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75-451: Steamtown National Historic Site (NHS) is a railroad museum and heritage railroad located on 62.48 acres (25.3 ha) in downtown Scranton, Pennsylvania , at the site of the former Scranton yards of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad (DL&W). The museum is built around a working turntable and a roundhouse that are largely replications of the original DL&W facilities;

150-402: A hospital a few days later. The tender destroyed the cab of the locomotive, and the loads from the 18 derailed cars were scattered. The locomotive was repaired by Union Pacific at its Cheyenne facility and returned to service until 1962. Most of the 25 Big Boys were scrapped, but seven remain on static display—two indoors and five outdoors, under the elements—and an eighth, Union Pacific 4014 ,

225-509: A hundred cities like Scranton, the smoke-belching engines carried the people and the goods that made possible the Industrial Revolution." By 1995, Steamtown had been acquired and developed by the NPS at a total cost of $ 66 million. In June 1995, the newest National Historic Site was ready for its grand opening. Michigan 's only surviving steam locomotive, no. 1225, was to arrive on July 1 for

300-532: A late-night meeting near the end of the legislative session in October 1986. Congressional authorizing committees, which are charged with setting policy and reviewing such proposals, were bypassed, and the Park Service did not conduct its customary two-year review of proposed new parks." The article noted that "a number of historians and museum curators around the nation call Steamtown a second-rate collection of trains on

375-581: A millionaire seafood processor from New England. In 1964, Blount established a non-profit organization, the Steamtown Foundation, to operate Steamtown, U.S.A. , a steam railroad museum and excursion business in Bellows Falls, Vermont . In 1984, the foundation moved Steamtown to Scranton, conceived of as urban redevelopment and funded in part by the city. But the museum failed to attract the expected 200,000 to 400,000 annual visitors, and within two years

450-704: A new locomotive that could handle the run by itself: faster and more powerful than the compound 2-8-8-0s that UP tried after World War I , able to pull long trains at a sustained speed of 60 miles per hour (100 km/h) once past mountain grades. A Union Pacific design team led by Otto Jabelmann, the head of the Research and Mechanical Standards section of the Union Pacific's Mechanical Department, worked with ALCO (the American Locomotive Company) to re-examine their Challenger locomotives. The team found that

525-546: A program put on by the National Railway Historical Society to educate future railroad employees and fans of the industry about railroad operation and preservation. F. Nelson Blount , the heir to the largest seafood processor in the United States, was an avid railroad enthusiast. When he was 17, he wrote a book on steam power; later, he amassed one of the largest collections of vintage steam locomotives in

600-641: A single stack in October 1948. The results were unsatisfactory, and the locomotive was reverted to double stack after testing. One final short-term experiment was the fitting of smoke deflectors on locomotive 4019, similar to those found on the railroad's FEF Series , as well as some of their Challengers. These were later removed, as the Big Boys' nozzle and blower in the smoke box could blow smoke high enough to keep engineers’ lines of sight clear. The American Locomotive Company manufactured 25 Big Boy locomotives for Union Pacific: 20 in 1941 and five in 1944. Along with

675-483: A third-rate site. They say that while such historic recreations have a place, the Federal Government should not be financing them simply because influential members of Congress want them for their districts." It said that James M. Ridenour , director of the Park Service, said that Steamtown was among other projects that the agency neither needed nor wanted, adding that the same collection was rejected by them when it

750-604: A variety of demonstrations, tours, and excursions that demonstrate how railroads functioned in the age of steam. Park rangers give guided tours of the locomotive shop, where one can see work being done on the steam engines in the original roundhouse area; the Union Pacific Big Boy locomotive on display; and demonstrations of the turntable on a regular basis. They also give talks on the history of Steamtown. The Scranton yard occupies about 40 acres (16 ha). Several working locomotives take visitors on short excursions through

825-443: Is more than tourism and jobs. It is a significant part of America's past before the welder's torch is turned on the likes of the 1877 'Prince of Liege', the rare Union Pacific diamond stack, etc. The steel alone is worth $ 3 million." In June 1983, McManus wrote about Steamtown again, this time announcing that Scranton had taken his suggestion. He said that Springfield, Massachusetts , and Willimantic, Connecticut , had also vied for

