe Amtrak got some of the passenger
equipped variety. I doubt that there ever was
a "Heritage" caboose with Head End Power cables,
but can someone confirm? I never tried Amtrak
for a caboose, because the bosses bought a bay
window hack CR 24519 from ConRail and turned it
into a private car NHIR 447 with freight
equipment. It's now on the New Hampshire
NorthCoast Corp.

TyburnRR@cs.com