Nostalgia & History > PRR Steam Locomotive Number Plates

Some of these engines had keystone number plates and some were round.
Comments?

Thanks,
Hal

Passenger had the Keystones while freight generally had the plain round plates.

HotWater Wrote:
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> Passenger had the Keystones while freight
> generally had the plain round plates.

True but a couple of exceptions were the J1/J1a 2-10-4s and Q2 4-4-6-4s, which were freight haulers but had keystone number plates. It seems all the last PRR steam locos, delivered in the 1940s, got the keystones regardless of their use.

Some diligent searching will yeild at least one 2-8-0 with a Keystone, a 2-10-2 with a keystone, and K4s with rounds plates. It seems the K4s had round early in life, then swapped to keystones. There were also several anomolies among freight engines with keystones.

At one time all (or most} PRR steam locomotives had round number plates. I believe that in the mid-1920's the keystone appeared and started to be applied to all of the passenger locomotives. It is possible to find round and keystone number plates from the same locomotives. The M-l 4-8-2 came out and they were all given keystone number plates even though they were most used in freight service. This was continued when the J-l's were built and the Q-2's. The PRR called themselves the standard railroad of the world, but when it came to builder's and number plates, they were anything but standard. Some of these exceptions have been noted in previous posts.

Here is a freight engine with a keystone.

http://prr8157.deviantart.com/art/PRR-N2sa-8941-328254686

And an H8 2-8-0 with a Keystone

http://www.northeast.railfan.net/images/prr3205s.jpg



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/29/13 18:00 by puddlejumper.