Here's an oddball one, a geared 0-4-0 dinky made by the Risdon Iron and Locomotive Works in 1893. It was 22" gauge with the cylinders in between the wheels, resulting in a very long wheelbase. The narrow dimensions were due to its original use, hauling ore through a combination haulage/drainage/sluice tunnel in Alaska.



This particular locomotive was purchased new in 1893 by the Nowell mining co for use in the aforementioned tunnel at their Silverbow Basin placer mine. At some point prior to 1897 it was moved to the Silver Queen Mine at Sheep Creek, AK (just S of Juneau). By 1897 it had been replaced by a 24" gauge Porter locomotive.



Up until last year, this Risdon was upside down in a ditch along the former Sheep Creek railroad grade. A local tour operation has pulled it out and is now displaying the remains at their property in Juneau. The local power company still owns it, as they purchased/inherited all the assetts from local mining companies, and the tour company is leasing it from them. Interestingly, it spent probably 100 years on public land after the mining claims expired, but still seems to be privately owned. Try leaving your car upside down on city land for 100 years and then saying you still own it!



At some point the firebox, boiler, and water tank disappeared. These were sometimes recycled for stationary use as heating boilers or water tanks. All that's left now is the frame, wheels, pistons, and assorted small parts. I measured the wheels and found them still at 22" gauge, so it was probably not used after 1897 when the mine railroad switched to 24".








I'd be interested to know if Risdon ever made more locomotives, and where they were used. As far as I've been able to discover, they mostly manufactured stamp mills and gold dredges. I did find an article claiming this was the last locomotive they ever made, but it contained some inaccuracies so I'm not sure how trustworthy it is.

That's an interesting bit of preservation of an interesting locomotive. What's left of it appears to be in remarkable shape considering its disposition for the past 120 years or so.

It looks like it had a marine type (cylindrical) fire box. Probably the only solution that would work within the very limited confines it was designed for.

Thanks for sharing that.

Roger

Storing it upside down was probably smart, as it means all the ports are facing downward.

I don't know if it was so much "stored" as it was "We don't need this anymore, push it off the trestle"...

It's pretty common to find old equipment shoved out of the way in Alaska, either off the side of a road / railroad, in the back of an abandoned building, or dumped somewhere convenient (mine shafts, quarry pits, ponds, off the end of a dock, etc). It has always cost a lot to ship equipment up there, and just as much to ship it back South, so when machinery wears out it's usually not worth the expense of salvaging or scrapping it.

Same thing happened with quite a few other steam locomotives in Alaska. They were obsolete and the owners had no room for storage and no funds to ship them out of state, so they got dumped wherever was easiest. In the last few decades a few have been recovered from various ditches, beaches, and rivers for restoration. There are a few known ones waiting to be recovered, and some lost ones that no one's bothered to look for. I know a fellow who will be checking out a rumored underwater locomotive with an R.O.V. soon.

Nice find.

Does she have 2 steam cylinders? It is hard to tell in the last photo due to the angle. Do you know the size?

Can't tell in the pile of miscellaneous on top of her, but did you find the crank and intermediate gear (gear between the crank and axle mounted gear)? In the first photo you can see the crank bearing and it looks disassembled not broken.

Does she still roll?

Take care,
Rich C.

Per the builder's blueprint the cylinders were 5" dia x 6" stroke. Pretty small! The boiler was 32", Wheels 22" and Track gauge 22".

I doubt it still rolls, the wheels seemed to be in the same position as they were while it was capsized in the ditch. Likely its all seized up and would need quite a bit of work to get it mobile. The folks who own the tour and presently have possession of it also have an 0-4-0 Porter from the Kensington Mine, they'd like to restore that to working condition but there is not a lot original left. It was welded up to look nice for a 1970s parade after some of the parts were found (also in a ditch!).

Here are a few more pictures of the Risdon. I tried to document it as much as I could, but I only had about 10 minutes before the property owners were locking up. I'd spent the rest of the day in the woods looking for this, as I didn't know it had been moved! It was also pouring rain (as it does in Juneau), and it was a struggle to keep the camera and lens dry! I suspect there are parts of other "stuff" mixed in with the Risdon, I see what looks like the frame for an aerial tram car sitting on top. There were a couple ore cars and other stuff in the woods near where it lay, either the mine's dump or just what fell there when a building rotted.