Anyone else see another "Al Capone's Vault" in the making?

Too bad Nat Geo won't fund an exploration looking for "Lost Locomotives" in the back lot at (insert your favorite railroad museum here.)

I guess the mystery and all makes for good TV, but it would sure be nice if they could get excited about more realistic restoration projects. As we've pointed out in other recent threads on rumors, it's not like the thing is encased in amber and all you do is wash it off, kick the driver tires (ouch!) and light the fire.

If (and that's a -BIG- if) it was left in the tunnel, there's a reason, and not's because the crew went dead on the law and they forgot it was there. But let's play "pretend" for a moment and say that for whatever reason they rolled the engine out of the backshop and into the tunnel for a civil war version of the "strategic steam reserve". 182 years later, exactly what do you think would be left? I'm guessing it's not in mint condition. Well, actually, I'm guessing it doesn't exist, but if it does, it's going to be in rough shape.

One of the problems with "restarting" a subject, is that a lot of the previous info discussed gets omitted. There was a reason this old 1832 outmoded "beast of burden" was in the tunnel in the first place and a reason it was (supposedly) left there. I don't know if it is or isn't behind that wall, but it seems that a relatively low cost dig, professionally done, could find out once and for all. Forget personalities. Forget opinions, one way or the other. Concentrate on the piece of history that just might be found. And if not found, move on.

Les

Do they even need to remove the wall? Seems like they could drill a hole and send in a camera, kind of like they do with trapped miners. No tearing down walls or other big projects. If they find something, then you move on to bigger excavation, if desired.

What's the actual documentary proof that it was left in the tunnel to begin with?

Was there no scrap market in the 19th century?

The previous threads date from 1998 and 2009, and still no locomotive has been discovered.

2009
http://www.rypn.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=2478&p=10291&hilit=brooklyn+tunnel#p10291

1998

http://www.rypn.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=26971&hilit=brooklyn+tunnel

That seems to be the basic criteria here for the belief in lost locomotives. That is that they should be a free locomotive in near operating condition, there for the taking, and preferably a Big Boy or a Hudson. Under those criteria, no lost locomotive legend can be true. There is an ex-C&O 4-4-0 in Churchill Tunnel in Richmond, VA. It never got scrapped.

To further elaborate on my inquiry regarding proof:

1. We know the tunnel is there, no mistaking it.

2. What is the documentary proof that a locomotive was left in there? Is there a journal, a newspaper article, or other primary source material that mentions this?

3. The event seems too far removed in history for it to be an oral tradition of the lost locomotive.

4. If there is documentary proof, who found it and where is the documentation? Can it be viewed by others. Is it in a library or historcial society's collection.

Just because a person is credible in one aspect (finding the tunnel) doesn't mean they are credible in other aspects (locomotive).

In the 1860's I would think that removing rails located 25ft or so below grade would likely have been doable with a team of Irishmen hand carrying each rail one by one. Perhaps a one would need to either rig up some sort of Gib crane, or a team of oxen and up it would come. Once out of the hole onto a horse drawn cart it would go to transverse some streets that would likely vary from nice firm cobble stone to wet muck depending on the time of year the endeavor would take place. On the other hand how would you remove a whole locomotive 40years before the oxy-acetelyne torch comes onto the scene? I doubt a bunch of Irish men are going to hand carry that one out, and I don't know when the steam crane comes on the scene.

Next the question becomes what do you do with the locomotive once it gets to the surface? The rail at a time when the country was building its rail network left and right would likely be a quick and easy sell in the city as a finished product. The obsolete steam locomotive wouldn't be worth more than scrap. Scrap metal would likely be a different story. In the day and age when a link and pin 4-4-0 American was a large modern freight locomotive I doubt that they were pulling long drag freights of scrap to big steel mills yet to be invented. So at that point the scrap market likely would be something heavily dependent on how close you were to your local foundry. Perhaps others could comment more but once again depending on the quality of the streets you were crossing, I suspect it may cost some money to take the thing to market. Once again the thought of moving said locomotive across lousy streets seems like a major pain.

