ST. PAUL, Minn. — For the first time in decades, it’s possible to see three Northern Pacific steam locomotives gathered in a roundhouse, thanks to the efforts of the Minnesota Transportation Museum (MTM). The museum is exhibiting two NP 4-6-2s and a 4-6-0 at its former Great Northern Railway Jackson Street Roundhouse in St. Paul.
The steam gathering was decades in the making. In 1976, MTM leased NP 4-6-0 No. 328 from the City of Stillwater, where it had been displayed. The museum rebuilt the Ten-Wheeler and returned it to service in 1981. It remained in service until 1999.
NP 4-6-2 No. 2156 was on display at Como Park in St. Paul from the 1950s until 1980, when the museum leased it and planned to return it to service. The engine was disassembled for renovation when major damage was discovered. While on display, water had gotten into the fireman’s side high-pressure steam passage, frozen, and cracked about a square foot out of the side of the steam passage. Since this is an inner part of the complicated cylinder casting, repairs would be expensive and the restoration effort stalled. For the last 22 years, No. 2156 sat blocked up on cribbing inside the roundhouse.
Another 4-6-2, No. 2153, was given to the City of East Grand Forks, Minn. In 2000, the city donated it to MTM and it was moved to St. Paul in 2002. The engine has now been cosmetically restored and moved into the roundhouse in January.
Getting the mostly dismantled 2156 off its cribbing and moving again turned out to be a big task. A number of volunteers spent the last six months reassembling the running gear and spring rigging and slowly lowering the 100-ton locomotive back onto its wheels. As part of the stalled restoration, volunteers had refurbished the spring rigging, the front truck was already assembled, and the other major components needed for the assembly were in good shape. This made lowering and moving the locomotive much easier.
Four 50-ton mechanical jacks were used to lower the locomotive. Work was done slowly — only a few inches at a time. Cribbing had to be removed to allow the pilot truck to be reinstalled. Eventually No. 2156 was moved outside by a diesel switcher, using No. 2153’s tender to allow No. 2156 and the switcher to fit on the roundhouse turntable for placement into the roundhouse. Once inside, No. 2156’s tender was put back behind the engine for display.
While NP didn’t save any examples of its “Supersteam” power such as 4-8-4s, 4-6-6-4’s or 2-8-8-4 “Yellowstones,” it was generous with its Q-3 class 4-6-2s. In addition to Nos. 2153 and 2156 in St. Paul, two other Q-3s survive — No. 2152 in Auburn, Wash., and No. .2164 in Bismarck, N.D.
MTM’s Nos. 2153 and 2156 were both built by Baldwin in 1909. The Q-3s generally served the east end of the system, running west from St. Paul and Duluth, Minn., but 2156 is known to have been assigned to the NP’s premier North Coast Limited passenger train in Montana in the early 20th Century. With the arrival of the first 4-8-4s in the late 1920s (hence the “Northern” designation for 4-8-4s) the Pacific’s were bumped to secondary runs.
NP No. 328 was part of a 1904 order for 20 4-6-’s placed with American Locomotive Co. from the Chicago Southern Railroad. After receiving six engines, Chicago Southern was unable to pay for any more, and the unfinished 14 sat at Alco’s Rogers Works in Patterson, N.J. In 1907, NP bought 10 of the engines, which were completed and shipped that February. They were used on lighter branch lines, with eight scrapped during the Great Depression. No. 328 and No. 321 were spared for use in Minnesota, where they worked branch lines to Grantsburg, Wis.; Taylors Falls; and Stillwater. After retirement in 1950, the Minnesota Railfans Association persuaded NP to save No. 328 and donate it for display in Stillwater where it once operated. Between 1987 and 1991, No. 328 returned to the Stillwater branch, then owned by MTM, where it pulled in excursion trains.
The three locomotives are now on display side-by-side in the Jackson Street Roundhouse, which is open every Wednesday and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. For more information go to https://www.trainride.org.
