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Locomotives and More

Locomotive Antelope

CPRR Diamond Stack Locomotive #29 "Antelope" and Wood Tender, c. 1867, 18" x 14" Albumen Print, detail.
[4-4-0, built 1867 by Mc Kay & Aldus Iron Works of East Boston, Mass. This engine was chosen by Leland Stanford for the
Golden Spike Ceremony but was damaged by
logs near Truckee and the "Jupiter" took its place at Promontory Summit. ]

George B. Trumbull CPRR engine drawing, 1894.  Courtesy Heise Huntington, Zamboni & Huntington.
George B. Trumbull "CPRR" engine drawing, "Fast Freight Locomotive," detail, 1894.
Courtesy Heise Huntington, Zamboni & Huntington.


[Click on a picture below to get an enlarged view.]

CP_82_Rocklin_1890_SPRR
CP_82_Rocklin_1890_SPRR
CP_225_Schenectady_1876
CP_225_Schenectady_1876
CP_Huntington
CP_Huntington
CPRR_Loco_166_CP_Shops
CPRR_Loco_166_CP_Shops
CPRR_Loco_1353_1543_1773
CPRR_Loco_1353_1543_1773
CPRR_Loco_1353
CPRR_Loco_1353
CPRR_Loco_1543
CPRR_Loco_1543
CPRR_Loco_1773
CPRR_Loco_1773
Locomotive_1283
Locomotive_1283
Locomotive_1710
Locomotive_1710
Locomotive_at_Colfax
Locomotive_at_Colfax
Locomotive_CP_173
Locomotive_CP_173
Locomotive_CP_191
Locomotive_CP_191
Locomotive_CP_1061_Baldwin
Locomotive_CP_1061_Schenectady
Locomotive_CP_Grey_Eagle
Locomotive_CP_Grey_Eagle
Locomotive_CP6_Conness
Locomotive_CP6_Conness
Locomotive_Pequop60_McKay68
Locomotive_Pequop60_McKay68
Locomotive_Stanford
Locomotive_Stanford
SP_49_Schenectady_1880
SP_49_Schenectady_1880
SP_1620_Cooke99_Oakland39
SP_1620_Cooke99_Oakland39
SP_1629_Schen1900_TracyCA44
SP_1629_Schen1900_TracyCA44
SP_1660_Oakland1946
SP_1660_Oakland1946
SP_2409_Baldwin_1906_1940
SP_2409_Baldwin_1906_1940
SP_2425_Tracy_CA_1942_DJW
SP_2425_Tracy_CA_1942_DJW
SP_2925_Cooke_1892
SP_2925_Cooke_1892
SP2405_Baldwin06_Oakland40
SP2405_Baldwin06_Oakland40
UP_2
UP_2
UPRR_Loco_9
UPRR_Loco_9
Russell_Promontory_UPRR
Russell_Promontory_UPRR
Last_Spike_Monument_SPRR
Last_Spike_Monument_SPRR
Hart_90_d
Hart_90_d
Hart_145_d
Hart_145_d
Hart_246_d
Hart_246_d
Hart_327_d
Hart_327_d
Hart_350_d
Hart_350_d

Jupiter
'Jupiter' replacement locomotive with Chinese. Courtesy Southern Pacific Company.
["The locomotive is V&T number 12 Genoa. The car is V&T number 16. The location is either the
New York World's Fair in 1939-40, or the Chicago Wheels-a-Rollin' in 1949." -Wendell Huffman]

["Virginia & Truckee #12 Genoa standing in for Central Pacific #60 Jupiter at the 1949 Chicago Wheels-a-Rollin' Fair." -Kyle K. Wyatt]



CPRR Locomotive Roster, 1868
[Click to enlarge.]
Locomotive Roster, 1868.
From the Lewis W. Peters Collection, courtesy of G.J. Graves and Carol Graves.
Born about 1852, Lewis W. Peters, whose portait appears below, worked at the Sacramento shops of the Central Pacific Railroad.
He died at age 82 in Sacramento on Dec. 28, 1934. The the group of photographs below come from an album that was part of his estate. Some of the images were photographed by W. I. Morrison, as annotated on the images.

