The Northern
by Gordon Elwell
Title
The Northern
Artist
Gordon Elwell
Medium
Photograph - Photograph
Description
This locomotive is a "Northern", one of 8 built by for Chicago, Burlington & Quincy. It was built in 1940, and represents one of the last of the "modern" steam engine designs in production. This fine engine is on display at the Colorado Railroad Museum in Golden, Colorado. The 4-8-4 was the ultimate wheel configuration for the modern passenger and fast freight steam locomotive. The eight driver arrangement was usable on almost every main line in North America and with drivers up to 80 inches in diameter allowed any reasonable speed that the railroad could handle. The four wheel trailing truck supported a larger firebox for maximum steam levels allowing for extra boiler capacity. The four wheel leading (or pony) truck completed the best combination for riding and tracking. With the surge in passenger business in the 1920's most railroads were being forced to operate extra trains or run their scheduled trains in sections simply because the locomotives in use could only haul about 12 cars. It was out of this need that the "super powered" locomotives were developed and of them the 4-8-4 was the most numerous and widely used.
The first 4-8-4 was built by the American Locomotive Company, in January, 1927, for the Northern Pacific. This locomotive was basically the 4-8-2 modified to accommodate a large grate area and a very deep firebox which was required to burn the very low grade of bituminous coal that the Northern Pacific produced from its own mines. This new wheel arrangement was dubbed "Northern Pacific", which was quickly shortened to "Northern". There were 36 North American Railroads that owned and operated a total of 1,126 "Northern" type locomotives. Some railroads used different names, such as Greenbriers, Poconos, Wyoming, Dixies, Niagaras, Golden States, Potomacs, or Confederations.
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April 29th, 2017
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