Nostalgia & History > mundo: N&W Steam in 1957, Part 4: Blue Ridge

October 16, 1957

Continuing with the slides taken by Ed Von Nordeck, TO user mundo, during the Pacific Railroad Society trip that visited the Norfolk & Western in Virginia in October 1957, we move east to Blue Ridge, VA to see N&W steam in action on the grade. The weather wasn't very cooperative, and I hope you'll forgive my rather heavy use of Photoshop's shadows/highlights tool to try to compensate for the low light conditions. I tried to keep the balance of lights and darks believable and the noise/haze in the shadows to a minimum, but with the variety of monitors and settings out there, I'm sure some of you will see objectionable levels of noise. My apologies in advance to them and to Ed.

1. The depot at Blue Ridge. Old photos show it on the north side of the right of way, and I'm using that as the basis for describing east and westbounds. If I have it wrong, please let me know.

2. A Class Y6 2-8-8-2 and a Class A 2-6-6-4 slug up the grade eastbound with coal loads. As best I can tell, this view was taken from the long-gone State Route 616 overpass (Blue Ridge Springs Rd.) west of Blue Ridge proper. The engine numbers appear to be 2140 and 1231.

3. What may well be the same eastbound is on the far track as a westbound headed by Y6a #2161 and A #1223 roll past the Blue Ridge depot.

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4. The caboose on 2161 west.

5. The helper on the eastbound is Y6a 2169.

6. After cutting away from the eastbound, the 2169 drifts back down the grade to await its next assignment.

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7-9. K2-class 4-8-2 #118 approaches and passes with an eastbound passenger train. We saw the 118 emerging from the "lubritorium" at Shaffer's Crossing in Roanoke in an earlier installment of this series:

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,4340528,4340530#4340530

The final installment of Ed's N&W steam slides will include some views taken at Norfolk and few from another trip to N&W country in November of 1957.

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This whole series is great, thanks so much for the effort in bringing this to us.

Bob Jordan

Simply wow.

KG

Just fabulous. Thanks. The depot at Blue Ridge is long gone, and the trees in the area have grown considerably in nearly 70 years.

Amazing images. WOW!
Bob

Great stuff Evan, thanks for doing so much work to make the images available online.

JBWX

O Winston Link, eat your heart out!
I know it's daylight stuff, but really over the top Evan & Ed!

Great photo's! It's not surprising to see that all the ground is covered with cinders, no matter what photo it is! Kinda like Sherman Hill during the steam years!

Like the other photos in this series, these are fantastic. They are as good as the best photo essays I have seen in Classic Trains.

Thank you for posting them and providing the commentary.

Scott Griggs
Louisville, KY

P.S. I think it is admirable that the N&W didn't succumb to the temptation to gradually strip away the streamlining from its streamlined power like so many other roads did. I find this interesting and noteworthy for two reasons: 1) By even the early 1950's, streamlined steam locomotives had long passed from the scene of most other roads where they once ran. 2) The streamlining obviously makes maintenance more work. I'm wondering if there was a high level edict that went down to the shop crews that said all streamlining is to be installed and maintained. It seems unlikely to me that the railroad would have been as disciplined in the absence of such direction.

These are truly great shots. Thanks so much for sharing them all. The ones in this post and earlier. Quite a collection

I'd like to hear about the trip out and back as well. Any photos?

Evan_Werkema Wrote:
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> 7-9. K2-class 4-8-2 #118 approaches and passes
> with an eastbound passenger train.

Judging by the baggage-RPO, the train is the Southern Railway's "The Tennessean" which N&W handled between Bristol and Lynchburg.

Per N&W streamlining not being removed.

Both classes of engines were built streamlined, not, as on some other lines, engines that
were streamlined with add on metal work to make them look modern. Their streamlining was integral
to their construction.

awesome photos, thanks for posting........

66

Thank you for those wonderful images. I can't tell you how surprised I was to learn that the famous N&W helper district portrayed above was only nine train lengths long.

SP2541 Wrecked & Retired

BCH wanted to know more about the trip to/from the N&W.

I was behind operating the trip to visit the N&W before it went diesels and did the rail routing. As an organized trip, it only went eastbound and offered individual returns.
One reason it was not organized round trip, was that several of the folks would be traveling on a railroad pass and wanted to  use "pass honored" trains as much as possible.

Do not have a brochure of the trip, but as I recall, used the Santa Fe Chief to Kansas City, with a 10-6 sleeper,  Mo Pac Coach to St Louis, B&O St Louis to Cinci in one of the rare rebuilt heavyweights sleepers to a 12 roomette 5 single and double bedroom cars.

I did not travel with the group, but joined in Cinci.

Several wives joined and included Mr Mrs William (Bill) Garner of Santa Fe in San Bernardino.  Bill was well known in western railfan  and history circles and later a steam engineer on a few museum tourist trains.  Emery Marks from the old "Golden West Rail Tours" was the escort. The man in the tan jacket in a couple of station shots, was Elbert Gann of Long Beach.

The trip ended in Norfork VA and group split up.  However someone mentioned that the overnight  "OldBay" line steamers were still operating from Norfolk to Baltimore.  So those who could, rode the steam to Baltimore.  Glad we did.  Still have brochures from the steamer.  ($6.00 postpaid)   Steamer was well worn out and remember the restrooms/showers were a disaster.  No photos however, being overnight.

Mr. Ben Bane Dulaney, Public Relations of the N&W made the arrangements for us to visit all the facilites and escorted us each day.  A fine southern gentleman from the "old school".

Definitely recall the scene in #2 from the awesome "N&W Hauling Coal" video I've seen on that one website.
Great series, thanks!

Evan_Werkema Wrote:
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> October 16, 1957
>

> 1. The depot at Blue Ridge. Old photos show it on
> the north side of the right of way, and I'm using
> that as the basis for describing east and
> westbounds. If I have it wrong, please let me
> know.
>
Compare photos 8 and 9 with these two that I took last year standing at the same location. The 3 tracks are still in, although the third track ends before the signals. The going away shot shows some RR clutter where the wood depot used to stand. The photographers are near the Color Position Light signals that I understand are now gone.

Gordon Bjoraker
Hiawatha101

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