Alco RS27 failure: It’s tough when professional engineers create a decent locomotive that builds on successes, and pitfalls, of the past and still nobody really wants it. That was the Alco RS27, also referred to as the DL640. Its 16-cylinder, 251B prime mover pushed out 2,400 hp. Coincidentally, only 27 were built between December 1959 […]
Southern Railway locomotives: It’s time to celebrate the sleek lines and power of Southern Railway locomotives. Please enjoy this photo gallery selected from files in Kalmbach Media‘s David P. Morgan Library. Each month since October 2019, Classic Trains editors have selected one Fallen Flag to honor. A Fallen Flag is a railroad whose name and […]
Southern Railway freight trains remembered: All through June 2022, Classic Trains editors are celebrating the grit, panache, and charm that was the Southern Railway. As part of the celebration, please enjoy this freight train photo gallery as the perfect accompaniment. Each month since October 2019, Classic Trains editors have showcase one “Fallen Flag” railroad — […]
A switcher tacks a head-end car to a train consist in the wee hours at Seattle, Wash., in 1948. Union Pacific and Milwaukee Road used Union Station; Great Northern and Northern Pacific used King Street Station, just out of view to the left. Robert Gazay photo […]
Three Pacifics share the shop floor with several 2-10-2s at the New Haven Railroad’s system locomotive backshop in Readville, Mass. Classic Trains coll. […]
Kansas City Southern’s last new steam locomotives were 10 class J 2-10-4s built by Lima in 1937. As this postwar photo of No. 905 indicates, they were massive machines — those are 70-inch drivers under that giant boiler. Harold K. Vollrath photo […]
New York Central J-1 Hudson 5236 takes water from a track pan near Huron, Ohio, in the 1940s. Water columns stand ready to serve engines that stop for water. Richard J. Cook photo […]
Built during the gold rush years of 1904-05, Nevada’s Tonopah & Goldfield ran 100 miles southeast from an SP connection in the desert near the California border. An Air Force base near Goldfield brought traffic to the road during World War II — these two slide-valve 2-8-0s are hauling aviation fuel — but the boom didn’t […]
Southern Railway passenger trains remembered All through June 2022, Classic Trains editors are celebrating the history and heritage of the Southern Railway. Please enjoy this Southern Railway passenger train photo gallery selected from the files in Kalmbach Media’s David P. Morgan Library. This gallery was first published in March 2019. Only from Trains.com! […]
Flexi-Vans on the IC The Illinois Central was one of several roads that used Flexi-Vans for mail. Here, two Flexi-Van flatcars (four containers) are tucked behind the engines, and a third flatcar with a single container brings up the rear, on the Land O’ Corn at Rockford, Ill., in March 1967. Mike Schafer photo […]
A single-axle Pennsylvania Railroad trailer with the “Keystone Merchandise Service” logo on the front is positioned on a flatcar in Chicago in 1954. Soon the PRR led the formation of Trailer Train, known today as TTX. Pennsylvania Railroad photo […]
Pennsylvania class J1 Texas types 6486 and 6488 move Lake Erie-bound coal north out of Columbus, Ohio, in September 1955. PRR’s 125-strong J1 fleet of 1942–44, based on a Chesapeake & Ohio design, accounted for more than a quarter of all 2-10-4s built. Philip R. Hastings photo […]