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900-465: Is the only city in the Eastern United States with the vestiges of the era of industrialization (1840–1920) in plain sight, 40 acres in the middle of downtown, with car shops, locomotive shops, roundhouse, turntable, grand passenger station , a working yard, iron furnaces , passenger excursions — the whole works and a restored coal mine nearby. There is no other site like it. This city [Scranton]

975-645: The Campbell Soup Company , William B. Murphy , who had also served as National Chairman of Radio Free Europe , and the vice president of Blount Seafood, Fredrick Richardson, were among the other directors. The first order of business for the Steamtown Foundation was to acquire the Blount collection at North Walpole, and move it to property once owned by the Rutland Railroad , in Bellows Falls, Vermont. Blount

1050-562: The Challenger -type ( 4-6-6-4 ) locomotives on its main line over the Wasatch Range between Green River and Ogden. For most of the route, the maximum grade is 0.82% in either direction, but the climb eastward from Ogden, into the Wasatch Range, reached 1.14%. Hauling a 3,600-short-ton (3,300 t; 3,200-long-ton) freight train demanded double heading and helper operations, which slowed service. Union Pacific therefore decided to design

1125-618: The Erie Lackawanna Railway . The site eventually passed to Conrail, and was purchased by the city of Scranton as the site for Steamtown, USA. The site included 13 buildings built between 1865 and 1937 that were listed on the National Register of Historic Places . Wrote Linda Greenhouse of The New York Times , "Scranton was once served by five railroads, an almost unthinkable luxury for a city of just over 80,000 people. The passenger trains stopped decades ago, but one memory remains:

1200-459: The Wasatch Range between Ogden, Utah , and Green River, Wyoming . In the late 1940s, they were reassigned to Cheyenne, Wyoming , where they hauled freight over Sherman Hill to Laramie, Wyoming . They were the only locomotives to use a 4-8-8-4 wheel arrangement : four-wheel leading truck for stability entering curves, two sets of eight driving wheels and a four-wheel trailing truck to support

1275-460: The "proliferation of valves and gauges on the backhead showed that running a Big Boy was an altogether more complicated and demanding task for the crew than running previous existing locomotives", Morrison wrote. The 4-8-8-4 class series, originally rumored to be called the "Wasatch", after the Wasatch Mountains, acquired its nickname after an unknown ALCO worker scrawled "Big Boy" in chalk on

1350-417: The 1.14% ruling gradient over this subdivision, the tests demonstrated that a Big Boy could handle 4,200 tons, running at an average speed of 18 to 20 mph between those two division points. The locomotives were held in high regard by crews, who found them sure-footed and more “user friendly” than other motive power. They were capable machines, and their rated hauling tonnage was increased several times over

1425-494: The 1865 roundhouse inspection pits uncovered in archaeological excavations is also preserved in situ , under glass. Some of the rolling stock is historically connected to the site, including a DL&W steam engine and diesel, caboose, boxcar, a former World War II troop sleeper that the DL&;W converted to maintenance of way service, and numerous passenger cars. Former Oneida & Western / Rahway Valley Railroad 2-8-0 engine #15

1500-530: The 1988 excursions were canceled. After only three years, it was $ 2.2 million in debt and facing bankruptcy. Part of the problem was the cost of restoration of the new property and the deteriorating equipment. In addition, while the tourists in Vermont had enjoyed the sights of cornfields, farms, covered bridges, a waterfall and a gorge on a Steamtown excursion, the Scranton trip to Moscow, Pennsylvania , cut through one of

1575-556: The Big Boys during their years in revenue service. One experiment saw the conversion of No. 4005 to oil fuel in 1946. Unlike a similar effort with the Challengers, the conversion failed due to uneven heating in the Big Boy's large, single-burner firebox. The locomotive was converted back to coal in 1948. (Decades later, No. 4014 would be successfully converted to oil during its restoration. ) Another experiment saw No. 4007 being modified with

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1650-584: The Challengers, the Big Boys arrived on the scene just as traffic was surging in preparation for American participation in World War II . The Big Boy locomotives had large grates to burn the low-quality bituminous coal supplied by Union Pacific-owned mines in Wyoming. Coal was carried from the tender to the firebox by a Standard Stoker Company type MB automatic stoker that could supply slightly over 12 + 1 ⁄ 2 short tons (25,000 lb) per hour. Water to

