There it is, No it isn't, Yes it is, Oops, Gone Again

The locomotive pictured on the front of this post card is a 50-ton Atlas Locomotive built in 1940.

It is viewed, here, at the Junction of the Penn Central and Warwick Railway in Cranston, Rhode Island. Atlas Engine Works was around for a very, very long time. Wikipedia provides for us the following information about the company’s history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peckett_and_Sons The company began trading in 1864 as the Atlas Engine Works, in St. George, Bristol, as Fox, Walker and Company, building four and six-coupled saddle tank engines for industrial use. They also built stationary engines and pioneered steam tramcars, the first being tested in Bristol in 1877. Much of their output was exported, mostly 0-6-0, with some 0-4-0, 2-4-0 and 0-4-2. In 1878 they produced six 18 inch gauge 2-4-2 trench engines for the Royal Engineers at Chatham using Henry Handyside's steep gradient apparatus. Here is a link to some information about the apparatus: https://www.irsociety.co.uk/Archives/53/Handyside.htm They also produced nine 0-6-0STs for the Somerset and Dorset Railway. They were taken over by Thomas Peckett in 1880, becoming Peckett and Sons, Atlas Engine Works, Bristol. The company acquired limited liability some years later. By 1900 the two companies had built over 400 locomotives. The company continued producing a variety of small industrial and shunting engines at their factory located between Fishponds and Kingswood in Bristol. They became specialists in the field, with very precise specifications and standardisation of parts. The largest engine was an 0-8-0 built in 1931 for the Christmas Island Phosphate Company. The works were served by a branch line starting just southwest of Kingswood junction on the Midland line and ran for about 1 mile in a generally eastward direction. It also served some collieries in the Speedwell area. During the two World Wars, the works were especially busy, but by 1950 trade had largely dried up. Although in 1956 an attempt had been made to enter the diesel-mechanical market, the last steam engine was produced in 1958 and the company was taken over by Reed Crane & Hoist Co Ltd on 23, October 1961, which itself later went into liquidation. The information below is a compilation of American Rails and Wikipedia The Wikipedia link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warwick_Railway is this one; and the Amercian Rails by Adam Burns link https://www.american-rails.com/lhr.html is this one. The Lehigh & Hudson River's earliest heritage began with the tiny Warwick Valley Railroad organized on March 8, 1860, to build a line between Greycourt and Warwick, New York, a distance of about 10 miles. It opened for service on April 1, 1862. The Warwick Railway (reporting mark WRWK) was a railroad in Rhode Island. It was originally chartered in 1873 under the name Warwick Railroad, with a route connecting Cranston to Oakland Beach, eight miles away. Opened in 1875, the company survived until 1879 when it declared bankruptcy and shut down; it was resurrected in 1880 as the Rhode Island Central Railroad under New York, Providence and Boston Railroad (NYP&B) ownership and extended by two miles. In 1949, the NYP&B line was purchased by a newly formed Warwick Railway, which ended electrified service in favor of diesel locomotives in 1952, and abandoned another mile of track in 1954. The Warwick Railway provided freight service until 1979, when the Providence and Worcester Railroad (P&W) began service following the Warwick Railway becoming insolvent.

This post card is another of Mary Jayne’s Railroad Specialties post cards in my collection. The photo was taken In April of 1975 by Ronald N. Johnson.

Bigger than Ever!!

The locomotives pictured on the front of this post card are the products of Alco, the American Locomotive Company.

The back of the post card reads: “Three of Genesee & Wyoming Railroad’s Alco 1,000 h.p. locomotives, Numbers 35, 1776, and 42 are shown entering Genesee & Wyoming’s Retsof Freight Yard in Retsof, N.Y. These Units are normally NU’s in order to provide the necessary power to transport salt trains from Retsof to the Caledonia, N.Y. interchange location.” My favourite website about the history of railroads, https://www.american-rails.com/gw.html tells us this: The history of G&W;'s current operations began humbly as a small, short-line by the same name, the Genesee & Wyoming Railroad. This little system was based in Western New York, south of Rochester and began as the Genesee & Wyoming Valley Railway. The G&WV; was incorporated in 1891 and eventually opened from Retsof (where the picture on the front of this post card was taken) to a location known as P&L; Junction near Caledonia in 1894, a distance of about 14 miles. With freight traffic never materializing as hoped the G&WV fell into bankruptcy in November of 1898 and was reorganized as the Genesee & Wyoming Railroad (reporting mark GNWR), incorporated on March 24, 1899. The new G&W was owned by Edward Laton Fuller and began serving a massive salt mine near Retsof, owned by the International Salt Corporation. The mine was, for many years, the largest producer of rock salt in the world and the G&W's largest customer. As it turns out salt remained the railroad's primary source of traffic throughout the 1970s and even today it continues to handle large quantities of the mineral. The modern history of the G&W is continued on the American Rails website. I recommend that you go there to read about it. It leads to the information contained on the current website of the G&W. You can read that and more here: https://www.gwrr.com/about-us/ Genesee & Wyoming Inc. (G&W) owns or leases more than 100 freight railroads throughout North America with 4,000 employees serving 2,000 customers over more than 13,000 track miles. G&W subsidiaries and joint ventures also provide rail service at more than 30 major ports, rail-ferry service between the U.S. Southeast and Mexico, transload services, and railcar switching and repair.

