Mattoon IL - Niagara 6018 (on the right of the photo) has just arrived with the westbound Knickerbocker. Class J-1e Hudson 5404 (on the left) waits to take over the trip to St. Louis. Richard Baldwin Photo.
Another beauty, Roger. Thanks for that one. 5404 has to be the last J-1e built, as 5405 was the first J-3. Surprising to see the original tender on 5404. So many of the Hudsons had those monster PTs near the end of steam. IMHO those are two of the most beautiful steam locomotives that ever existed. :tb-biggrin:
Were the Niagaras too big to go into St Louis or were they changed at Mattoon for better utilization? Dick Haave
I don't know the answer to that, Dick, but the Niagara was designed to "fit" in all of the restrictive areas on the Central, thus the lack of domes. :tb-biggrin:
I don't think they had a turntable large enough at St. louis . I know they had to use an A unit on each end because they could not turn them.Another story:Was waiting to go out on TV -4 And the road foreman told us what the engine number on the lead engine was . It was an SD-40 and some of these engines after shopping lost their neutral air in the cab and would suck cold air from outside into the cab.It did not make any difference how good the heater was it was like being outside.I told the road foreman I had rode my last cold engine ,his answer ,they said it was cold and the engine house was going to check it. The crew came in and the head man said , I have been on some cold engines but this is the worst one . I said we had better get on the engine because the engine house will say ,it seems to be ok now. Boarding the locomotive I sat down in the seat and opened the throttle to #8 position. The enginehouse person said why did you do that? You don't run the engine in idle but wide open most of the time I answered . In about 30 seconds you could feel the cold air start to come in.Oh yes the temperature was about 0 degrees. The enginehouse man said that's not going to work. In the end we turned the 4 units on the Y and of course the rear unit which became the lead unit was a brand new GE and we were just as snug as a bug in a rug. During all of this it came up that they could not turn engines at St. Louis. LEW
I too, have cold air experience with SD-40-2s! The yard office in LaCrosse(WI) issued rolls of duct tape(if you didn't have your own supply)to tape the doors on the SD-40s. Cut down on the draft so the sidewall and fan heaters could warm the cab. Those hogs would pull their hearts out, but they leaked in every seam! Charlie
Wonderful pic. I was under the impression that St. Louis Union was a stub served by two triple-track wyes. Could the big engines possibly have had trouble on those frogs? Also, which bridge did they use, and did it tend to run anyone else's heavy power?
