For those that are interested, someone has posted the film "Broadway Limited" on YouTube at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PP2uXjle ... ture=feedu

It has some great footage of PRR steam.

Sure looks a lot like the ROW along Warriors Ridge just north of Huntingdon, train heading RR West.

Anyone identify the 4-4-0 in the later scenes?

I was going to say somewhere on the Middle Division, but Junior may have the answer.

There was an article on just this film a year or two ago in Classic Trains (I think it was by the late Curt Katz), and it may have mentioned the locations.

The 4-4-0 is supposedly the 1223, which ran for years at Strasburg, and is now at the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, but I'm not entirely sure of that; I think the Pennsy had three D-16sbs still running at about that time. That the 1223 was preserved and had some sort of celebrity status for that suggests she was the one in the film. . .but I don't know this positively.

The film is apparently in public domain; it's available for free download at the Internet Archives.

There is another flick with a (too short) rail sequence in it; that is "The Big Trees," from 1952. This features a full scale train wreck (cut of log cars and a sabotaged bridge collapse), using stock footage from another film, "Valley of the Giants," made in 1937. Question: What logging railroad was this filmed on, which rostered a 2-6-6-2T?

Rail action starts at about 1:15:00. The Mallet appears at 1:16:30, and the wreck itself is at 1:22:00. Errors include a caboose with an offset cupola (looks like an ex-SP cab) that gets reversed between a couple of shots, and Kirk Douglas still winding up the brake wheel on that caboose even after he has brakes cranked up to where the wheels are sliding.

http://www.archive.org/details/big_trees

Trailer from "Valley of the Giants;" I wonder if this is also in public domain, and if it is available in some form.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o46fdolfUlg

Now, I've got to reserve some time to watch "Broadway Limited" (I've never seen the whole movie before) and perhaps see "Danger Lights" again. Argh, what would it take to get something like these or other flicks, such as "Other Men's Women," or even a remake something like "Union Pacific," "Whispering Smith," or "Emperor of the North Pole?" What would it take to get a new film with an interesting story and even more authenticity, such as an adaptation of Hollister Noble's "One Way to Eldorado," Steven R. Meader's "The Long Trains Roll," William Wister Haine's "High Tension," Frank Spearman's "Held for Orders," Herbert Hamblen's "The General Manager's Story," or Gilbert Lathrop's "Rio Grande Glory Days?"

It would be nice to see something that looks as good as "Broadway Limited," "Danger Lights," or "The Titfield Thundebolt" that wasn't 60 or 70 or 80 years old, and didn't include such wild stuff as a train loaded with hazardous materials going around a curve on only one set of wheels! ("Unstoppable")

The PRR had three 4-4-0s in service late in steam. 1223, 1035, and 5079. The 1223 was also used for display and retained an older more traditional look than the other two. They were all used on Del-Mar-Va where there were a number of branches that required light locomotives. The 1223 reportedly given the princess treatment at the Wilmington Shops. I might be wrong but I think she was owned by the PRR, PC, and maybe even Conrail and leased to Strasburg during her time in tourist service there.

I've checked in A. Staufer's book, Pennsy Power (Vol. 1), and it provided a bit of information that seems to verify that the 1223 was used in the movie "Broadway Limited". On page 109 it's stated that the 1223 had kept her slatted pilot into the 1940's while the other two 4-4-0's had footboards installed on the front end by that time. In checking the movie in several spots, (starting the train, a running shot and coming into the station at Harrisburg), it clearly shows the slatted pilot. In addition, the striping and lettering seem similar to photos of 1223 during its preservation days.

It was the 1223. The other 2 D-16sb engines had high collar coal spaces and larger sandboxes.

The 1223, but not the cab shots.

The Kalmbach Publishing book on railroad movies claimed that the back head shots in the cab were of a very realistic studio prop, even to the oil and water stains.