1725-578: The House of Representatives voted against dropping the project from the NPS and instead voted to add an additional $ 14 million to its funding. By 1994, one of the earlier skeptics of the Steamtown project, Railfan & Railroad magazine associate editor Mike DelVecchio, who had visited the site, had changed sides in the debate saying, "When it is finished, Steamtown will be the only place in America that can recreate

1800-510: The Lackawanna's elegant station, just up the street from Steamtown, completed in 1908 and converted into a hotel through a public-private partnership in 1983." In April 1992, Newsweek printed an excerpt from a soon-to-be-published book about pork-barrel politics called Adventures in Porkland . It said of Representative McDade's leadership in securing funds for Steamtown: McDade has achieved

1875-522: The Park Service's worthier, maintenance-starved projects." William W. Scranton , former governor of Pennsylvania and descendant of the founders of Scranton, along with J. A. Panuska, president of the University of Scranton , responded to the Times' coverage with a letter to the editor. Published on January 8, 1992, the letter argued that the statement, first made by a former Smithsonian curator, that "Steamtown

1950-451: The Scranton yard in the spring, summer, and fall. Most rides are on passenger coaches, but there are also caboose and handcar rides offered. Longer excursions are scheduled with separate tickets. These include a ride on a Pullman coach and longer trips to various nearby towns, including Carbondale , Tobyhanna , Moscow , Delaware Water Gap , Cresco , East Stroudsburg and Gouldsboro , Pennsylvania. Until 2012, Steamtown hosted RailCamp,

2025-664: The State of New Hampshire to take over control of the bulk of the collection, Blount established the "Steamtown Foundation for the Preservation of Steam and Railroad Americana" to operate Steamtown, USA in 1964. The non-profit, charitable, educational organization was to have nine un-salaried directors, including the five incorporators: Blount, former New Hampshire governor Lane Dwinell ; Emile Bussiere; Robert L. Mallat Jr., mayor of Keene; and Bellows Falls Municipal Judge Thomas P. Salmon , who later became governor of Vermont. The president of

2100-414: The Steamtown Foundation's equipment in 1987 and 1988. This research was used for a Scope of Collections Statement for Steamtown NHS and was published in 1991 under the title Steamtown Special History Study . Aside from providing concise histories of the equipment, the report also made recommendations as to whether or not each piece belonged in the now government-funded collection. Historical significance to

2175-485: The United States was a criterion of the recommendations. Many of the pieces of equipment that did not meet the report's recommendations were sold or traded for pieces that had historical significance to the region. The adoption of Steamtown as a federal endeavor caused controversy. On November 23, 1991, an article in The New York Times said, "The provision for the park was inserted into a huge appropriations bill at

2250-408: The United States. By 1964, part of his collection — 25 steam locomotives from the United States and Canada, 10 other locomotives, and 25 pieces of rolling stock — was housed at North Walpole, New Hampshire . The Monadnock, Steamtown & Northern Railroad, as the enterprise was then called, ran excursions between Keene and Westmoreland, New Hampshire . After failing in 1962 to convince

2325-519: The Vermont location had attracted only 65,000 visitors. When questions about Steamtown, USA in New England are posed, the official response of the National Park Service is: Steamtown National Historic Site was created in 1986 to preserve the history of steam railroading in America, concentrating on the era 1850 through 1950. This is the mission of the park. The park was not created to preserve

Steamtown National Historic Site - Misplaced Pages Continue

2400-531: The boiler was furnished by a Nathan type 4000C Automatic Restarting injector rated for 12,500 gallons per hour on the right side and an Elesco T.P. 502 exhaust steam injector rated for 14,050 gallons per hour on the left side. Upon their arrival on Union Pacific property in 1941, the Big Boys were assigned to the Utah Division's First Sub, between Ogden and Green River, which included the 1.14% grade for which they were designed. From February 1943 to November of

2475-504: The bulk of service between Ogden and Green River, the Big Boys saw only occasional service on the Utah Division, while their operating territory was expanded to include the line south from Cheyenne to Denver. Between 1950 and 1957, they were occasionally assigned to handle trains east of Cheyenne to North Platte over the Nebraska Division's Third Sub. In the final years of steam on the UP, where

