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 TJ 625.B18 1897 
 
 3 1924 022 809 630 
 
Matthtas W. Baldwin 
 
HISTORY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 Baldwin Locomotive Works 
 
 FROM 
 
 J 83 J TO J 897. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 
 J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY. 
 
 J 89 7. 
 
^. I ^%^\ 
 
PLAN. 
 
 The Baldwin Locomotive Works is situated y^ith a front on 
 Broad Street, Philadelphia, extending from Pennsylvania Avenue 
 to Spring Garden Street. It also comprises one block bounded 
 by Fifteenth and Sixteenth, Hamilton and Buttonwood Streets, 
 and the greater part of two blocks between Seventeenth and 
 Eighteenth, and from Buttonwood Street to Pennsylvania Ave- 
 nue. The plan below shows the area occupied, over nine acres 
 in all, of whi(jji between .six and seven acres are under roof 
 
 3i>RlNc Garden St 
 
 Fhila St Reading Rir 
 
 PennsyvvamiaAvc 
 
 1. Main Office, Drawing Room, Erecting .Shop, Cylinder Shop, Paint Shop, and 
 Store Room. 
 
 2. Boiler Shop, Machine Shop, Brass Machine Shop, Brass Foundry, and Wheel 
 Shop. 
 
 3. Machine Shop, Blacksmith Shop, Hammer Shop, and Power Plant. 
 
 4. Iron Foundry, Repair Shop, and Flange Shop. 
 
 5. Superintendent's Office, Laboratory, Pattern Shop, and Electrical Department. 
 
 6. Machine Shop, Tender Shop, and Sheet Iron Shop. 
 
 7. Spring Shop, Drop Hammer Shop, Hydraulic Smith Shop, Wood Shop, and 
 Power Plant. 
 
 Note. — The shaded spaces indicate buildings occupied by the Baldwin Locomo- 
 tive Works. 
 
 5 
 
HISTORY 
 
 Baldwin Locomotive Works. 
 
 The Baldwin Locomotive Works dates its origin from the 
 inception of steam railroads in America. Called into existence 
 by the early requirements of the railroad interests of the country, 
 it has grown with their growth and kept pace with their progress. 
 It has reflected in its career the successive stages of American 
 railroad practice, and has itself contributed largely to the develop- 
 ment of the locomotive as it exists to-day. A history of the 
 Baldwin Locomotive Works, therefore, is, in a great measure, a 
 record of the progress of locomotive engineering in this country, 
 and as such cannot fail to be of interest to those who are con- 
 cerned in this important element of our material progress. 
 
 Matthias W. Baldwin, the founder of the estabhshment, 
 learned the trade of a jeweler, and entered the service of 
 Fletcher & Gardiner, Jewelers and Silversmiths, Philadelphia, in 
 1817. Two years later he opened a small shop, in the same line 
 of business, on his own account. The demand for articles of 
 this character falling off, however, he formed a partnership, in 
 1825, with David Mason, a machinist, in the manufacture of 
 bookbinders' tools and cylinders for calico-printing. Their shop 
 was in a small alley which runs north from Walnut Street, above 
 Fourth. They afterwards removed to Minor Street, below Sixth. 
 The business was so successful that steam-power became neces- 
 sary in carrying on their manufactures, and an engine was bought 
 for the purpose. This proving unsatisfactory, Mr. Baldwin 
 decided to design and construct one which should be specially 
 
 7 
 
8 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 Mr. Baldwin's First Engine. 
 
 adapted to the requirements of his shop. One of these require- 
 ments was that it should occupy the least possible space, and 
 this was met by the construction of an upright engine on a novel 
 and ingenious plan. On a bed-plate about five feet square an 
 upright cylinder was placed ; the piston- 
 rod connected to a cross-bar having two- 
 legs, turned downward, and sliding in 
 grooves on the sides of the cylinder, 
 which thus formed the guides. To the 
 sides of these legs, at their lower ends, 
 was connected by pivots an inverted 
 U-shaped frame, prolonged at the arch 
 into a single rod, which took hold of 
 the crank of a fly-wheel carried by up- 
 right standards on the bed-plate. It will 
 be seen that the length of the ordinary 
 separate guide-bars was thus saved, and 
 the whole engine was brought within the 
 smallest possible compass. The design 
 of the machine was not only unique, but its workmanship was 
 so excellent, and its efficiency so great, as readily to procure for 
 Mr. Baldwin orders for additional stationary engines. His atten- 
 tion was thus turned to steam engineering, and the way was 
 prepared for his grappling with the problem of the locomotive 
 when the time should arrive. 
 
 This original stationary engine, constructed prior to 1830, is 
 still in good order and carefully preserved at the works. It has 
 successively supplied the power in six different departments as 
 they have been opened, from time to time, in the growth of the 
 business. 
 
 The manufacture of stationary steam-engines thus took a 
 prominent place in the establishment, and Mr. Mason shortly 
 afterwards withdrew from the partnership. 
 
 In 1829-30 the use of steam as a motive power on railroads 
 had begun to engage the attention of American engineers. A 
 few locomotives had been imported from England, and one 
 (which, however, was not successful) had been constructed at 
 the West Point Foundry, in New York City. To gratify the 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 public interest in the new motor, Mr. Franklin Peale, then 
 proprietor of the Philadelphia Museum, applied to Mr. Baldwin 
 to construct a miniature locomotive for exhibition in his establish- 
 ment. With the aid only of the imperfect published descrip- 
 tions and sketches of the locomotives which had taken part in 
 the Rainhill competition in England, Mr. Baldwin undertook the 
 work, and on the 25th of April, 1831, the miniature locomotive 
 was put in motion on a circular track made of pine boards 
 covered with hoop iron, in the rooms of the Museum. Two 
 small cars, containing seats for four passengers, were attached to 
 it, and the novel spectacle attracted crowds of admiring spec- 
 tators. Both anthracite and pine-knot coal were used as fuel, 
 and the exhaust steam was discharged into the chimney, thus 
 utilizing it to increase the draught. 
 
 The success of the model was such that, in the same year, 
 Mr. Baldwin received an order for a locomotive from the Phila- 
 delphia, Germantown and Norristown Railroad Company, whose 
 short line of six miles to Germantown was operated by horse- 
 power. The Camden and Amboy Railroad Company had 
 shortly before imported a locomotive from England, which was 
 stored in a shed at Bordentown. It had not yet been put 
 together; but Mr. Baldwin, in company with his friend, Mr. 
 Peale, visited the spot, inspected the detached parts, and made a 
 few memoranda of some of its principal dimensions. Guided by 
 these figures and his experience with the Peale model, Mr. 
 Baldwin commenced the task. The difficulties to be overcome 
 in filling the order can hardly be appreciated at this day. There 
 were few mechanics competent to do any part of the work on 
 a locomotive. Suitable tools were with difficulty obtainable. 
 Cylinders were bored by a chisel fixed in a block of wood and 
 turned by hand. Blacksmiths able to weld a bar of iron exceed- 
 ing one and one-quarter inches in thickness were few, or not to 
 be had. It was necessary for Mr. Baldwin to do much of the 
 work with his own hands, to educate the workmen who assisted 
 him, and to improvise tools for the various processes. 
 
 The work was prosecuted, nevertheless, under all these diffi- 
 culties, and the locomotive was fully completed, christened the 
 "Old Ironsides," and tried on the road, November 23, 1832. 
 
lO 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 The circumstances of the trial are fully preserved, and are given, 
 further on, in the extracts from the journals of the day. Despite 
 some imperfections, naturally occurring in a first effort, and which 
 were afterward to a great extent remedied, the engine was, for 
 that early day, a marked and gratifying success. It was put at 
 once into service, as appears from the Company's advertisement 
 three days after the trial, and did duty on the Germantown road 
 and others for over a score of years. 
 
 The " Ironsides" was a four-wheeled engine, modelled essen- 
 tially on the English practice of that day, as shown in the 
 " Planet" class, and weighed, in running order, something over 
 five tons. The rear or driving-wheels were fifty-four inches in 
 
 a? 
 
