Got a quick tour of the Baldwin office building in Eddystone a few weeks ago. Not too much left...every floor I visited had been renovated. I couldn't get to the 7th and 8th floors, but they are supposedly less changed. The lobby has a few really cool pics and a live steam Reading T-1 2100 in a showcase. The lobby is open if anyone wants to take a look. Not sure how much longer the T-1 will be there...evidently it will be donated to a museum soon as the building will be undergoing another round of renovations. It's a cool building. It was really built to impress...the outside has some great detail. The south side of the building has a great view of the NE corridor. As I looked out of the office building windows onto the NE corridor I could just picture the engineers watching their engines race up and down showing off what they had. Pretty cool. Just wanted to share.

Any directions from 95?J

Thanks for a fascinating post! I drove up to the plant itself in the mid-late 1980s. Acre after acre of abandoned buildings, with "The Baldwin Locomotive Works" still painted on the outside. Wish I had had the guts or foresight to ask the security folks if I could wander around (although who's to say whether they would have agreed or not). Couldn't get near the office building itself. It's fascinating-and sad-to see an impressive part of America's industrial infrastructure/heritage, where thousands once worked, now abandoned. I suppose little, if any, of the actual shop buildings remain.Anyone know where info can be found-articles, etc-on the disposition of the shop machinery?

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Dan,Does the no photography imply that photos made from the street are not allowed, or not allowed within the Baldwin Industral Park?Robert Yuill

There is a really good academic, research quality history of the Baldwin Company that came out a few years ago. I enjoyed reading it, especially its coverage of the financial and management aspects. According to the authors, the Eddystone works were really white elephants immediately on completion. The company's finances were already faltering. When the great railroad boom ended after WWI, and the locomotives became more efficient, the number of new locomotives required each year dropped dramatically. Those engines that were built had much higher startup costs for manufacturing due to their complexity, and the volumes were not great enough to pay off the engineering costs. Eddystone was doomed even before the depression.