2550-540: The collection have visited the Scranton site: NYS&W #142, BM&R #425 (now Reading Blue Mountain and Northern 425), Lowville & Beaver River Shay #8, former RDG T-1 #2102 (restored and operable by Reading Blue Mountain and Northern), Milwaukee Road 261 , PRR 1361 and NKP 765 . "Peppersass" No.1 from Mount Washington Cog Railway visited the Steamtown Scranton site during Railfest 2016, and revisited again during March 11 to 13, 2019. Steamtown NHS offers

2625-463: The collection. "But on May 24, Scranton signed a contract to get it, pledging to raise $ 2 million to cover the cost of moving 40 ancient steam engines and 60 cars, few of which are operable, and to create a museum." On October 23, 1983, Steamtown sponsored its last Vermont excursion, using Canadian Pacific 1246 to pull a "dozen or so cars" on a 100-mile (160 km) round trip from Riverside station to Ludlow, Vermont , and Scranton began raising money for

2700-439: The day. Many locomotives and freight and passenger cars are on display. Some have open cabs and compartments that visitors can climb in and walk through, including a mail car , railroad executives' passenger car (with dining room and sleeping / lounge areas), a boxcar , two cabooses , and a recreated DL&W station with ticket window. A steam locomotive with cutaway sections helps visitors understand steam power. Part of one of

2775-422: The dream of most pork-barrel congressmen, a living memorial, indeed two: the University of Scranton 's new Joseph M. McDade Center for Technology and Applied Research, and the county's McDade Park , with its Anthracite Coal Museum. But the congressman's crowning achievement is a historic theme park called Steamtown. The article also repeated the charge that the collection was second-rate. It went on to say that at

2850-424: The entire 993 mi (1,598 km) from Council Bluffs, Iowa , to Ogden. On April 27, 1953, No. 4005 was pulling a freight train through southern Wyoming when it jumped a switch track at 50 mph (80 km/h), throwing the engine onto its left side and derailing its tender and the first 18 freight cars of its 62-car train. The engineer and fireman were killed on impact; the brakeman died of severe burns in

2925-580: The equipment, providing the money was matched by non-federal funds. Attendance rebounded in the 2010s, reaching 111,000 in 2011. From October 1 through 16, 2013, Steamtown was closed, along with the rest of the National Park system, as part of the United States federal government shutdown of 2013 . In 2021, Steamtown completed a two-year, $ 1.6 million restoration of its largest engine, Union Pacific Big Boy #4012. On July 10, 1995, less than two weeks after

3000-491: The experience of mainline steam railroading." The director of Steamtown, Roger G. Kennedy, said, "those who concentrated on the pork-barrel politics of the development of the park were ignorant of the history." Len Barcousky, writing for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , described that history saying: "It was steam locomotives that unified the nation in the century between 1850 and 1950. Maintained in giant roundhouses in

3075-504: The first series of Chesapeake and Ohio 2-6-6-6 H-8 “Allegheny” locomotives, built by the Lima Locomotive Works in 1941, may have weighed as much as 778,200 lb (353,000 kg), exceeding the Big Boys, but subsequent re-weighs of early-production H-8s, under close scrutiny by the builder and the railroad, found them to be about half a ton less than 772,250 lb (350,290 kg). A few experiments were carried out on

Steamtown National Historic Site - Misplaced Pages Continue

3150-585: The front of No. 4000's smokebox door, then under construction as the first of its class. The Big Boys were articulated, like the Mallet locomotive design, although lacking the compounding of the Mallet. They were built with a wide margin of reliability and safety, and normally operated well below 60 miles per hour (100 km/h) in freight service. Peak drawbar horsepower was reached at about 41 mph (66 km/h). The maximum drawbar pull measured during 1943 tests

3225-447: The history of Steamtown USA. Our site does touch on the history of railroad preservation, specifically in our History Museum. The work of F. Nelson Blount, creator of the former Steamtown USA, and other pioneers of the steam preservation movement, is a part (albeit a small part) of the story Steamtown NHS has been charged with preserving. Self-syndicated newspaper columnist Michael McManus once said that his goal in writing his weekly column