 The " Old Ironsides." 1832. 
 
 diameter on a crank-axle placed in front of the fire-box. The 
 cranks were thirty-nine inches from centre to centre. The front 
 wheels, which were simply carrying wheels, were forty-five inches 
 in diameter, on an axle placed just back of the cylinders. The 
 cylinders were nine and one-half inches in diameter by eighteen 
 inches stroke, and were attached horizontally to the outside of 
 the smoke-box, which was D-shaped, with the sides receding 
 inwardly, so as to bring the centre line of each cylinder in line 
 with the centre of the crank. The wheels were made with heavy 
 cast-iron hubs, wooden spokes and rims, and wrought-iron tires. 
 The frame was of wood, placed outside the wheels. The boiler 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. I I 
 
 was thirty inches in diameter, and contained seventy-two copper 
 flues, one and one-half inches in diameter and seven feet long. 
 The tender was a four-wheeled platform, with wooden sides and 
 back, carrying an iron box for a water-tank, inclosed in a wooden 
 casing, and with a space for fuel in front. The engine had no 
 cab. The valve-motion was at first given by a single loose 
 eccentric for each cylinder, placed on the axle between the crank 
 and the hub of the wheel. On the inside of the eccentric was 
 a half-circular slot, running half-way around. A stop was 
 fastened to the axle at the arm of the crank, terminating in a 
 pin which projected into the slot. The engine was reversed by 
 changing the position of the eccentric on the axle by a lever 
 operated from the footboard. This form of valve-motion was, 
 however, shortly afterward changed, and a single fixed eccentric 
 for each cyHnder substituted. The rock-shafts, which were 
 under the footboard, had arms above and below, and the 
 eccentric-straps had each a forked rod, with a hook, or an upper 
 and lower latch or pin, at their extremities, to engage with the 
 upper or lower arm of the rock-shaft. The eccentric-rods were 
 raised or lowered by a double treadle, so as to connect with the 
 upper or lower arm of the rock-shaft, according as forward or 
 backward gear was desired. A peculiarity in the exhaust of the 
 " Ironsides" was that there was only a single straight pipe running 
 across from one cylinder to the other, with an opening in the 
 upper side of the pipe, midway between the cylinders, to which 
 was attached at right angles the perpendicular pipe into the 
 chimney. The cyHnders, therefore, exhausted against each 
 other; and it was found, after the engine had been put in use, 
 that this was a serious objection. This defect was afterward 
 remedied by turning each exhaust-pipe upward into the chimney, 
 substantially as is now done. The steam-joints were made with 
 canvas and red-lead, as was the practice in English locomotives, 
 and in consequence much trouble was caused, from time to time, 
 by leaking. 
 
 The price of the engine was to have been $4000, but some 
 difficulty was found in procuring a settlement. The Company 
 claimed that the engine did not perform according to contract ; 
 and objection was also made to some of the defects alluded to. 
 
12 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 After these had been corrected as far as possible, however, Mr. 
 Baldwin finally succeeded in effecting a compromise settlement, 
 and received from the' Company ^3500 for the machine. 
 
 The results of the trial and the impression produced by it on 
 the public mind may be gathered from the following extracts 
 from the newspapers of the day : 
 
 The United States Gazette of November 24, 1832, remarks: 
 
 " A most gratifying experiment was made yesterday afternoon on the Philadelphia, 
 Germantown and Norristown Railroad. The beautiful locomotive engine and 
 tender, built by Mr. Baldwin, of this city, whose reputation as an ingenious 
 machinist is well known, were for the first time placed on the road. The engine 
 traveled about six miles, working with perfect accuracy and ease in all its parts, 
 and with great velocity." 
 
 The Chronicle of the same date noticed the trial more at 
 length, as follows : 
 
 " It gives us pleasure to state that the locomotive engine built by our townsman, 
 M. W. Baldwin, has proved highly successful. In the presence of several gentlemen 
 of science and information on such subjects, the engine was yesterday placed upon 
 the road for the first time. All her parts had been previously highly finished and 
 fitted together in Mr. Baldwin's factory. She was taken apart on Tuesday and 
 removed to the Company's depot, and yesterday morning she was completely together, 
 ready for travel. After the regular passenger cars had arrived from Germantown in 
 the afternoon, the tracks being clear, preparation was made for her starting. The 
 placing fire in the furnace and raising steam occupied twenty minutes. The engine 
 (with her tender) moved from the depot in beautiful style, working with great ease 
 and uniformity. She proceeded about half a mile beyond the Union Tavern, at the 
 township line, and returned immediately, a distance of six miles, at a speed of about 
 twenty-eight miles to the hour, her speed having been slackened at all the road 
 crossings, and it being after dark, but a portion of her power was used. It is need- 
 less to say that the spectators were delighted. From this experiment there is every 
 reason to believe this engine will draw thirty tons gross, at an average speed of forty 
 miles an hour, on a level road. The principal superiority of the engine over any of 
 the English ones known, consists in the light weight, — which is but between four 
 and five tons, — her small bulk, and the simplicity of her working machinery. We 
 rejoice at the result of this experiment, as it conclusively shows that Philadelphia, 
 always famous for the skill of her mechanics, is enabled to produce steam-engines 
 for railroads combining so many superior qualities as to warrant the belief that her 
 mechanics will hereafter supply nearly all the public works of this description in the 
 country." 
 
 On subsequent trials, the " Ironsides" attained a speed of thirty 
 miles per hour, with its usual train attached. So great were the 
 wonder and curiosity which attached to such a prodigy, that 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 13 
 
 people flocked to see the marvel, and eagerly bought the privi- 
 lege of riding after the strange monster. The officers of the 
 road were not slow to avail themselves of the public interest to 
 increase their passenger receipts, and the following advertisement 
 from Poidson's American Daily Advertiser of November 26, 1832, 
 will show that as yet they regarded the new machine rather as a 
 curiosity and a bait to allure travel than as a practical every-day 
 servant : 
 
 PHILADEEPIHA, OEUMANTOWN, AND 
 NOHKISTOWN KAIL-ROAD. 
 - LOCOMOTtVE ENGINE. 
 
 Tl^OTICE,— The Luoomotive Elaine, (buiU by 
 - J^ M. W. Baldwin, of tiiia cily,) will itepai t 
 , U,AHjy, when ihe.weavher is fair, with a Tsain of 
 
 pASSKisBER Cabjs, commeooingou Mondav tlie46ih 
 
 inst., a' the lollowinghours, viZ:— 
 
 'At it o'clock, Ai M. I At 12 o'elock, M, 
 
 ' l" 1 o'clock, a. M. t '» 2 o'cloek, P. AI. 
 ■ « 3 o'clock, P. Jf. I " 4 o'clock, P. M. 
 
 - T*be Cars drawn by horses, wilt Mao dppiii I as. 
 uaaal, from Philjdelpliia at 9 o'clock, A. \3,, .ji.i 
 
 ■ from Gferraaniown at 10 o'clock, A. M., auO at lK&. 
 
 'sibove mentioned hours when the weather 's nottiilr.i^ 
 ■ The points of starting, are from the D< po», iIl i>j 
 corner of Green and Ninth street, Philadtlphizj in<J 
 from the Main street, nsar the centrf of Geuoan* 
 town. "Whole Cars can be takca. Tickets, «%" 
 cents. no? e4-Jl 
 
 This announcement did not mean that in wet weather horses 
 would be attached to the locomotive to aid it in drawing the train, 
 but that the usual horse cars would be employed in making the 
 trips upon the road without the engine. 
 
 Upon making the first trip to Germantown with a passenger 
 train with the " Ironsides," one of the drivers slipped upon the 
 axle, causing the wheels to track less than the gauge of the road 
 and drop in between the rails. It was also discovered that the 
 valve arrangement of the pumps was defective, and they failed 
 to supply the boiler with water. The shifting of the driving- 
 wheel upon the axle fastened the eccentric, so that it would not 
 operate in backward motion. These mishaps caused delay, and 
 
H 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 prevented the engine from reaching its destination, to the great 
 disappointment of all concerned. They were corrected in a few 
 days, and the machine was used in experimenting upon its 
 efficiency, making occasional trips with trains to Germantown. 
 The road had an ascending grade, nearly uniform, of thirty-two 
 feet per mile, and for the last half-mile of forty-five feet per mile, 
 and it was found that the engine was too light for the business 
 of the road upon these grades. 
 
 Such was Mr. Baldwin's first locomotive; and it is related of 
 him that his discouragement at the difficulties which he had 
 undergone in building it and in finally procuring a settlement for 
 it was such that he remarked to one of his friends, with much 
 decision, ''That is our last locomotive." 
 
 It was some time before he received an order for another, but 
 meanwhile the subject had become singularly fascinating to him, 
 and occupied his mind so fully that he was eager to work out 
 his new ideas in a tangible form. 
 
 Shortly after the " Ironsides" had been placed on the German- 
 town road, Mr. E. ,L. Miller, of Charleston, S. C., came to 
 Philadelphia and made a careful examination of 
 the machine. Mr. Miller had, in 1830, contracted 
 to furnish a locomotive to the Charleston and 
 Hamburg Railroad Company, and accordingly 
 the engine " Best Friend" had been built under 
 - — his direction at the West Point Foundry, New 
 
 Half-Crank. 
 
