| 611 Is Fired Up! - Kevin EuDaly |
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The excursion on May 30, 2015, behind 611 was a spectacular success. Rick’s Antiques provides a perfect backdrop for 611 and her train as she steams westbound at Forest, Virginia, toward Roanoke and the excited crowd at the Virginia Museum of Transportation. (Charles Wilson, III, photo) |
| The N&W Virginian Modeler / Two Stellar Cars Brighten N-Scale Freights - Frank Gibson |
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This diagram, dated September 18, 1939 (and last revised on July 22, 1949), shows the H2a 70-ton triple hopper in the 17-inch “N&W” lettering in use prior to the October 21, 1952, change to 24-inch lettering.
(N&WHS Archives collection) |
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This diagram shows the H2a 70-ton triple hopper in the 24-inch “N&W” lettering put in place after October 21, 1952, and includes the H3 hoppers. Its last revision date is July 17, 1964. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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This photo shows the 24-inch lettering version of the H2a when brand new in Roanoke, Virginia, on May 8, 1953. Notice the rivet lines indicating the split-panel construction used on this series of cars. (N&W Railway photo, N&WHS Archives collection) |
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Undecorated and decorated versions of the H2a hopper cars are available. (Photos courtesy Walthers) |
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This in-service view of the 22272 reveals the car was built in January 1952. This car, like the Broadway Limited model, was not a split-panel car (no horizontal row of rivets). These 70-ton H2a hoppers had a capacity of 2,460 cubic feet.
(N&W Railway photo, N&WHS Archives collection) |
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This view shows the inside of a brand new H2a hopper in May 1949.
(N&WHS Archives collection) |
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This view of the brake wheel end of brand new H2a 25200 was taken on May 8, 1953. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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This September 15, 1915, lettering diagram shows the CF caboose was lettered with 7-inch lettering and numbers with 12 inches between the two rows. It was last revised on October 22, 1958, when it was superseded by a newer drawing.
(N&WHS Archives collection) |
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CF caboose 518335 was the only unit of its class equipped with a liquid propane tank and a propane heater. The tank is clearly visible in this undated view.
(N&W Railway photo, N&WHS Archives collection) |
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Y6a 2168 is pushing a coal train with CF 518216 on the back in this rail-level view at Boaz, Virginia. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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Abram Burnett poses for a photograph in front of his ride — CF caboose 518315 — in this undated photograph taken at Payne, Virginia. His grip and lantern sit on the end platform — important tools for any trip. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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Three crewmen pose with CF caboose 518194 — the date and location are unknown, as are the identities of the three men. This view yields a close-up look at the boards that sheathed these cars.
(N&WHS Archives collection) |
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A completed American Model Builders CF kit.
(Photo courtesy American Model Builders) |
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In later years some of the CF class cabooses were rebuilt with plywood sides. CF caboose 518040 was photographed in blue and yellow with a companion on an unknown date. The yellow ends eventually will have red striping added. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
| Nuggets from the Archives / Inside Roanoke Shops During WWII - Gordon Hamilton |
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Roanoke Shops (looking west) largely as it would have appeared in 1944 with the open-air freight car shop in the foreground. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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The presence of the enclosed freight car shop to the east (below) of the passenger car roundhouse dates this map to sometime after about 1956. The old freight car paint yard was east of the scrap wharf near the Lawson & Sons warehouse. (N&WHS Archives Collection) |
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Posed where one would expect to see a newly out-shopped streamlined N&W Class J locomotive, this C&NW Mikado is one of many locomotives that Roanoke Shops repaired for other railroads — in this case for the Seaboard Air Line, which was leasing the locomotive. Lewis (Bud) Jefferies, in his book, N&W: Giant of Steam, reports that during World War II Roanoke Shops repaired no less than 284 locomotives from eight other railroads. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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This is the interior of the cavernous Roanoke Shops foundry. The circular molds on the left appear to be intended for cast iron freight car wheels that the N&W is known to have produced until made obsolete by stronger steel wheels. Some N&W cast iron wheels can be found incorporated into benches on the Rail Walk in downtown Roanoke. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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N&W’s blacksmiths could operate a steam hammer with great precision to shape parts such as this drive rod, but they needed the assistance of skilled helpers and laborers whose work was heavy and hot. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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This is the open-air freight car shop looking east with the double-track main line to Norfolk alongside on the right side and with gondolas under construction on the assembly line. Production must have been adversely affected by weather extremes, eventually leading to the opening of a new car shop under roof in the mid-1950s. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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Some of the less glamorous work, such as the scrapping of passenger cars, took place in the scrap wharf yard. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
| Implementing the Norfolk & Western Vision / Part 3 - Alex Schust |
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Frederick J. Kimball (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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This is the Jed Hotchkiss map dated August 3, 1880, of the Great Flat Top Coal Field. It notes that it was furnished to President Kimball. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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Though undated, this map of the four potential routes for the N&W building west was most likely produced in 1881. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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McCreath published The Mineral Wealth of Virginia in 1884. This was expanded from an original 1882 report he published of his survey and analysis of the potential mineral wealth of the N&W and Shenandoah Valley railroads. (Eastern Regional Coal Archives collection) |
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McCreath’s map of 1884 shows a potential route along the Little Coal River to St. Albans. (Eastern Regional Coal Archives collection) |
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McCreath sketched this map to illustrate the railroad projected down the Bluestone River and branch lines up the tributaries, outlined in red. (Eastern Regional Coal Archives collection) |
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By the end of 1888 the Flat-Top Extension had been built down the Bluestone River and up Flipping Creek, a distance of 10 miles from Bluestone Junction. The Elkhorn Extension had tunneled through Flat Top Mountain and reached Powhatan, a distance of eight miles. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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E.V. d'Invilliers Big Coal River Report (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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This map dated January 1, 1887, shows the projected route along a postal route (and perhaps a wagon road) that ran from Elkhorn Creek, along Burks Creek to Pinnacle Creek, Rockcastle Creek, and on to Oceana. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
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Major changes to the N&W’s January 1, 1890, System Map from the January 1, 1889 System Map included labeling the dashed line between Elkhorn and Ironton as the Ohio Extension, adding Pondmouth (Present-day Williamson), Ceredo, and Chaterawha to the map, and the Chattaroi Railroad had been renamed the Ohio & Big Sandy Railroad (O&BS). (N&WHS Archives collection) |
| A CF at Kenova - Kevin EuDaly |
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In a scene repeated myriad times, a crew rides a CF class caboose at the end of a manifest passing Kenova, West Virginia. Long gone are the interlocking tower, its adjacent storage shed, the train order boards, and likely every piece of rolling stock in view, passed from this age as the decades roll by. Indeed, cabooses today are few and are typically relegated to specific local switching requirements. But in happier times, nearly every freight movement had a caboose, or “cabin car” in N&W terminology, bringing up the rear. At least now the N&W classic CF caboose can be built in N-scale with the arrival of American Model Builders’ wood kit available through the N&WHS Commissary. (N&WHS Archives collection) |
