Take a good look at your photo. The doubleheader should show a 4-6-2 (1286) in the lead and a 4-6-0 (972) trailing. 1251 is an 0-6-0T, not at all suitable for 50 mph running on WM. There are several published photos of this run and all show 1286/972. Unless I'm getting very near-sighted, my movies of the run (now on video) also indicate 1286/972 in a broadside shot just east of Gettysburg. Don't take my word for it, check the published photos. In Ron Ziel's book, Mainline Steam Revival, pg 174 there's a wonderful 3/4 color shot of 1286/972 on the horseshoe curve at Iron Springs. This photo is also found in his 1998 calendar, Great Steam Trains.

Are you sure you're not thinking of the Reading T1 trips with 2102? There are several photos of it on Jacks with the WM FA's, and many elsewhere running solo on WM's Dutch line.

1. Peter Beste, replaced by Ringo Starr who is probably better known in this venue for his role in Thomas the Tank Engine.

2. NH 0783 acquired as a parts donor.

GME

It's my opinion that the Reading T-1s and G-3s stayed around as long as they did because their equipment trusts had to be paid off before they could be scrapped. That said, it's also important to note that they were products of the post World War II era, while the other anthracite railroads had built no steam locomotives later than the 1930s.

By 1954, the Reading's passenger service had been dieselized 100 percent for 2 years, and some of the G-3s were on lease to the Pennsylvania Reading Seashore Lines. The T-1s were in storage at St. Clair that year, and there were enough diesels on hand to handle all the business. In 1955 and 1956, an uptick in the economy caught the Reading (and the PRR) power short, so several T-1s were leased to the PRR and other went in service in low-mileage, short haul coal service on the Shamokin Division. They operated in month-to-month service as needed, and by April 1957, it was all over, and the first T-1s were sent to Luria Brothers in Coatesville for reduction. The G-3s were still sitting in Reading in the spring of 1959, as the idea of the Iron Horse Rambles was being discussed, but they were sent to scrap that summer. By the time the first Ramble operated in the fall of 1959, just 10 T-1s remained on hand, and five of them were scrapped the next year.