 I — York. After inspecting the " Ironsides," he sug- 
 gested to Mr. Baldwin to visit the Mohawk and 
 Hudson Railroad and examine an English loco- 
 motive which had been placed on that road in 
 July, 1 83 1, by Messrs. Robert Stephenson & Co., 
 of Newcastle, England. It was originally a four- 
 wheeled engine of the " Planet" type, with hori- 
 zontal cylinders and crank-axle. The front wheels of thi.s engine 
 were removed .about a year after the machine was put at work, 
 and a four-wheeled swiveling or " bogie" truck substituted. The 
 result of Mr. Baldwin's investigations was the adoption of this 
 design, but with some important improvements. Among these 
 was the " half-crank," which he devised on his return from this 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 IS 
 
 trip, and which he patented September lo, 1834. In this form 
 of crank, the outer arm is omitted, and the wrist is fixed in a 
 spoke of the wheel. In other words, the wheel itself formed one 
 arm of the crank. The result sought and gained was that the 
 cranks were strengthened, and, being at the extremities of the 
 axle, the boiler could be made larger in diameter and placed 
 lower. The driving-axle could also be placed back of the fire- 
 box, the connecting-rods passing by the sides of the fire-box 
 and taking hold inside of the wheels. This arrangement of the 
 crank also involved the placing of the cylinders outside the 
 smoke-box, as was done on the " Ironsides." 
 
 By the time the order for the second locomotive was received, 
 Mr. Baldwin had matured this device and was prepared to 
 embody it in practical form. The order came from Mr. E. L. 
 Miller in behalf of the Charleston and Hamburg Railroad 
 Company, and the engine bore his name, and was completed 
 February 18, 1834. It was on six wheels; one pair being 
 drivers, four and a half feet in diameter, with half-crank axle 
 placed back of the fire-box as above described, and the four 
 front wheels combined in a swiveling truck. The driving-wheels, 
 it should be observed, were cast in solid bell-metal ! The com- 
 bined wood and iron wheels used on the " Ironsides" had proved 
 objectionable, and Mr. Baldwin, in his endeavors to find a satis- 
 factory subsk^tute, had re- 
 course to brass. June 29, 
 1833, he took out a patent 
 for a cast-brass wheel, his 
 idea being that by varying 
 the hardness of the metal 
 the adhesion of the drivers 
 on the rails could be in- 
 creased or diminished at 
 will. The brass wheels on 
 the " Miller," however, soon 
 wore out, and the experi- 
 ment with this metal was not repeated. The " E. L. Miller" had 
 cylinders ten inches in diameter; stroke of piston, sixteen inches ; 
 and weighed, with water in the boiler, seven tons eight hundred- 
 
 Baldwin Engine, 1834. 
 
l6 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 weight. The boiler had a high dome over the fire-box ; and this 
 form of construction, it may be noted, was followed, with a few 
 exceptions, for many years. 
 
 The valve-motion was given by a single fixed eccentric for 
 each cylinder. Each eccentric-strap had two arms attached to 
 it, one above and the other below, and, as the driving-axle was 
 back of the fire-box, these arms were prolonged backward under 
 the footboard, with a hook on the inner side of the end of each. 
 The rock-shaft had arms above and below its axis, and the hooks 
 of the two rods of each eccentric were moved by hand-levers 
 so as to engage with either arm, thus producing backward or 
 forward gear. This form of single eccentric, peculiar to Mr. 
 Baldwin, was in the interest of simplicity in the working parts, 
 and was adhered to for some years. It gave rise to an animated 
 controversy among mechanics as to whether, with its use, it was 
 possible to get a lead on the valve in both directions. Many 
 maintained that this was impracticable ; but Mr. Baldwin demon- 
 strated by actual experience that the reverse was the case. 
 
 Meanwhile the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania had given Mr. 
 Baldwin an order for a locomotive for the State Road, as it was 
 then called, from Philadelphia to Columbia, which, up to that 
 time, had been worked by horses. This engine, called the 
 "Lancaster," was completed in June, 1834. It was similar to 
 the " Miller," and weighed seventeen thousand pounds. After it 
 was placed in service, the records show that it hauled at one time 
 nineteen loaded burden cars over the highest grades between 
 Philadelphia and Columbia. This was characterized at the time 
 by the officers of the road as an " unprecedented performance." 
 The success of the machine on its trial trips was such that the 
 Legislature decided to adopt steam-power for working the road, 
 and Mr. Baldwin received orders for several additional locomo- 
 tives. Two others were accordingly delivered to the State in 
 September and November respectively of that year, and one was 
 also built and delivered to the Philadelphia and Trenton Railroad 
 Company during the same season. This latter engine, which was 
 put in service October 21, 1834, averaged twenty-one thousand 
 miles per year to September 15,1 840. 
 
 Five locomotives were thus completed in 1834, and the new 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 17 
 
 business was fairly under way. The building in Lodge Alley, to 
 which Mr. Baldwin had removed from Minor Street, and where 
 these engines were constructed, began to be found too contracted, 
 and another remo\al was decided upon. A location on Broad 
 and Hamilton Streets (the site, in part, of the present works) 
 was selected, and a three-story L-shaped brick building, fronting 
 
 Baldwin Compound Wood and Iron Wheels, 1834. 
 
 on both streets, erected. This was completed and the business 
 removed to it during the following year (1835). The original 
 building was partially destroyed by fire in 1884 and was replaced 
 by a four-stoiy brick structure. 
 
 These early locomotives, built in 1834, were the types of Mr. 
 Baldwin's practice for some years. All, or nearly all of them. 
 
HISTORY OF THE 
 
 embraced several important devices, which were the results of 
 his study and experiments up to that time. The devices referred 
 to were patented September lo, 1834, and the same patent 
 covered the following four inventions, viz. : 
 
 1. The half-crank, and method of attaching it to the driving- 
 wheel. (This has already been described.) 
 
 2. A new mode of constructing the wheels of locomotive 
 engines and cars. In this the hub and spokes were of cast-iron, 
 cast together. The spokes were cast without a rim, and ter- 
 minated in segment flanges, each spoke having a separate flange 
 disconnected from its neighbors. By this means, it was claimed, 
 the injurious effect of the unequal expansion of the materials 
 composing the wheels was lessened or altogether prevented. 
 The flanges bore against wooden felloes, made in two thick- 
 nesses, and put together so as to break joints. Tenons or pins 
 projected from the flanges into openings made in the wooden 
 felloes, to keep them in place. Around the whole the tire was 
 passed and secured by bolts. The sketch on page 17 shows the 
 device. 
 
 3. A new mode of forming the joints of steam and other 
 tubes. This was Mr. Baldwin's invention of ground joints for 
 steam-pipes, which was a very valuable improvement over pre- 
 vious methods of making joints with red-lead packing, and 
 which rendered it possible to carry a much higher pressure of 
 steam. 
 
 4. A new mode of forming the joints and other parts of the 
 supply-pump, and of locating the pump itself This invention 
 consisted in making the single guide-bar hollow and using it for 
 the pump-barrel. The pump-plunger was attached to the piston- 
 rod at a socket or sleeve formed for the purpose, and the hol- 
 low guide-bar terminated in the vertical pump-chamber. This 
 chamber was made in two pieces, joined about midway between 
 the induction and eduction pipes. This joint was ground steam- 
 tight, as were also the joints of the induction-pipe with the bottom 
 of the lower chamber, and the flange of the eduction-pipe with 
 the top of the upper chamber. All these parts were held together 
 by a stirrup with a set-screw in its arched top, and the arrange- 
 ment was such that by simply unscrewing this set-screw the 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 19 
 
 different sections of the chamber, with all the valves, could be 
 taken apart for cleaning or adjusting. The cut below illustrates 
 the device. 
 
 It is probable that the five engines built during 1834 embodied 
 all, or nearly all, these devices. They all had the half-crank, 
 the ground joints for steam-pipes (which were first made by him 
 in 1833), and the pump formed in the guide-bar, and all had the 
 four-wheeled truck in front, and a single pair of drivers back of 
 the fire-box. On this position of the driving-wheels Mr. Baldwin 
 laid great stress, as it made a more even distribution of the 
 
 Pump and Stirrup. 
 
 weight, throwing about one-half on the drivers and one-half on 
 the four-wheeled truck. It also extended the wheel-base, making 
 the engine much steadier and less damaging to the track. Mr. 
 William Norris, who had established a locomotive works in 
 Philadelphia in 1832, was at this time building a six-wheeled 
 engine with a truck in front and the driving-wheels placed in 
 front of the fire-box. Considerable rivalry naturally existed 
 between the two manufacturers as to the comparative merits of 
 their respective plans. In Mr. Norris's engine, the position of 
 the driving-axle in front of the fire-box threw on it more of the 
 
20 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 weight of the engine, and thus increased the adhesion and the 
 tractive power. Mr. Baldwin, however, maintained the superiority 
 of his plan, as giving a better distribution of the weight and a 
 longer wheel-base, and consequently rendering the machine less 
 destructive to the track. As the iron rails then in use were gen- 
 erally light, and much of the track was of wood, this feature 
 was of some importance. 
 
