Steam & Excursion > Good news for N&W 4-8-0s!

A friend of mine just sent to me the text of a newspaper article from Roanoke:

Steam, diesel relics to be saved from scrapyard

Published: Wednesday, July 15, 2009
ROANOKE, Va. - Three Norfolk & Western steam locomotives will be removed from a Roanoke scrapyard for restoration after more than a half-century of rusting in their places. The Virginia Museum of Transportation, the Railroad Museum of Virginia, and North Fork Lumber Co. will each get one of the engines.

VMT has been working for 30 years to save the engines. Virginia Scrap Iron & Metal Co. will donate them to the museums. The company recently sold its Roanoke scrapyard to make room for an expanding clinic, which enabled the deal to take place.

As part of the agreement, VMT will get N&W M2c Class 1151, the Railroad Museum of Virginia will get Class M2 No. 1134, and Will Harris/North Fork will get M2 No. 1118. The M2s date to 1910, while the M2c arrived in 1911. The three were among the oldest engines on N&W's roster in the 1950s, when they were sold for scrap.

In addition to the steamers, two Chesapeake Western Baldwin diesels will be saved. VMT will restore one and use the other for parts and scrap. The two railroad museums will each get one N&W steam locomotive tender from the deal, while North Fork Lumber will add an N&W maintenance-of-way-service flatcar.

"We are excited to be taking action on the lost engines and to be able to put together such a wonderful coalition of partners to make it happen," said Beverly Fitzpatrick Jr., VMT's executive director. "The lot engines will be saved, but it will take additional funding and support from the community to restore these pieces and put them on display."

All equipment is to be moved by Sept. 30.

Nice. I remember the earlier plea on TO. Good that it is being spread around so that the maximum amount of work will be done on all engines, and not one place receiving everything and just restoring one.

Mike Massee
Tehachapi, CA
Photography, Railroading and more..

Nice to see some action on these after all these years. Some years ago when I edited my dads N&W films, he had shots of M class 1150 at clare near Cincinnati.
In 1970 a week before the Amtrak takeover, we decided to ride the Pocahontas from Cincinnati to Roanoke. While there my brother and I poked around this place which was weedy then.
Also we found a Y class 2-8-8-2 and a couple of tenders on the other side of the tracks. I think it got cut up a few years later, probably making it the last Y to be cut-up. Two survive today, one in Illinois Railway Museum, and one in St. Louis. As I kid I saw the one in St. Louis all spit-polished being hauled on the local on its way to St. Louis. Ah, the good old days!!!
Greg Scholl

Who is footing the bill for moving all these pieces?

I had always wondered how long scrapped locomotives lasted after being officially scrapped. For instance, many Santa Fe steam locos were bought by Purdy. How long did these engines last on the property? Any other locos assumed gone actually still intact somewhere?

gp

Fantastic! This is always good news. Kudos to those involved in saving them.

im from VA and the main reason i went to st louis transportation museum was to see the Y6, personally i wish the VMT would pursue even more to purchase it than rather to take 2 old rusty locos that will take years to cosmetically restore (or sit out back to rust at the museum which will proboly happen) but thats just my opion.

I keep making jokes about the NdeM's 4-8-0's, well it's great
that the M2's are getting saved. It would have been a crime to
cut up that totally unique power this late in life. Massive
props to the scrapper for their kind act.

It would seem that the 4-8-0 might be a handy size for a tourist road: Big enough to be fun to watch, small enough to maintain, not so big as to tax existing rail infrastructure.

John Gezelius
Tustin, CA

Strasburg operates an N&W 4-8-0 doesn't it?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4-8-0_475


john1082 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It would seem that the 4-8-0 might be a handy size
> for a tourist road: Big enough to be fun to
> watch, small enough to maintain, not so big as to
> tax existing rail infrastructure.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/17/09 12:41 by wabash2800.

The Strasburg N&W 4-8-0 is an M class engine thay was a common branchline engine in steam gays on the N&W. The M-2 4-8-0s are bigger brutes that ran mainline freights for many years. The M-2s were as big as a heavy 2-8-2 on most roads.

Well, we've heard similar news a few years ago, but nobody had the $ to move them. I'll keep my fingers crossed the everyone will cooperate and save the ladies-in-waiting !!

Mike