Steam & Excursion > McCloud River #26 - An Alaska Refugee

McCloud River #26 built by Brooks Locomotive Works for the Copper River & Northeastern, in 1915, found its way to the McCloud River Railway.  After spending her final years, working in the shadow of Mt. Shasta #26 was unceremoniously scrapped in 1955. By Guy Dunscomb in Bartle, California. From my collection of odds ends.  As a footnote, by the time I made it to the McCloud River, the railway was shut down with only a tired Baldwin switcher sitting in the yard.  It is a shame the three SD38's no longer haul lumber on this grand little railway.

In a cave, under a glacier...

Yukon Yeti 



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 07/15/18 08:11 by YukonYeti.

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Thank you "Mr. Yeti" for the post ... and yes
 the McCloudRiverRR was a class act ... thanks
for sharing some history!

Odyssey
Evergreen, CO

Up this late, monitoring a fire burning not too far off from my house...

McCloud River faced a significant motive power shortage coming out of the Depression, and the epic winters of 1936-1937 and especially 1937-1938 forced the issue.  McCloud had a couple ancient prairies in the dead line they reactivated, but recognized those were only a bandaid.  The railroad's front office went shopping, they got quotes and preliminary specifications from Vulcan about a 2-6-6-2T Duplex (THAT would have been interesting!) and issued an Authorization for Expenditure to spend $100,000 on a pair of new Mikados.  In the end, they found the two Alco-built 2-8-2s on the Copper River & Northwestern at a fraction of the cost of new power- the CR&N #72 (to McCloud River Railroad #26 12/1938) cost $8,173.08 f.o.b. Mt. Shasta, plus $1,442.51 conditioning, while the CR&N #73 (to McCloud River Railroad #27 11/1938) cost $8,151.31 f.o.b. Mt. Shasta City, plus $1,250.13 conditioning.

You'll note in your picture of the #26, taken I'm almost positive by Guy Dunscomb in Bartle, California, the large rectangular tender it then carried.  In May 1947 McCloud sold the tenders to the affiliated Shevlin-Hixon Lumber Company for $3,714.00 for use on their logging railroad out of Bend, Oregon- the S-H company then had a long log haul over the Great Northern mainline south of Bend and needed the capacity for their numbers 4 and 8, the typical road power assigned to that run.  To replace them McCloud bought a Vanderbuilt style tender from the Southern Pacific (cost $2,000 f.o.b. Oakland, plus $124.20 freight and $491.21 conditioning) for the #27, while the #26 received the tender from McCloud's Baldwin-built 2-8-2 #15.  This only lasted a couple months, as in July McCloud bought a second Vanderbuilt tender from the SP for the #26, cost $2,000 f.o.b. Mount Shasta City, plus $297.68 to install.  

The arrival of two Baldwin diesels in 1953, one of them being that ratty S-12 you saw in McCloud, put both of these locomotives out of work.  McCloud promptly sold the #27 to Sixth Street Auto Wrecking Company for scrap, while it held on to the #26 as backup power.  That need evaporated in 1955, and McCloud sold the #26 for scrap through dealer Luria Brothers.

Back to watching the orange in the sky...

Jeff Moore
Elko, NV 


 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/15/18 01:21 by JDLX.

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Here are the 2 tenders from McCloud #26 and #27 in service in Bend, Oregon on Shevlin-Hixon #8 and #4.

Martin

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Sister CR&NW engines #70 and #74 became Midland Terminal #62 and 63 in 1940.   Because of their length, they were also subject to a tender swap so that they could fit on the old Colorado Midland 60' turntable at the former CM roundhouse in Colorado City.  They actually received former MT tenders until they were sold to Mexico in 1948 with their original tenders.  Here are #62 (70) and #63(74) with their Midland Terminal tenders in 1941 and 1943 respectively.  

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Many, many thanks!  I got told about the CR&NW while I lived at Ft. Richardson, Alaska- 1956-1958. I spent some time in the spring 1958 to go to Chitina and see the Copper River RR. So I never go to see any of the CR&NW steam. Really enjoyed your photo stories. wag216

Thanks for the history of those locos.  I miss the McCloud like the rest of you.