 To the use of the ground joint for steam-pipes, however, much 
 of the success of his early engines was due. The English 
 builders were making locomotives with canvas and red-lead 
 joints, permitting a steam pressure of only sixty pounds per inch 
 to be carried, while Mr. Baldwin's machines were worked at one 
 hundred and twenty pounds with ease. Several locomotives 
 imported from England at about this period by the Common- 
 wealth of Pennsylvania for the State Road (three of which were 
 made by Stephenson) had canvas and red-lead joints, and their 
 efficiency was so much less than that of the Baldwin engines, on 
 account of this and other features of construction, that they 
 were soon laid aside or sold. 
 
 In June, 1834, a patent was issued to Mr. E. L. Miller, by whom 
 Mr. Baldwin's second engine was ordered, for a method of in- 
 creasing the adhesion of a locomotive by throwing a part of the 
 weight of the tender on the rear of the engine, thus increasing 
 the weight on the drivers. Mr. Baldwin adopted this device 
 on an engine built for the Philadelphia and Trenton Railroad 
 Company, May, 1835, and thereafter used it largely, paying one 
 hundred dollars royalty for each engine. Eventually (May 6, 
 1839) he bought the patent for nine thousand dollars, evidently 
 considering that the device was especially valuable, if not indis- 
 pensable, in order to render his engine as powerful, when required, 
 as other patterns having the driving-wheels in front of the fire- 
 box, and therefore utilizing more of the weight of the engine for 
 adhesion. 
 
 In making the truck and tender-wheels of these early locomo- 
 tives, the hubs were cast in three pieces and afterward banded 
 with wrought iron, the interstices being filled with spelter. This 
 method of construction was adopted on account of the difficulty 
 then found in casting a chilled wheel in one solid piece. 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 21 
 
 Early in 1835, the new shop on Broad Street was completed 
 and occupied. Mr. Baldwin's attention was thenceforward given 
 to locomotive building exclusively, except that a stationary 
 engine was occasionally constructed. 
 
 In May, 1835, his eleventh locomotive, the "Black Hawk,'' 
 was delivered to the Philadelphia and Trenton Railroad Company. 
 This was the first outside- connected engine of his build. It was 
 also the first engine on which the Miller device of attaching part 
 of the weight of the tender to the engine was employed. On 
 the eighteenth engine, the " Brandywine," built for the Philadel- 
 phia and Columbia Railroad Company, brass tires were used on 
 the driving-wheels, for the purpose of obtaining more adhesion; 
 but they wore out rapidly and were replaced with iron. 
 
 April 3, 1835, Mr. Baldwin took out a patent for certain im- 
 provements in the wheels and tubes of locomotive engines. That 
 relating to the wheels provided for casting the hub and spokes 
 together, and having the spokes terminate in segments of a rim, 
 as described in his patent of September 10, 1834. Between the 
 ends of the spokes and the tires wood was interposed, and the 
 tire might be either of wrought-iron or of chilled cast-iron. The 
 intention was expressed of making the tire usually of cast-iron 
 chilled. The main object, however, was declared to be the inter- 
 position between the spokes and the rim of a layer of wood or 
 other substance possessing some degree of elasticity. This 
 method of making driving-wheels was followed for several years, 
 the tires being made with a shoulder. See illustration on page 
 22. 
 
 The improvement in locomotive tubes consisted in driving a 
 copper ferrule or thimble on the outside of the end of the tube, 
 and soldering it in place, instead of driving a ferrule into the 
 tube, as had previously been the practice. The object of the 
 latter method had been to make a tight joint with the tube-sheet ; 
 but by putting the ferrule on the outside of the tube, not only 
 was the joint made as tight as before, but the tube was 
 strengthened, and left unobstructed throughout to the full extent 
 of its diameter. This method of setting flues has been generally 
 followed in the works from that date to the present, the only 
 difference being that, at this time, with iron tubes, the end is 
 
22 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 swedged down, the copper ferrule brazed on, and the iron end 
 turned or riveted over against the copper thimble and the flue- 
 sheet, to make the joint perfect. 
 
 Driving-Wheels, Patented Septe 
 
 Fourteen engines were constructed in 1835; forty in 1836; 
 forty in 1837; twenty-three in 1838; twenty-six in 1839; and 
 nine in 1840. During all these years the general design con- 
 tinued the same ; but, in compliance with the demand for more 
 power, three sizes were furnished, as follows : 
 
 First class. Cylinders, 12J X "6; weight, loaded, 26,000 pounds. 
 Second class. " 12 X '6; " 
 
 Third class. " loj X 16; " 
 
 23,000 
 20,000 
 
 The first-class engine he fully believed, in 1838, was as heavy 
 as would be called for, and he declared that it was as large as he 
 intended to make. Most of the engines were built with the half- 
 crank, but occasionally an outside-connected machine was turned 
 out. These latter, however, failed to give as complete satisfac- 
 tion as the half-crank machine. The drivers were generally four 
 and a half feet in diameter. 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 23 
 
 A patent was issued to Mr. Baldwin, August 17, 1835, for his 
 device of cylindrical pedestals. In this method of construction, 
 the pedestal was of cast-iron, and was bored in a lathe so as to 
 form two concave jaws. The boxes were also turned in a lathe 
 so that their vertical ends were cylindrical, and they were thus 
 fitted in the pedestals. This method of fitting up pedestals and 
 boxes was cheap and effective, and was used for some years for 
 the driving and tender wheels. 
 
 As showing the estimation in which these early engines were 
 held, it may not be out of place to refer to the opinions of some 
 of the railroad managers of that period. 
 
 Mr. L. A. Sykes, engineer of the New Jersey Transportation 
 Company, under date of June 12, 1838, wrote that he could draw 
 with his engines twenty four-wheeled cars with twenty-six passen- 
 gers each, at a speed of twenty to twenty-five miles per hour, 
 over grades of twenty-six feet per mile. " As to simplicity of 
 construction," he adds, " small liability to get out of order, 
 economy of repairs, and ease to the road, I fully believe Mr. 
 Baldwin's engines stand unrivaled. I consider the simplicity of 
 the engine, the arrangement of the working parts, and the distri- 
 bution of the weight, far superior to any engine I have ever seen, 
 either of American or English manufacture, and I have not the 
 least hesitation in saying that Mr. Baldwin's engine will do the 
 same amount of work with much less repairs, either to the engine 
 or the track, than. any other engine in use." 
 
 L. G. Cannon, President of the Rensselaer and Saratoga Rail- 
 road Company, writes : " Your engines will, in performance and 
 cost of repairs, bear comparison with any other engine made in 
 this or any other country.'' 
 
 Some of Mr. Baldwin's engines on the State Road, in 1837, 
 cost, for repairs, only from one and two-tenths to one and six- 
 tenths cents per mile. It is noted that the engine " West 
 Chester," on the same road, weighing twenty thousand seven 
 hundred and thirty-five pounds (ten thousand four hundred and 
 seventy-five on drivers), drew fifty-one cars (four-wheeled), weigh- 
 ing two hundred and eighty-nine net tons, over the road, some of 
 the track being of wood covered with strap-rail. 
 
 The financial difficulties of 1836 and 1837, which brought 
 
24 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 ruin upon so many, did not leave Mr. Baldwin unscathed. His 
 embarrassments became so great that he was unable to proceed, 
 and was forced to call his creditors together for a settlement. 
 After offering to surrender all his property, his shop, tools, house, 
 and everything, if they so desired, — all of which would realize 
 only about twenty-five per cent, of their claims, — he proposed to 
 them that they should permit him to go on with the business, 
 and in three years he would pay the full amount of all claims, 
 principal and interest. This was finally acceded to, and the 
 promise was in effect fulfilled, although not without an extension 
 of two years beyond the time originally proposed. 
 
 In May, 1837, the number of hands employed was three 
 hundred, but this number was reducing weekly, owing to the 
 falling off in the demand for engines. 
 
 These financial troubles had their effect on the demand for 
 locomotives, as will be seen in the decrea.se in the number built 
 in 1838, 1839, and 1840; and this result was furthered by the 
 establishment of several other locomotive works and the intro- 
 duction of other patterns of engines. 
 
