I read somewhere once that UP 4439 (preserved at Travel Town in Los Angeles) was the last UP steamer (Still working for the UP) in daily service.

Of course, we could start talking like baseball; The last steamer driven by a left hander at home during night games with the wind from the south. :-)

Greg

Perhaps the trick word is "daily", or maybe they meant in Los Angeles.

Not all of the locomotives were worn out before they were retired. Some were never had many miles on them after their last rebuild. Some locomotives were rebuilt for possible floods that never came and were retired in preety good shape. SP 3420 only took ten months to return to operation in 1980/81 without much repair work given what most locomotive rebuilds take.

Robby

How about: "the last run that was made because the steam engine happened to be the only or best available power in the roundhouse when the train needed to be run".

But even so there are a lot of variations on the theme. My picture of the ex-UP 4455 is not on the UP, it is on the Laramie Valley Railroad.....so maybe it counts as an engine of UP heritage, but not ON the UP.

My favorite is when the SP 2475 was deadheading from Oakland to San Jose for a fan special the next day, and the dispatcher had it pickup some freight cars enroute. That is arguably the last "regular" use of standard gauge steam on the SP....but it was hardly "regular".

Lotsa possibilities here.

John

Robbie,

Did they every get the tube sheet problem corrected to satisfy all concerned?

IT is a pretty engine.

JD Johnson, Morehead and North Fork Railroad Historian