3300-502: The lack of signs on Interstate 91 , which the state opposed. Moreover, the roof of the largest storage shed on the property had collapsed under heavy snow the previous winter, damaging several pieces of equipment. Among the injured were CP Rail No. 1293, which had served on Vermont's "Bicentennial Train" and on the movie Terror Train (1979), and the Meadow River Lumber Company No. 1 Shay . Asked by McManus to describe

3375-443: The large firebox . Today, eight Big Boys survive, with most on static display at museums across the United States. One of them, No. 4014 , was re-acquired by Union Pacific, and between 2014 and 2019 was rebuilt to operating condition for the 150th anniversary of the first transcontinental railroad . It thus regained the title as the largest and most powerful operating steam locomotive in the world. In 1936, Union Pacific introduced

3450-411: The length of sidings and the locomotives' capacity to recharge the train's air brake system. The two exceptions were the 1.14% eastbound gradient between Ogden and Evanston and the 1.55% westbound gradient between Cheyenne and Sherman Hill. In 1953, the latter grade was alleviated by the opening of Track 3 via Harriman, whose 0.82% grade theoretically allowed a Big Boy to haul a 6,000-ton train unassisted

3525-589: The locomotives were only fired up to help with the fall rush traffic, the Big Boys saw service only between Cheyenne and Laramie. In April 1943, UP borrowed a dynamometer car from AT&SF to evaluate Big Boy performance. Several test runs were made on the Evanston Subdivision from Ogden to Evanston (76 miles), and it was found that a Big Boy could consume 11 tons of coal and 12,000 gallons of water an hour operating at full throttle, producing 6,290 drawbar horsepower at 41.4 mph. Designed to haul 3,600 tons up

3600-607: The maximum possible starting tractive effort with a factor of adhesion of 4.0. It was designed to travel smoothly and safely at 80 miles per hour (130 km/h). To achieve these new engineering goals, the Challenger locomotive was "comprehensively redesigned from first principles", wrote locomotive historian Tom Morrison. The overall design simplified some aspects of previous locomotive designs and added complexity elsewhere. Compounding, booster, and feed water heaters were eliminated, as were Baker valve gear and limited cut-off. But

3675-474: The missing portions of the original roundhouse, giving an impression of what the original circular structure was like. The museum has exhibits about the history and technology of steam railroads in the United States and specifically in Pennsylvania , particularly the DL&W; life on the railroad; and the business, labor, and governmental relationships between railroads. The theater shows a short film throughout

3750-511: The move. When Scranton agreed to take on Steamtown, it was estimated that the museum and excursion business would attract 200,000 to 400,000 visitors to the city every year. In anticipation of this economic boon, the city and a private developer spent $ 13 million to renovate the DL&;W station and transform it into a Hilton hotel, at a time when the unemployment rate in the city was 13 percent. Only 60,000 visitors showed up at Steamtown in 1987, and

3825-414: The museum opened, two teen-aged boys were killed when they were struck by Steamtown's Canadian Pacific 2317, which was pulling a train with 575 passengers on an excursion trip to Moscow, Pennsylvania . The boys were hit while trying to remove their all-terrain vehicle which had gotten stuck on the tracks. Two years later, the parents of the boys filed a lawsuit for $ 48 million. On October 27, 2003, No. 2317

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3900-436: The nation's largest junkyards, an eyesore described by Ralph Nader as "the eighth wonder of the world". In 1986, the U.S. House of Representatives , under the urging of Scranton native Representative Joseph M. McDade , voted to approve the spending of $ 8 million to study the collection and to establish the site as a National Historic Site (NHS) . The National Park Service (NPS) consequently conducted historical research on

3975-401: The need of costly asbestos removal from many pieces of the collection were spurring discussion about privatizing Steamtown. Steamtown NHS is located within a working railroad yard and incorporates the surviving elements of the 1902 DL&W Scranton roundhouse and locomotive repair shops. The visitor center, theater, technology and history museums are built in the style of and on the site of

4050-409: The occasion. In November 1995, The New York Times printed a favorable review written by Supreme Court correspondent Linda Greenhouse, who had visited the site with her husband and daughter. Wrote Greenhouse, "The pleasure of the park is to see trains not only as one might see them in a museum but to see them in motion. Steamtown is a dynamic museum, with locomotives moving regularly from the yard into