This post card is another of Mary Jayne’s Railroad Specialties post cards in my collection. The photo was taken by Thomas Cottone.

The Bluebird of Happiness - for a Train Fan!!

The locomotive pictured on the front of this post card is an Alco S4 Switcher.

This one is just minutes out of Grand Rapids on the bridge that spans the Maumee River and the Miami-Erie Canal. The train ride on the Bluebird Passenger Train passes the historic Ludwig Mill and is great family fun, entertainment and an exciting educational experience, according to the back of the post card. This website: https://tlew.org/ provides the information regarding the Bluebird Passenger Train. This museum runs the train. Today the Toledo, Lake Erie & Western Railway and Museum (TLE&W) hosts the Bluebird Passenger Train. The museum is a nonprofit, volunteer-run organization dedicated to preserving Northwest Ohio’s railroad heritage. Established in 1965 and incorporated in 1969, it operates on a 10-mile stretch of historic track between Waterville and Grand Rapids, Ohio, originally part of the Toledo, St. Louis and Western Railroad (aka Clover Leaf, later Nickel Plate Road and Norfolk & Western). The museum showcases vintage locomotives, railcars, and equipment, offering visitors a glimpse into the region’s rail history. Its signature Bluebird Passenger Train, though currently not running due to track restoration, is a focal point of ongoing volunteer efforts. The TLE&W also features a scenic 901-foot bridge over the Maumee River, the largest owned by a tourist railroad east of the Mississippi. In 2014, the museum expanded by acquiring the Waterfront Electric Railway Museum in Grand Rapids, enhancing its historical displays and community engagement.

This post card is another of the 243 post cards in my collection from Mary Jayne’s Railroad Specialties. This one was published in March of 1999. The photo was taken by Joe Minnich.

117 Years Ago, Today!!

The locomotive you see on the front of this post card was manufactured by General Electric. It is one of their 70-Tonner models.

This locomotive was previously owned by the South Carolina line, the Lancaster & Chester Railroad, and operated for them as #62 before it became #104 for the Laurinburg and Southern Railroad (reporting mark LRS). This favourite website of mine tells us some of the history of the LRS: https://www.american-rails.com/laurinburg.html This railroad is a venerable short line established on March 4, 1909, to serve the southeastern region of North Carolina, particularly Laurinburg and the surrounding areas. Construction on the system commenced quickly and was in service from Johns to East Laurinburg by July 2nd that year. Within a year, the line extended to Wagram, marking a period of rapid growth. The expansion continued with the strategic acquisition of a section from Wagram to Raeford from the Aberdeen & Rockfish Railroad on November 12, 1921. Beyond its primary 28-mile stretch from Laurinburg to Raeford, LRS broadened its operations by acquiring several other shortline railroads across North Carolina and even extending into Virginia. In 1994 the L&S had streamlined its portfolio, retaining only its namesake line and two others: the Nash County Railroad and the Yadkin Valley Railroad. That is the year in which the Gulf & Ohio Railways acquired the Laurinburg & Southern holding company. This website is the website of the current owners of the LRS: https://gulfandohio.com/laurinburg-and-southern Here is what they have to say about themselves: Today, the Laurinburg and Southern Railroad (LRS) operates on 27 track miles in Scotland County, North Carolina. It is served by CSX, located along I-74, and just 100 miles to the Port of Wilmington. There are 40 miles to I-95. The railroad has Industrial and Transload Sites Available as well as Railcar Storage and Repair Available. The Track Capacity is 286K. And in 2022 and 2023 the railroad was the ASLRRA Jake Award Winner. The Laurinburg & Southern Railroad hauls approximately 2,500 carloads annually including soda ash, glass, fertilizer, and feed ingredients. Commodities frequently handled are raw materials for glass production, finished glass products, plastics, agricultural products and petroleum products.

While the publisher of this post card is ubiquitous in my collection (204 of them), I can find nothing about them in the outside world.