In Mexico at Los Mochis, there's a 36" gauge 2-8-0 displayed and on it's smokebox there's a Baldwin Locomotive Works builders plate. No big deal, right? Except the number on the builder's plate is definitely non-Baldwin. The highest construction number Baldwin used was somewhere in the mid-70,000s. This one is 600880. Picture is included below. What is this plate? And why the weird number?

Doug,
If you zoom in on the plate it does say it is an extra order plate. This puts it outside the normal range.without reference materials in front of me I can't say what the order was but it could be something like a new boiler or some other major work or change that BLW would have viewed as significant.

The plate in question states "Extra Order", meaning the engine has a replacement boiler ordered from Baldwin and built in 1947. Extra Order items did not follow the same construction number sequence as the regular orders. According to Dave Conrad's listing, the engine in question was originally out-shopped in Dec 1899 as Construction number 16525.

Thanks! These old eyeballs couldn't make sense of the extra wording on the plate.

Thank you for the informaton Ted! I'm correcting my entry for this locomotive.
Much appreciated.

Dear steaminfo,
I was also thrown a curve ball by the plates on the two S.D. Warren paper mill locomotives at the Boothbay Railroad Village, which were built circa 1895.

They now have plates on them for the replacement boilers that BLW did for them circa 1922.

And now the Boothbay Village shop is building a new boiler and saddle tank for the #2. So it will be her third boiler.

The correct construction number on the #1 is 14283 and the #2 is the 14522.

Ted Miles, WW&F Ry Museum member