4125-511: The park's architectural centerpiece, the roundhouse". Visitor attendance in its first year was 212,000. By 2008, the federal government had spent a total of $ 176 million on Steamtown, which had an annual operating cost of $ 5.2 million. Visitor attendance had declined since its opening year to 61,178 in 2006. Many of the locomotives and passenger cars contained asbestos , a carcinogen. The federal government pledged $ 1.5 million for its removal, to be disbursed in 2011, and more money for restoration of

4200-498: The railroad was able to operate for several years under waivers issued by the state. By 1978, the Steamtown Foundation had begun scouting for a new location for Steamtown, USA. In 1980, Ray Holland, the Chairman of the Board of Steamtown Foundation, resigned after accusing the board of incompetence. His resignation was followed by that of Robert Barbera, a long-time director of the board. In

4275-477: The railroad's goals could be achieved by enlarging the Challenger firebox to about 235 by 96 inches (5.97 m × 2.44 m) (about 150 sq ft or 14 m ), increasing boiler pressure to 300 psi (2.1 MPa), adding four driving wheels, and reducing the size of the driving wheels from 69 to 68 in (1,753 to 1,727 mm). The new locomotive was carefully designed not to exceed an axle loading of 67,800 lb (30,800 kg), and achieved

4350-448: The restoration of No. 4014 and placed it in excursion service . The locomotive was sent on a tour in celebration of the 150th anniversary of the completion of the First transcontinental railroad . Most grades on Union Pacific's Overland Route were no steeper than 0.82%. So for a majority of the route, Big Boys could handle trains of roughly 6,000 tons in either direction, limited only by

4425-475: The roundhouse, for example, was reconstructed from remnants of a 1932 structure. The site also features several original outbuildings dated between 1899 and 1902. All the buildings on the site are listed with the National Register of Historic Places as part of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad Yard-Dickson Manufacturing Co. Site . Most of the steam locomotives and other railroad equipment at Steamtown NHS were originally collected by F. Nelson Blount ,

4500-518: The same year, three Big Boys were assigned to the Los Angeles & Salt Lake Line and ran between Ogden and Milford, Utah . In 1944, with the arrival of additional Challengers and the second order of Big Boys, their operating territory was expanded east from Green River to Cheyenne over the Wyoming Division's Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Subs. Beginning in 1948, with Challenger locomotives taking over

4575-488: The site and the collection were ideal representations of American industrial history. By 1995, the National Park Service (NPS) had acquired Steamtown, USA, and improved its facilities at a total cost of $ 66 million. Steamtown National Historic Site has since sold a few pieces from the Blount collection, and added a few others deemed of greater historical significance to the region. By 2008, low visitor attendance and

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4650-579: The site there was little evidence of the $ 40 million that had been spent to date; that several of the pieces were from the 1940s and 1950s, not the 19th century, which was the time period that was supposedly being preserved; that some of the better pieces of equipment were Canadian , not U.S.; that other museums, already in existence, were already fulfilling the historical mission of Steamtown; and that other NPS projects like Yosemite and Yellowstone were in desperate need of funding. Nevertheless, in February 1992,

4725-465: The value of the Steamtown collection, Jim Boyd, editor of Railfan & Railroad magazine, said, "Everything there is no longer obtainable anywhere, whether it is the "Big Boy" [Union Pacific No. 4012] or the Rahway Valley No. 15, a nice-sized locomotive any museum would give a right arm for. Most of the other large collections do not have any serviceable equipment." McManus added "What is at stake

4800-427: The year that followed, Steamtown did not run excursions. Don Ball Jr., had taken over direction of Steamtown by this time and discovered that the excursion train did not meet federal safety guidelines. In 1981, despite its vast holdings of vintage railroad stock, Steamtown had only 17,000 visitors, while Connecticut 's Essex Valley Railroad, which ran two small engines, had 139,000 visitors. Even in its best year, 1973,