So yea I can easily see the thing being left there.

As to the discussion of why, do this, it wouldn't be the first time a combination of a local piece of railroad history and emotion caused a man to go to great lengths to go to great lengths to save something others would otherwise declare too far gone!

There actually has to be something there in order to save it.

Before we talk about digging holes, using cameras, etc., let us look at the documentary proof.

The land owners along Atlantic Ave. voted to let themselves be taxed according to their street frontage to raise the money to pay the railroad to get out of town by midnight or not get paid. That part is in newspapers and government records.
One version of the rumor is that their wasn't enough time to both remove the rails from both tracks and wall up the tunnel. The far downhill end was walled up 1st. Then, while the engine that had brought the work train with stone to the near uphill end was detached from its train, it ran away and crashed into the new wall at the far end. It was too close to the deadline to retrieve the wreck without risking the loss of the payment,so the locomotive was left there and the other wall built in time. About 1904, a telephone company laying a cable near the downhill end of the old tunnel broke into an unknown hole and quickly filled it with dirt.
The trouble with that story is that the rails for both tracks are gone. The tie beds for the North track are worn down as if from wagon traffic after the ties were gone, the indentations for the other track's ties are in much better condition, as if those ties rotted in place. There is now a rough stone wall near the far end, that must have been installed from the inside.
Another rumor that the government tried to use to keep Mr. Diamond out was that the tunnel was inhabited with giant rats and man eating German saboteurs! Al Capone's victims and Judge Crater are imprisoned or buried inside, and all the stores on Atlantic Ave. have basement entrances so they can store their Prohibition liquor off site.

I've been told, backchannel by one of the trolley guys, that Mr. Diamond has supposedly served jail time for his repeated incursions into the tunnel against city wishes. That supposed fact is not revealed in the various alternative-media write-ups of him, though I'm not sure I trust any of them to either bother investigating that fact or report it if true--you know, doesn't "fit the chosen narrative" of "do-gooder underdog fighting City Hall to show off cool things/improve the city with trolleys" or whatnot.

As for obsessions with buried/underground locomotives, those with long memories and over a certain age may remember that one of the originators of this website, a former news editor of a certain rail magazine, shared a similar obsession with various steam locomotives conveniently "out of reach" of serious preservation efforts.........

If I were the authorities I would try to find out, whatever piece of metal there might be.

Is does not matter how the person who promotes this is being characterized.

It does not matter if people say he speculates. Those who believe there may be nothing are speculating as well.

And it does not matter there are other historical buried locomotives to be saved in other places. Preserving the one does not exclude preserving the other.


Mike

And if/when you find/confirm it--then what? It's a hunk of metal. So what?

That's the stickler of the details. Always has been. Drag it out, at a cost of hundreds of thousands, or even millions? Preserve in place and create yet another museum? Document, and then seal back up? Let this one guy try and dig it out, with a shovel and a bucket, hauling dirt through the manhole? What happens if/when he gets killed in a collapse, or buildings' foundations start cracking, or a sinkhole opens up on the street? Who pays?

As many have repeatedly said, it's always so easy to tell someone else what to do with someone else's money.

It matters quite a bit. We do things like this based on real research. Why? Resources such as time and money are scarce. Mel Fisher didn't just go hunting around the ocean for the Atocha on a whim. Robert Ballard has always done extensive research before he goes hunting for shipwrecks.

So getting back to my original inquiry, what is the primary source evidence that a locomotive may be under there?

I know very little about this legend, but it seems like a lot has been written about it here, and the person looking for the engine has made his quest rather high profile. But I too would like to know the evidence that the locomotive is there. That seems like a simple question. Maybe that is clearly addressed in the story of this quest, but I have no idea how to find it. Is there a link to a comprehensive account of this search from the start to the present?