CPRR Sacramento Shop Workers.  [Click to enlarge.]
Veterans of Sacramento Shops Who Took Part in Repairing Southern Pacific Locomotive No. 1 in 1884.
Patrick Sheedy, 1868; W.B. Dutton, 1875; L. Peters, 1875; H. Ingham, 1879; Harry Bay, 1880; A.L. Humphrey, 1881; H.A. Crocker, 1882; R. Vaughn 1883;
D. Farr, 1883; G.A. Knoblauch, 1883; C.E. Leinberger, 1883; A.C. Boothby, 1884.

Photograph Taken in Sacramento, January 16, 1928.

Additional Images from the Lewis W. Peters Album
Courtesy G.J. Graves and Carol Graves.

CPRR Locomotive T. D. Judah.
CPRR Locomotive T.D. Judah.
Note the foreground shadow of the photographer and large format camera on its tripod.



Charles R. Savage Photo at Promontory Summit, May 10, 1869.
"Champagne Photo" May 10, 1869 with Jupiter & 119 nose to nose, detail of Charles R. Savage stereoview. Courtesy National Park Service.


CPRR Locomotive 1775
Central Pacific Railroad Diamond Stack Wood Burning Locomotive #1775. Courtesy Bonnie Miller.


CPRR Locomotive 31 Mariposa
Central Pacific Railroad Locomotive #1193, formerly #31, "Mariposa." Courtesy Paul Morrissey.

Jupiter enroute to Promontory, Postcard.
"CENTRAL PACIFIC No. 60 Jupiter
Governor Stanford's special train behind the famous locomotive Jupiter enroute to Promontory, Utah, to take part in the driving of the Golden Spike held May 10, 1869. The sign on the left marks the east end of the ten miles of track laid in one day by Superintendent Strobridge's laborers. This colorful oil painting by railroad artist Harlan Hiney decorates the book Iron Horses to Promontory by Gerald M. Best ... Litho by Bob Plunkett, Los Angeles." Postcard detail.



"The Tiger," Baldwin Locomotive

"THE TIGER. No. 134, the Tiger, 4-4.0 or American type, was one of four similar eight-wheelers all named after fierce members of the animal and insect kingdom, that M. W. Baldwin & Co. built for the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1857. The others were the Leopard, the Wasp, and the Hornet. Like most locomotives of her time, the Tiger sported gay colors, ornate scrolls, and brass trimmings that were kept highly polished. Note too, the flag on her pilot beam. If you look closely with a magnifying glass, you can make out the figure of a tiger painted on her wooden cab and the tropical palm scene on her oilburning box headlight. It was not uncommon for locomotives built before the 1870's to be adorned with such paintings. One famous engine, for example, had a handsome portrait of Commodore Vanderbilt painted on her headlight. The Tiger weighed 59,100 pounds and had tall driving wheels, 66 inches in diameter, which could roll on level track at about 60 miles per hour. Coverdale and Colpitts Collection."

 

Richard Norris & Son, "Wyoming" Locomotive

"WYOMING. The locomotive-building firm of Richard Norris & Son constructed the dazzling Wyoming primarily as a showpiece and used this lithograph of her to advertise their wares. Like most iron horses of her time, the Wyoming was a 4-4-0 or American type, splashed with bright colors, stars, pictures of eagles, and brightly burnished brasswork. There was even a blackand-white portrait of a bearded man, possibly Richard Norris himself, as a sort of trademark on the side of the cabvery likely on both sides. Although capstacks were commonly used on coalburners built between 1870 and 1910, they were extremely rare in 1856, when the Wyoming was built. Other distinctive features were the Gothic-arch windows in her cab and the ornamental outside bearing truck connecting her two pairs of pony-truck wheels. Coverdale and Colpitts Collection."