4875-658: The years (see section on tonnage ratings). Postwar increases in the price of coal and labor, along with the advent of efficient, cost-effective diesel-electric power, spelled the end of their operational lives. They were among the last steam locomotives withdrawn from service on the Union Pacific. The last revenue train hauled by a Big Boy ended its run early in the morning on July 21, 1959. Most were stored in operational condition until 1961; four remained in operational condition at Green River, Wyoming , until 1962. Their duties were assumed by diesel locomotives and gas turbine-electric locomotives . In 2019, Union Pacific completed

4950-539: Was "to suggest answers to problems of the old industrial states." In March 1982 a substantial article by McManus appeared in the Bangor Daily News . In the article, McManus proposed several reasons why a city, like Chicago , Pittsburgh , or Scranton , might benefit from a tourist attraction like Steamtown. McManus went on to explain why the business was failing in Vermont: past failed management, an isolated location and

5025-417: Was 138,200 lbf (615 kN) while starting a train. The Big Boy has the longest engine body of any reciprocating steam locomotive, longer than two 40-foot buses. They were also the heaviest reciprocating steam locomotives ever built; the combined weight of the 772,250 lb (350,290 kg) engine and 436,500 lb (198,000 kg) tender outweighed a Boeing 747 . There was some speculation that

5100-517: Was a second-rate collection on a third-rate site," was unfounded. Scranton and Panuska wrote, "The collection of 29 steam engines and 82 other railroad cars and equipment is the third largest in the country, the only one available for commemorating the industrialization of America in a historic setting." They said that the 19th-century American Industrial Revolution was under-represented in the National Park System and further said that Scranton

5175-416: Was facing bankruptcy. In 1986, the U.S. House of Representatives , at the urging of Scranton native Representative Joseph M. McDade , approved $ 8 million to begin turning the museum into a National Historic Site . The idea was derided by those who called the collection second-rate, the site's historical significance questionable, and the public funding no more than pork-barrel politics. But proponents said

5250-467: Was founded because of its iron ore and its ability to produce rails (previously imported from England), followed by its graduation to a coal and steel economy. It is a graphic demonstration of the industrial period of our country, an excellent site for Americans to learn about their history. The site they were referring to had mostly belonged to the DL&W, which joined the Erie Railroad in 1960 to form

5325-548: Was killed on August 31, 1967, when his private airplane hit a tree during an emergency landing, in Marlborough, New Hampshire . By that time, a good deal of Blount's collection was controlled by the Steamtown Foundation and had been moved to Bellows Falls. One of Blount's corporations, the Green Mountain Railroad (GMRC), controlled the tracks that lay between Walpole, Bellows Falls and Chester, Vermont , which Steamtown

5400-429: Was overhauled by the DL&W. Other noteworthy pieces are the popular Union Pacific Big Boy #4012, Canadian Pacific Railway (CP Rail) #2929 (a rare Jubilee 4-4-4), Nickel Plate Road (NKP) S-2 #759, and Reading Company (RDG) T-1 #2124. Engines NKP #759 , CN #47 , New Haven Trap Rock Co. #43, and Rahway Valley #15 have operated at Steamtown, but not since the move to Pennsylvania. Several engines not part of

5475-753: Was pulling a train through the Poconos when the tender and three of the nine passenger cars jumped the tracks. No one was injured because the train was only moving at around 10 mph. The accident occurred one mile outside Delaware Water Gap in an area known as Point of Gap. List of railway museums A railway museum is a museum that explores the history of all aspects of rail related transportation, including: locomotives ( steam , diesel , and electric ), railway cars , trams , and railway signalling equipment. They may also operate historic equipment on museum grounds. Union Pacific Big Boy The 25 Big Boy locomotives were built to haul freight over

5550-399: Was still in Vermont because it "lacked historic importance". Aside from the $ 73 million that had at that point been proposed for the development of the project, there would also be a projected annual operation cost of $ 6.5 million. A December 17, 1991, editorial reported that the development appropriation had been capped at $ 53 million, and said the Steamtown project had siphoned resources "from

5625-480: Was to use for its excursions. When Blount died, most of the controlling stock of the GMRC was transferred to the president of the railroad, Robert Adams. By 1976, the relationship between Steamtown and GMRC was strained as the two organizations fought over maintenance of the tracks, which were owned by the state of Vermont. In addition, the steam excursions that Steamtown sponsored violated Vermont's pollution regulations, but

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