Delaware & Locomotive locomotives demonstrated some of the greatest variety for a railroad its size.
Class E-68 (formerly E-5a) 2-8-0 no. 1119 represents Delaware & Hudson’s last series of non-experimental Consolidations, built by Colonie Shops in 1929. The outboard lead truck journal and the outside ashpan hoppers are typical D&H details. Delaware & Hudson photo
Delaware & Hudson 1401, the John B. Jervis, was the second of a quartet of experimental high-pressure locomotives. The watertube firebox accounts for the shape of the boiler; the pipe over the top of the smokebox in front of the stack carries steam from the high-pressure cylinder on this side to the low-pressure cylinder on the left side. The plumbing behind the stack is for the throttle. Adding to the awkward appearance is the location of the stack well forward of the center line of the cylinders. The locomotive’s tractive effort is augmented by a booster engine on the rear truck of the tender. Baldwin photo
Delaware & Hudson Challenger 1531 differs only in details of stack, headlight, and pilot from 4-6-6-4s built for Clinchfield. S. Botsko photo
Delaware & Hudson No. 3048 has the large radiator and AAR trucks common to the S4. Philip Miller photo
Delaware & Hudson bought 18 Alco C628 diesels in 1965. Classic Trains collection
At Allentown, Pa., on Jan. 24, 1973, the livery on D&H U33C 753 (with C628s) shows its heritage as EL 3303. Bob Wilt photo
On one of many of their goodwill-generating outings, D&H PAs 19, 18, and 17 perform a photo runby on the return leg of a Colonie Shops-North Creek, N.Y., excursion Oct. 7, 1973. J. David Ingles, Brian M. Schmidt collection
D&H bicentennial U23B 1776 greets the Sharks at Whitehall, N.Y., on Sept. 20, 1975. J. David Ingles, Brian M. Schmidt collection
Steam locomotives on the D&H were distinctive. Its roster was dominated by 2-8-0 and 4-6-0 types, but it also had notable fleets of 4-6-2s, 4-8-4s, and 4-6-6-4s. After World War I, the road stuck with the 2-8-0 long after other roads had moved on to more modern and larger designs. Notably, the D&H had four experimental locomotives: three 2-8-0s and a 4-8-0. These were not successful and the road eventually moved toward the larger 4-8-4s and 4-6-6-4s for its last decade of steam operation.
The D&H was known a loyal Alco customer. The railroad dieselized with S2 switchers and RS2 and RS3 road switchers in the 1940s and early 1950s and didn’t acquire an EMD locomotive until buying three SD45 demonstrators in 1966. The railroad was also noted for its former Santa Fe PAs that operated from the late 1960s through the mid-1970s, and for the pair of freight-service Baldwin Sharks it acquired in the early 1970s.
Guilford purchased D&H in 1984; the D&H subsequently declared bankruptcy in 1988 and in 1991 Guilford sold the railroad to Canadian Pacific, which eventually absorbed it.