> I may be able to help with the identity of the man depicted on the cab of the Norris locomotive "Wyoming" ... According to John H. White, Jr., the portrait depicts a Mr. Phelger, who invented the patent boiler (identified by the long raised channel along the top of the boiler) used on the engine. On the other side of the cab was a genre painting of a small boy sleeping, protected by his dog. The boiler w as unsucessful - fatally weak, with no improvement in creating steam room. Phelger's boiler was advertised by Norris with exceptionally showy engines and the 1857 lithograph. Several other Phelger boilered engines were built by Norris for the Pennsylvania RR between 1857 and 62; all were rebuilt with conventional boilers shortly afterwards. All were unusually supplied with a much greater than usual amount of brass trim and brightwork. Wyoming was one of two engines built for the Lackawanna & Bloomsburg RR in Northestern Pennsylvania, and named for the Wyoming mountain range and coal seams. Paint schemes of Norris engines of this period ranged from opulant to gaudy, with purple, green and red combined with black, red or emerald green wheels. The Wyoming has gossy black wheels and heavy gold stripes on the spokes, which contrast with the red and apple green on the rest of the engine. Less exhuberant engines were green with red wheels. Black wheels were also favored by Norris's neighbor Baldwin in the early 1860s and may be indicitave of a regional painting style used by Philadelphia locomotive builders. No other 1860s era builder is known to have used them unless requested. The Pennsylvania RR – a heavy Baldwin customer – adopted black wheels as standard for all PRR locomotives in 1863. Baldwin shifted to red wheels in mid 1864, and the Baldwin engines built for the Western Pacific (one of which was photographed on construction train service along the Truckee River) are specified in the Baldwin paint data books as having red wheels. Lithographs of Norris engines have been extremely helpful in reconstructing the original appearance of the CPRR "Governor Stanford." Paint research by the California State Railroad Museum during restoration in 1979 revealed traces of apple green paint on the engine frame, similar to the paint schemes depicted in the Norris lithographs of 1855-60. When new, the engine literally glowed in green and vermilion and must have presented a handsome sight. —Jim Wilke

 

"Flight of the Fast Mail" Train

"FLIGHT OF THE FAST MAIL. This old print shows engine No. 317 of The New York Central and Lake Shore Railroad Post Office, about to pick up a mail bag on the fly. This speedy, all-mail exhibition train operated between New York and Chicago in competition with a similar Pennsy run. On the Post Office's first westbound trip, September 14, 1875, the Vanderbilts' private car Duchess, for eminent guests, was coupled behind the four white-painted, gold-lettered cars with their bright red mailbags. An Act of Congress July 7, 1838, declared all railroads to be post roads and authorized the U. S. Post Office to make contracts for hauling mail by rail. The first railway post office car, a converted baggage car, ran July 7, 1862, over the Hannibal & St. Joseph Railroad (now in the Burlington system) in Missouri as a special part of the pony express route. Coverdale and Colpitts Collection."  J. A. Burch, Washington, 1875The Fast Mail, Scene of catching and delivering the Mails on the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railway.
[Note: The Pony Express service ended Oct. 24, 1861 when the first transcontinental telegraph service started, so no Pony Express mail was ever sorted on an RPO car (the mail on the former Pony Express route was carried west of the Missouri River by stagecoach in 1862, instead). On July 28, 1862 (one website says instead July 18, 1862) the first ever Railway Post Office car in which mail was processed and sorted for the first time while actually in transit entered experimental service.]

 

World's Fastest Railroad Run, 127.1 mph, Broadway Limited, June 12, 1905.

"WORLD'S FASTEST RAILROAD RUN. The world's fastest run by a railroad train was made by the Broadway Limited of the Pennsylvania Railroad on Monday, June 12, 1905, when it ran 127.1 miles an hour between AY tower and Elida, Ohio. The Broadway Limited was pulled by coal-burning steam Locomotive 7002, and although many swift runs have been made in recent years by steam, electric and diesel locomotives, none has equalled the 127.1 milean-hour record run established in 1905. At the Chicago Railroad Fair of 1949, Locomotive 7002 stands on a section of P.R.R. standard roadbed with rails weighing 155-pounds to the yard — heaviest in the world. Chicago Railroad Fair, 1949."