 The changes and improvements in details made during these 
 years may be summed up as follows : 
 
 The subject of burning anthracite coal had engaged much 
 attention. In October, 1836, Mr. Baldwin secured a patent for 
 a grate or fireplace which could be detached from the engine at 
 pleasure, and a new one with a fresh coal fire substituted. The 
 intention was to have the grate with freshly ignited coal all ready 
 for the engine on its arrival at a station, and placed between the 
 rails over suitable levers, by which it could be attached quickly 
 to the fire-box. It is needless to say that this was never prac- 
 tised. In January, 1838, however, Mr. Baldwin was experimenting 
 with the consumption of coal on the German'town road, and in 
 July of the same year the records show that he was making a 
 locomotive to burn coal, part of the arrangement being to blow 
 the fire with a fan. 
 
 Up to 1838, Mr. Baldwin had made both driving and truck 
 wheels with wrought tires, but during that year chilled wheels 
 for engine and tender trucks were adopted. His tires were 
 furnished by Messrs. S. Vail & Son, Morristown, N. J., who 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 25 
 
 made the only tires then obtainable in America. They were 
 very thin, being only one inch to one and a half inches thick ; 
 and Mr. Baldwin, in importing some tires from England at that 
 time, insisted on their being made double the ordinary thickness. 
 The manufacturers at first objected and ridiculed the idea, the 
 practice being to use two tires when extra thickness was wanted, 
 but finally they consented to meet his requirements. 
 
 All his engines thus far had the single eccentric for each valve, 
 but at about this period double eccentrics were adopted, each 
 terminating in a straight hook, and reversed by hand-levers. 
 
 At this early period, Mr. Baldwin had begun to feel the 
 necessity of making all like parts of locomotives of the same 
 class in such manner as to be absolutely interchangeable. Steps 
 were taken in this direction, but it was not until many years 
 afterward that the system of standard gauges was perfected, 
 which has since grown to be a distinguishing feature in the 
 establishment. 
 
 In March, 1839, Mr. Baldwin's records show that he was 
 building a number of outside-connected engines, and had suc- 
 ceeded in making them strong and durable. He was also making 
 a new chilled wheel, and one which he thought would not break. 
 
 On the one hundred and thirty-sixth locomotive, completed 
 October 18, 1839, fo'' the Philadelphia, Germantown and Norris- 
 town Railroad, the old pattern of wooden frame was abandoned, 
 and no outside frame whatever was employed, — the machinery, as 
 well as the truck and the pedestals of the driving-axles, being 
 attached directly to the naked boiler. The wooden frame thence- 
 forward disappeared gradually, and an iron frame took its place. 
 Another innovation was the adoption of eight-wheeled tenders, 
 the first of which was built at about this period. 
 
 April 8, 1839, Mr. Baldwin associated with himself Messrs. 
 Vail & Hufty, and the business was conducted under the firm 
 name of Baldwin, Vail & Hufty until 1841, when Mr. Hufty 
 withdrew, and Baldwin & Vail continued the copartnership until 
 1842. 
 
 The time had now arrived when the increase of business on 
 railroads demanded more powerful locomotives. It had for some 
 years been felt that for freight traffic the engine with one pair of 
 
26 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 drivers was insufficient. Mr. Baldwin's engine had the single 
 pair of drivers placed back of the fire-box ; that made by Mr. 
 Norris, one pair in front of the fire-box. An engine with two 
 pairs of drivers, one pair in front and one pair behind the fire-box, 
 was the next logical step, and Mr. Henry R. Campbell, of Phila- 
 delphia, was the first to carry this design into execution. ' Mr. 
 Campbell, as has been noted, was the Chief Engineer of the 
 Germantown Railroad when the " Ironsides" was placed on that 
 line, and had since given much attention to the subject of loco- 
 motive construction. February 5, 1836, Mr. Campbell secured a 
 patent for an eight-wheeled engine with four drivers connected, 
 and a four-wheeled truck in front ; and subsequently contracted 
 with James Brooks, of Philadelphia, to build for him such a 
 machine. The work was begun March 16, 1836, and the engine 
 was completed May 8, 1837. This was the first eight-wheeled 
 engine of this type, and from it the standard American locomotive 
 of to-day takes its origin. The engine lacked, however, one 
 essential feature; there were no equalizing beams between the 
 drivers, and nothing but the ordinary steel springs over each 
 journal of the driving-axles to equalize the weight upon them. 
 It remained for Messrs. Eastwick & Harrison to supply this 
 deficiency; and in 1837 that firm constructed at their shop in 
 Philadelphia a locomotive on this plan, but with the driving-axles 
 running in a separate square frame, connected to the main frame 
 above it by a single central bearing on each side. This engine 
 had cylinders twelve by eighteen, four coupled driving-wheels, 
 forty-four inches in diameter, carrying eight of the twelve tons 
 constituting the total weight. Subsequently, Mr. Joseph Harri- 
 son, Jr., of the same firm, substituted "equalizing beams" on 
 engines of this plan afterward constructed by them, substantially 
 in the same manner as since generally employed. 
 
 In the American Railroad Journal of July 30, 1836, a woodcut 
 showing Mr. Campbell's engine, together with an elaborate cal- 
 culation of the effective power of an engine on this plan, by 
 William J. Lewis, Esq., Civil Engineer, was published, with a 
 table showing its performance upon grades ranging from a dead 
 le\'el to a rise of one hundred feet per mile. Mr. Campbell 
 stated that his experience at that time (1835-36) convinced him 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 2"] 
 
 that grades of one hundred feet rise per mile would, if roads 
 were judiciously located, carry railroads over any of the moun- 
 tain passes in America, without the use of planes with stationary 
 steam power, or, as a general rule, of costly tunnels, — an opinion 
 very extensively verified by the experience of the country since 
 that date. 
 
 A step had thus been taken toward a plan of locomotive 
 having more adhesive power. Mr. Baldwin, however, was slow 
 to adopt the new design. He naturally regarded innovations 
 with distrust. He had done much to perfect the old pattern of 
 engine, and had built over a hundred of them, which were in 
 successful operation on various railroads. Many of the details 
 were the subjects of his several patents, and had been greatly 
 simplified in his practice. In fact, simplicity in all the working 
 parts had been so largely his aim, that it was natural that he 
 should distrust any plan involving additional machinery, and he 
 regarded the new design as only an experiment at best. In 
 November, 1838, he wrote to a correspondent that he did not 
 think there was any advantage in the eight-wheeled engine. 
 There being three points in contact, it could not turn a curve, 
 he argued, without slipping one or the other pair of wheels 
 sidewajj-s. Another objection was in the multiplicity of machinery 
 and the difficulty in maintaining four driving-wheels all of ex- 
 actly the same size. Some means, however, of getting more 
 adhesion must be had, and the result of his reflections upon 
 this subject was the project of a " geared engine." In August, 
 1839, he took steps to secure a patent for such a machine, and 
 December 31, 1840, letters patent were granted him for the 
 device. In this engine, an independent shaft or axle was placed 
 between the two axles of the truck, and connected by cranks 
 and coupling-rods with cranks on the outside of the driving- 
 wheels. This shaft had a central cog-wheel engaging on each 
 side with intermediate cog-wheels, which in turn geared into 
 cog-wheels on each truck-axle. The intermediate cog-wheels 
 had wide teeth, so that the truck could pivot while the main 
 shaft remained parallel with the driving-axle. The diameters 
 of the cog-wheels were, of course, in such proportion to the 
 driving- and truck-wheels that the latter should revolve as 
 
28 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 much oftener than the drivers as their smaller size might require. 
 Of the success of this machine for freight service, Mr. Baldwin 
 was very sanguine. One was put in hand at once, completed in 
 August, 1 841, and eventually sold to the Sugarloaf Coal Com- 
 pany. It was an outside-connected engine, weighing thirty thou- 
 sand pounds, of which eleven thousand seven hundred and seventy- 
 five pounds were on the drivers, and eighteen thousand three 
 hundred and thirty-five on the truck. The driving-wheels were 
 forty-four and the truck-wheels thirt)'-three inches in diameter. 
 The cylinders were thirteen inches in diameter by sixteen inches 
 stroke. On a trial of the engine upon the Philadelphia and 
 Reading Railroad, it hauled five hundred and ninety tons from 
 Reading to Philadelphia — a distance of fifty-four miles — in five 
 hours and twenty-two minutes. The Superintendent of the 
 road, in writing of the trial, remarked that this train was un- 
 precedented in length and weight both in America and Europe. 
 The performance was noticed in favorable terms by the Phila- 
 delphia newspapers, and was made the subject of a report by the 
 Committee on Science and Arts of the Franklin Institute, who 
 strongly recommended this plan of engine for freight service. 
 The success of the trial led Mr. Baldwin at first to believe that 
 the geared engine would be generally adopted for freight traffic; 
 but in this he was disappointed. No farther demand was made 
 for such machines, and no more of them were built. 
 
