A Powerful Freight Locomotive Engine
The Baldwin Locomotive Works display in the Palace
of Transportation comprised about a dozen locomotives, and the monster
engine shown here, which stood near the revolving
turntable in the center of the building, was the largest coupled engine
ever built and successfully operated at that time, respresenting the type
used on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe System. This engine alone weighed
287,000 pounds, and with the tender about 450,000 pounds. As you can see
this powerful locomotive had five pairs of driving wheels, with a single
pair of small wheels in front and another at the rear, and there was an
arrangement of parts that enabled the engineer to throw some of the wieght
from the small trucks to the drivers for the purpose of increasing traction
in starting the train. With a steam pressure of 225 pounds, the engine could
develop 2200 horse power, and a tractive force of about 60,000 pounds under
the best conditions. Such locomotives required a perfection and solidity
of track and represented an advance that was thought to be impossible a
few years earlier. Engine number 984 is in the foreground and Engine number
306 is standing next to it.
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Terry's 1904 World's Fair Page.
1-1997