Bob Cosgrove, Glancy Trains Curator, Detroit Historical Museum discusses the subsequent " ... U.S. RAIL SPEED RECORD OF 183.85 M.P.H. ... New York Central Railroad mechanical engineer Donald C. Wetzel ... designed and piloted the modified Rail Diesel Car on July 23, 1966 to the U.S. rail speed record of 183.85 m.p.h. ... Don Wetzel ... with the NYC's Collinwood Research Laboratories in Cleveland was given the assignment of modifying a 13-year old Budd Company all stainless steel diesel-powered Model RDC-3 combination baggage, mail and coach with two General Electric J-47 jet engines from a 1948-vintage Boeing B-36 bomber. The test was run near Bryan, Ohio, which is 40 miles west of Toledo on one of the nation's straightest track sections, part of the New York Central's the east-west mainline, which was shut down for the trials. While dismissed by the Wall Street Journal at the time as a publicity stun to help the NYC's stock value, much valuable data was collected and later incorporated in Penn Central's 120 m.p.h. New York City-Washington Metroliners. ... the record, which still stands ... was some 55 m.p.h. higher than the previous U.S. record." [from the R&LHS Newsgroup]


Chased by a Locomotive

The following is a Hoosiers' description of his first sight of a locomotive, and his adventure consequent there on:

"I come across through the country, and struck yer railroad, and was plying it about four knots an hour. Now I had hearn tell of locomotives, but never dreamed of seeing one alive and kicking; but about two miles from here I hearn something coffin’, sneezing and thundering, and I looked around; sure enough here she come down arter me, pawing the airth up and splitting the road wide open, with more smoke and fire a flying than or'to come out of a hundred burning mountains: There was a dozen wagons follering arter her, and to save her tarnel black, smoky, noisy neck, she couldn't get clear of them. I don't know whether they scared her up or no, but here she come foaming at the mouth—with her teeth full of burning red hot coals, and she pitched right straight at me, as if she was goin into me like a thousand of brick. I couldn't stand it any longer, so I wheeled about and broke down the road and began to make gravel fly in every direction. No sooner had I done that than she split after me, and every jump I made she squealed like a thousand wild cats!—She began to gain on me comin up a little hill, but we come round a pint to a straight level on the road. Now, thinks I, I'll gin you ginger, as I am great on a dead level; so I pulled to it, and soon got myself under full speed, and then she began to yelp, and howl, and cough, and stamp, and come on full chisel, and made the hull airth shake. But I kept on before, bouncing at the rate of 20 feet every pop, 'till I got to a turn of the road, and I was under such headway that I couldn't turn, so I tumbled head over heels down a bank, by a house, and landed with my head and shoulders cosmollick into a swilled barrel, and my feet stuck out behind and up in the air! Just about the time the locomotive found I had got away from it, it commenced spitting hot water into me, and just literally spattered it all over me. I thought in my soul that Mount Vesuvius had busted in some place in the neighborhood. But do you suppose I staid there long? No-sir ee! I just walked right through the barrel and come out the other end so quick that it really looked ashamed of itself.
Now, here I am a role propelling double revolving locomotive Snelly Goster, ready to attack anything but a combination of thunder-lightning-smoke-railroad iron and hot water."

From The California Star, San Francisco, April 17, 1847. Original spelling has been retained.
Courtesy Norman E. Tutorow.

The American Steam Locomotive: A Detailed Diagram
The American Steam Locomotive: A Detailed Diagram with 254 identified and marked
components from The Science of Railways" (Vol. I - Railway Equipment) by Marshall M. Kirkman.
The World Railway Publishing Co., New York & Chicago, 1899. [CLICK TO ENLARGE.]


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