 In 1840, Mr. Baldwin received an order, through August 
 Belmont, Esq., of New York, for a locomotive for Austria, and 
 had nearly completed one which was calculated to do the work 
 required, when he learned that only sixt)- pounds pressure of 
 steam was admissible, whereas his engine was designed to use 
 steam at one hundred pounds and over. He accordingly con- 
 structed another, meeting this lequirement, and shipped it in the 
 following year. This engine, it may be noted, had a kind of 
 link-motion, agreeably to the specification received, and was the 
 first of his make upon which the link was introduced. 
 
 Mr. Baldwin's patent of December 31, 1840, already referred 
 to as covering his geared engine, embraced several other de\'ices, 
 as follows : 
 
 I. A method of operating a fan, or blowing-wheel, for the 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 29 
 
 purpose of blowing the fire. The fan was to be placed under 
 the footboard, and driven by the friction of a grooved pulley in 
 contact with the flange of the driving-wheel. 
 
 2. The substitution of a metallic stufifing, consisting of wire, 
 for the hemp, wool or other material which had been employed 
 in stuffing-boxes. 
 
 3. The placing of the springs of the engine truck so as to 
 obviate the evil of the locking of the wheels when the truck- 
 frame vibrates from the centre-pin vertically. Spiral as well as 
 semi- elliptic springs, placed at each end of the truck-frame, were 
 specified. The spiral spring is described as received in two cups, 
 — one above and one below. The cups were connected together 
 at their centres, by a pin upon one and a socket in the other, so 
 that the cups could approach toward or recede from each other 
 and still preserve their parallelism. 
 
 4. An improvement in the manner of constructing the iron 
 frames of locomotives, by making the pedestals in one piece 
 with, and constituting part of, the frames. 
 
 5. The employment of spiral springs in connection with cylin- 
 drical pedestals and boxes. A single spiral was at first used, but 
 not proving sufficiently strong, a combination or nest of spirals 
 curving alternately in opposite directions was afterward em- 
 ployed. Each spiral had its bearing in a spiral recess in the 
 pedestal. 
 
 In the specification of this patent a change in the method of 
 making cylindrical pedestals and boxes is noted. Instead of 
 boring and turning them in a lathe, they were cast to the re- 
 quired shape in chills. This method of construction was used 
 for a time, but eventually a return was made to the original plan, 
 as giving a more accurate job. 
 
 In 1842, Mr. Baldwin constructed, under an arrangement with 
 Mr. Ross Winans, three locomotives for the Western Railroad 
 of Massachusetts, on a plan which had been designed by that 
 gentlemain for freight traffic. These machines had upright 
 boilers, and horizontal cylinders which worked cranks on a shaft 
 bearing cog-wheels engaging with other cog-wheels on an inter- 
 mediate shaft. This latter shaft had cranks coupled to four 
 driving-wheels on each side. These engines were constructed 
 
30 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 to burn anthracite coal. Their pecuharly uncouth appearance 
 earned for them the name of " crabs," and they were but short 
 hved in service. 
 
 But to return to the progress of Mr. Baldwin's locomotive 
 practice. The geared engine had not proved a success. It was 
 unsatisfactory, as well to its designer as to the railroad com- 
 
 Baldwin Six-Whehls-Connected Engine, i: 
 
 munity. The problem of utilizing more or all of the weight of 
 the engine for adhesion remained, in Mr. Baldwin's view, yet to 
 be solved. The plan of coupling four or six wheels had long 
 
 Baldwin Flexible-Beam Truck, 1842.— Elevation. 
 
 before been adopted in England, but on the short curves prevalent 
 on American railroads he felt that something more was necessary. 
 The wheels must not only be coupled, but at the same time must 
 be free to adapt themselves to a curve. These two conditions 
 were apparently incompatible, and to reconcile these incon- 
 sistencies was the task which Mr. Baldwin set himself to accom- 
 plish. He undertook it, too, at a time when his business had 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 3 1 
 
 fallen off greatly and he was involved in the most serious financial 
 embarrassments. The problem was constantly before him, and 
 at length, during a sleepless night, its solution flashed across his 
 mind. The plan so long sought for, and which, subsequently, 
 
 Half Plan. 
 
 more than any other of his improvements or inventions, con- 
 tributed to the foundation of his fortune, was his well-known 
 six-wheels-connected locomotive with the four front drivers com- 
 bined in a flexible truck. For this machine Mr. Baldwin secured 
 a patent, August 25, 1842. Its principal characteristic features 
 are now matters of history, but they deserve here a brief mention. 
 The engine was on six wheels, all connected as drivers. The 
 rear wheels were placed rigidly in the frames, usually behind the 
 fire-box, with inside bearings. The cylinders were inclined, and 
 with outside connections. The four remaining wheels had inside 
 journals running in boxes held by two wide and deep wrought- 
 iron beams, one on each side. These beams were unconnected, 
 and entirely independent of each other. The pedestals formed 
 in them were bored out cylindrically, and into them cylindrical 
 boxes, as patented by him in 1835, were fitted. The engine frame 
 on each side was directly over the beam, and a spherical pin, 
 running down from the frame, bore in a socket in the beam mid- 
 way between the two axles. It will thus be seen that each side- 
 beam independently could turn horizontally or vertically under 
 the spherical pin, and the cylindrical boxes could also turn in the 
 pedestals. Hence, in passing a curve, the middle pair of drivers 
 could move laterally in one direction — say to the right — while 
 the front pair could move in the opposite direction, or to the left ; 
 the two axles all the while remaining parallel to each other and 
 to the rear driving-axle. The operation of these beams was, 
 therefore, like that of the parallel-ruler. On a straight line the 
 
HISTORY OF THE 
 
 two beams and the two axles formed a rectangle; on curves, a 
 parallelogram, the angles varying with the degree of curvature. 
 The coupling-rods were made with cylindrical brasses, thus 
 forming ball-and-socket joints, to enable them to accommodate 
 themselves to the lateral movements of the wheels. Colburn, in 
 his " Locomotive Engineering," remarks of this arrangement of 
 rods as follows : 
 
 " Geometrically, no doubt, this combination of wheels could only work properly 
 around curves by a lengthening and shortening of the rods which served to couple 
 the principal pair of driving-wheels with the hind truck-wheels. But if the 
 coupling-rods from the principal pair of driving-wheels be five feet long, and if the 
 beams of the truck-frame be four feet long (the radius of curve described by the 
 axle-boxes around the spherical side bearings being two feet), then the total corre- 
 sponding lengthening of the coupling-rods, in order to allow the hind truck-wheels 
 to move one inch to one side, and the front wheels of the tr uck one in ch to the other 
 side, of their normal position on a straight line, would be V 60^ -|- i' — 60 -}- 24 — 
 V 24= — 1= = 0.0275 inch, or less than one thirty-second of an inch. And if only 
 one pair of driving wheels were thus coupled with a four-wheeled truck, the total 
 wheel-base being nine feet, the motion permitted by this slight elongation of the 
 coupling rods (an elongation provided for by a trifling slackness in the brasses) would 
 enable three pairs of wheels to stand without binding in a curve of only one hundred 
 feet radius." 
 
 The first engine of the new plan was finished early in December, 
 1842, being one of fourteen engines constructed in that year, and 
 was sent to the Georgia Railroad, on the order of Mr. J. Edgar 
 Thomson, then Chief Engineer and Superintendent of that line. 
 It weighed twelve tons, and drew, besides its own weight, two 
 hundred and fifty tons up a grade of thirty-six feet to the mile. 
 
 Other orders soon followed. The new machine was received 
 generally with great favor. The loads hauled by it exceeded 
 anything so far known in American railroad practice, and saga- 
 cious managers hailed it as a means of largely reducing operating 
 expenses. On the Central Railroad of Georgia, one of these 
 twelve-ton engines drew nineteen eight-wheeled cars, with seven 
 hundred and fifty bales of cotton, each bale weighing four hundred 
 and fifty pounds, over maximum grades of thirty feet per mile, 
 and the manager of the road declared that it could readily take 
 one thousand bales. On the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad 
 a similar engine of eighteen tons weight drew one hundred and 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 33 
 
 fifty loaded cars (total weight of cars and lading, one thousand 
 one hundred and thirty tons) from Schuylkill Haven to Phila- 
 delphia, at a speed of seven miles per hour. The regular load 
 was one hundred loaded cars, which were hauled at a speed of 
 from twelve to fifteen miles per hour on a level. 
 
 The following extract from a letter, dated August lo, 1844, of 
 Mr. G. A. Nicolls, then superintendent of that Hne, gives the 
 particulars of the performance of these machines, and shows the 
 estimation in which they were held : 
 
 " We have had two of these engines in operation for about four weeks. Each 
 engine weighs about forty thousand pounds with water and fuel, equally distributed 
 on six wheels, all of which are coupled, thus gaining the whole adhesion of the 
 engine's weight. Their cylinders are fifteen by eighteen inches, 
 
 " The daily allotted load of each of these engines is one hundred coal cars, each 
 loaded with three and six-tenths tons of coal, and weighing two and fifteen one- 
 hundredths tons each, empty ; making a net weight of three hundred and sixty tons 
 of coal carried, and a gross weight of train of five hundred and seventy-five tons, 
 all of two thousand two hundred and forty pounds. 
 
 " This train is hauled over the ninety-four miles of the road, half of which is 
 level, at the rate of twelve miles per hour ; and with it the engine is able to make 
 fourteen to fifteen miles per hour on a level. 
 
 " Were all the cars on the road of sufficient strength, and making the trip by day- 
 light, nearly one-half being now performed at night, I have no doubt of these 
 engines being quite equal to a load of eight hundred tons gross, as their average 
 daily performance on any of the levels of our road, some of which are eight miles 
 long. 
 
 " In strength of make, quality of workmanship, finish, and proportion of parts, 
 I consider them equal to any, and superior to most, freight engines I have seen. 
 They are remarkably easy on the rail, either in their vertical or horizontal action, 
 from the equalization of their weight, and the improved truck under the forward part 
 of the engine. This latter adapts itself to all the curves of the road, including some 
 of seven hundred and sixteen feet radius in the main track, and moves with great 
 ea'^e around our turning Y curves at Richmond, of about three hundred feet radius. 
 
 " I consider these engines as near perfection, in the arrangement of their parts, 
 and their general efficiency, as the present improvements in machinery and the 
 locomotive engine will admit of. They are saving us thirty per cent, in every trip on 
 the former cost of motive or engine power." 
 
 But the flexible-beam truck also enabled Mr. Baldwin to meet 
 the demand for an engine with four drivers connected. Other 
 builders were making engines with four drivers and a four- 
 wheeled truck, of the present American standard type. To 
 compete with this design, Mr. Baldwin modified his six-wheels- 
 
 3 
 
34 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 connected engine by connecting only two out of the three pairs 
 of wheels as drivers, making the forward wheels of smaller 
 diameter as leading wheels, but combining them with the front 
 drivers in a flexible-beam truck. The first engine on this plan 
 was sent to the Erie and Kalamazoo Railroad, in October, 1843, 
 and gave great satisfaction. The superintendent of the road was 
 enthusiastic in its praise, and wrote to Mr. Baldwin that he 
 doubted "if anything could be got up which would answer the 
 business of the road so well." One was also sent to the Utica 
 and Schenectady Railroad a few weeks later, of which the super- 
 intendent remarked that " it worked beautifully, and there were 
 not wagons enough to give it a full load." In this plan the lead- 
 ing wheels were usually made thirty-six and the drivers fifty-four 
 inches in diameter. 
 
 This machine of course came in competition with the eight- 
 wheeled engine having four drivers, and Mr. Baldwin claimed for 
 his plan a decided superiority. In each case about two-thirds of 
 the total weight was carried on the four drivers, and Mr. Baldwin 
 maintained that his engine, having only six instead of eight 
 wheels, was simpler and more effective. 
 
 At about this period Mr. Baldwin's attention was called by- 
 Mr. Levi Bissell to an " Air-Spring" which the latter had devised, 
 and which it was imagined was destined to be a cheap, effective, 
 and perpetual spring. The device consisted of a small cylinder 
 placed above the frame over the axle-box, and having a piston 
 fitted air-tight into it. The piston-rod was to bear on the axle- 
 box, and the proper quantity of air was to be pumped into the 
 cylinder above the piston, and the cylinder then hermetically 
 closed. The piston had a leather packing which was to be kept 
 moist by some fluid (molasses was proposed) previously intro- 
 duced into the cylinder. Mr. Baldwin at first proposed to 
 equalize the weight between two pairs of drivers by connecting 
 two air-springs on each side by a pipe, the use of an equalizing 
 beam being covered by Messrs. Eastwick & Harrison's patent. 
 The air-springs were found, however, not to work practically, 
 and were never applied. It ma)- be added that a model of an 
 equalizing air-spring was exhibited by Mr. Joseph Harrison, Jr., 
 at the Franklin Institute, in 1838 or 1839. 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 35 
 
 With the introduction of the new machine, business beean at 
 once to revive, and the tide of prosperity turned once more in 
 Mr. Baldwin's favor. Twelve engines were constructed in 1843, 
 all but four of them of the new pattern ; twenty-two engines in 
 1844, all of the new pattern; and twenty-seven in 1845. Three 
 of this number were of the old type, with one pair of drivers, 
 but from that time forward the old pattern with the single pair of 
 drivers disappeared from the practice of the establishment, save 
 occasionally for exceptional purposes. 
 
 In 1842, the partnership with Mr. Vail was dissolved, and Mr. 
 Asa Whitney, who had been superintendent of the Mohawk and 
 Hudson Railroad, became a partner with Mr. Baldwin, and the 
 firm continued as Baldwin & Whitney until 1846, when the latter 
 withdrew to engage in the manufacture of car-wheels, establish- 
 ing the firm of A. Whitney & Sons, Philadelphia. 
 
 Mr. Whitney brought to the firm a railroad experience and 
 thorough business talent. He introduced a system in many 
 details of the management of the business, which Mr. Baldwin, 
 whose mind was devoted more exclusively to mechanical sub- 
 jects, had failed to establish or wholly ignored. The method at 
 present in use in the establishment, of giving to each class of 
 locomotives a distinctive designation, composed of a number and 
 a letter, originated very shortly after Mr. Whitney's connection 
 with the business. For the purpose of representing the different 
 designs, sheets with engravings of locomotives were employed. 
 The sheet showing the engine with one pair, of drivers was 
 marked B ; that with two pairs, C ; that with three, D ; and that 
 with four, E. Taking its rise from this circumstance, it became 
 customary to designate as B engines those with one pair of 
 drivers ; as C engines, those with two pairs ; as D engines, those 
 with three pairs ; and as E engines, those with four pairs. 
 Shortly afterward, a number, indicating the weight in gross tons, 
 was added. Thus, the 12 D engine was one with three pairs of 
 drivers, and weighing twelve tons; the 12 C, an engine of same 
 weight, but with only four wheels connected. A modification of 
 this method of designating the several plans and sizes is still in 
 use, and is explained elsewhere. 
 
 It will be obser\'ed that the classification as thus established 
 
36 , HISTORY OF THE 
 
 began with the B engines. The letter A was reserved for an 
 engine intended to run at very high speeds, and so designed that 
 the driving-wheels should make two revolutions for each recip- 
 rocation of the pistons. This was to be accomplished by means 
 of gearing. The general plan of the engine was determined in 
 Mr. Baldwin's mind, but was never carried into execution. 
 
 The adoption of the plan of six-wheels-connected engines 
 opened the way at once to increasing their size. The weight 
 being almost evenly distributed on six points, heavier machines 
 were admissible, the weight on any one pair of drivers being 
 little, if any, greater than had been the practice with the old 
 plan of engine having a single pair of drivers. Hence engines 
 of eighteen and twenty tons weight were shortly introduced, and 
 in 1844 three of twenty tons weight, with cylinders sixteen and 
 one-half inches diameter by eighteen inches stroke, were con- 
 structed for the Western '-Railroad of Massachusetts, and six of 
 eighteen tons weight, with cylinders fifteen by eighteen, and 
 drivers forty-six inches in diameter, were built for the Philadel- 
 phia and Reading Railroad. It should be noted that three of 
 these latter engines had iron flues. This was the first instance 
 in which Mr. Baldwin had employed tubes of this material, 
 although they had been previously used by others. Lap-welded 
 iron flues were made by Morris, Tasker & Co., of Philadelphia, 
 about 1838, and but-welded iron tubes had previously been made 
 by the same firm. Ross Winans, of Baltimore, had also made 
 iron tubes by hand for locomotives of his manufacture before 
 1838. The advantage found to result from the use of iron tubes, 
 apart from their less cost, was that the tubes and boiler-shell, 
 being of the same material, expanded and contracted alike, while 
 in the case of copper tubes the expansion of the metal by heat 
 varied from that of the boiler-shell, and as a consequence there 
 was greater liability to leakage at the joints with the tube-sheets. 
 The opinion prevailed largely at that time that some advantage 
 resulted in the evaporation of water, owing to the superiority of 
 copper as a conductor of heat. To determine this question, an 
 experiment was tried with two of the six engines referred to 
 above, one of which, the " Ontario," had copper flues, and 
 another, the " New England," iron flues. In other respects they 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 37 
 
 were precisely alike. The two engines were run from Richmond 
 to Mount Carbon, August 27, 1844, each drawing a train of one 
 hundred and one empty cars, and, returning, from Mount Carbon 
 to Richmond, on the following day, each with one hundred 
 loaded cars. The quantity of water evaporated and wood con- 
 sumed was noted, with the result shown in the following table : 
 
 Up Trip, Aug. 27, 1844. 
 
 ' Ontario." 
 (Copper 
 Flues.) 
 
 " New 
 England." 
 (Iron Flues.) 
 
 Down Trip, Aug. 28, 18 
 
 ' Ontario." 
 (Copper 
 Flues.) 
 
 " New 
 
 England." 
 
 (Iron Flues.) 
 
 Time, running 
 
 " standing at stations . . 
 Cords of wood burned . . 
 Cubic feet of water evaporated 
 Ratio, cubic feet of water to a 
 
 cord of wood 
 
 9h. 
 4h. 
 
 7m. 
 2m. 
 68 
 925-75 
 
 138-57 
 
 7h. 41m. 
 3h. 7m. 
 
 5 -50 
 757.26 
 
 137.68 
 
 loh. 44m. 
 2h. 12m. 
 
 6-94 
 837-46 
 
 120.67 
 
 8h. igni. 
 
 3h. 8m. 
 
 6. 
 
 656.39 
 
 109.39 
 
 The conditions of the experiments not being absolutely the 
 same in each case, the results could not of course be accepted 
 as entirely accurate. They seemed to show, however, no con- 
 siderable difference in the evaporative efficacy of copper and iron 
 tubes. 
 
 The period under consideration was marked also by the intro- 
 duction of the French & Baird stack, which proved at once to 
 be one of the most successful spark-arresters thus far employed, 
 and which was for years used almost exclusively wherever, as 
 on the cotton-carrying railroads of the South, a thoroughly 
 effective spark-arrester was required. This stack was intro- 
 duced by Mr. Baird, then a foreman in the works, who purchased 
 the patent-right of what had been known as the Grimes stack, 
 and combined with it some of the features of the stack made 
 by Mr. Richard French, then Master Mechanic of the German- 
 town Railroad, together with certain improvements of his own. 
 The cone over the straight inside pipe was made with volute 
 flanges on its under side, which gave a rotary motion to the 
 sparks. Around the cone was a casing about six inches smaller 
 in diameter than the outside stack. Apertures were cut in the 
 
HISTORY OF THE 
 
 sides of this casing, through which the sparks in their rotary 
 motion were discharged, and thus fell to the bottom of the space 
 between the straight inside pipe and the outside stack. The 
 opening in the top of the stack was fitted with a series of V- 
 shaped iron circles perforated with numerous holes, thus present- 
 ing an enlarged area, through which the smoke escaped. The 
 patent right for this stack was subsequently sold to Messrs. 
 Radley & Hunter, and its essential principle is still used in the 
 Radley & Hunter stack as at present made. 
 
 In 1845, Mr. Baldwin built three locomotives for the Royal 
 Railroad Company of Wiirtemberg. They were of fifteen tons 
 weight, on six wheels, four of them being sixty inches in diameter 
 and coupled. The front drivers were combined by the flexible 
 beams into a truck with the smaller leading wheels. The cylin- 
 ders were inclined and outside, and the connecting-rods took hold 
 of a half-crank axle back of the fire-box. It was specified that 
 these engines should have the link-motion which had shortly 
 before been introduced in England by the Stephensons. Mr. 
 Baldwin accordingly applied a link of a peculiar character to 
 suit his own ideas of the device. The link was made solid, and 
 of a truncated V-section, and the block was grooved so as to fit 
 and sHde on the outside of the link. 
 
 During the year 1845 another important feature in locomotive 
 construction — the cut-off valve — was added to Mr. Baldwin's 
 practice. Up to that time the valve-motion had been the two 
 eccentrics, with the single flat hook for each cylinder. Since 
 1841, Mr. Baldwin had contemplated the addition of some device 
 allowing the steam to be used expansively, and he now added 
 the " half-stroke cut-off." In this device the steam-chest was 
 separated by a horizontal plate into an upper and a lower com- 
 partment. In the upper compartment, a valve, worked by a 
 separate eccentric, and having a single opening, admitted steam 
 through a port in this plate to the lower steam-chamber. The 
 valve-rod of the upper valve terminated in a notch or hook, 
 which engaged with the upper arm of its rock-shaft. When 
 thus working, it acted as a cut-off at a fixed part of the stroke, 
 determined by the setting of the eccentric. This was usually at 
 half the stroke. When it was desired to dispense with the cut- 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 39 
 
 off and work steam for the full stroke, the hook of the valve-rod 
 was lifted from the pin on the upper arm of the rock-shaft by a 
 lever worked from the footboard, and the valve-rod was held in 
 a notched rest fastened to the side of the boiler. This left the 
 opening through the upper valve and the port in the partition 
 plate open for the free passage of steam throughout the whole 
 stroke. The first application of the half-stroke cut-off was made 
 on the engine " Champlain" (20 D), built for the Philadelphia and 
 Reading Railroad Company, in 1845. It at once became the 
 practice to apply the cut-off on all passenger engines, while the 
 six- and eight-wheels-connected freight engines were, with a few 
 exceptions, built for a time longer with the single valve admitting 
 steam for the full stroke. 
 
 After building, during the years 1843, 1844, and 1845, ten 
 four-wheels-connected engines on the plan above described, viz., 
 six wheels in all, the leading wheels and the front drivers being 
 combined into a truck by the flexible beams, Mr. Baldwin finally 
 adopted the present design of four drivers and a four-wheeled 
 truck. Some of his customers who were favorable to the latter 
 plan had ordered such machines of other builders, and Colonel 
 Gadsden, President of the South CaroUna Railroad Company, 
 called on him in 1845 to build for that line some passenger 
 engines of this pattern. He accordingly bought the patent-right 
 for this plan of engine of Mr. H. R. Campbell, and for the 
 equalizing beams used between the drivers, of Messrs. Eastwick 
 & Harrison, and delivered to the South Carolina Railroad Com- 
 pany, in December, 1845, his first eight-wheeled engine with 
 four drivers and a four-wheeled truck. This machine had cylin- 
 ders thirteen and three-quarters by eighteen, and drivers sixty 
 inches in diameter, with the springs between them arranged as 
 equalizers. Its weight was fifteen tons. It had the half-crank 
 axle, the cylinders being inside the frame but outside the smoke- 
 box. The inside-connected engine, counterweighting being as 
 yet unknown, was admitted to be steadier in running, and hence 
 more suitable for passenger service. With the completion of 
 the first eight- wheeled " C" engine, Mr. Baldwin's feelings under- 
 went a revulsion in favor of this plan, and his partiality for it 
 became as great as had been his antipathy before. Commenting 
 
40 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 on the machine, he recorded himself as " more pleased with its 
 appearance and action than any engine he had turned out." In 
 addition to the three engines of this description for the South 
 Carolina Railroad Company, a duplicate was sent to the Camden 
 and Amboy Railroad Company, and a similar but lighter one 
 to the Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad Company, shortly 
 afterward. The engine for the Camden and Amboy Railroad 
 Company, and perhaps the others, had the half-stroke cut-off. 
 
 From that time forward all of his four-wheels-connected ma- 
 chines were built on this plan, and the six-wheeled " C" engine 
 was abandoned, except in the case of one built for the Philadel- 
 phia, Germantown and Norristown Railroad Company in 1846, 
 and this was afterwards rebuilt into a six-wheels-connected ma- 
 chine. Three methods of carrying out the general design were, 
 however, subsequently followed. At first the half-crank was 
 used ; then horizontal cylinders inclosed in the chimney-seat and 
 working a full-crank axle, which form of construction had been 
 practised at the Lowell Works ; and eventually, outside cylinders 
 with outside connections. 
 
 Meanwhile the flexible truck machine maintained its popularity 
 for heavy freight service. All the engines thus far built on this 
 plan had been six-wheeled, some with the rear driving-axle back 
 
 Baldwin Eight-Wheels-Connected Engine, 
 
 of the fire-box, and others with it in front. The next step, fol- 
 lowing logically after the adoption of the eight-wheeled " C" 
 engine, was to increase the size of the freight machine, and dis- 
 tribute the weight on eight wheels all connected, the two rear 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 41 
 
 pairs being rigid in the frame, and the two front pairs combined 
 into the flexible-beam truck. This was first done in 1 846, when 
 seventeen engines on this plan were constructed on one order for 
 the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad Company. Fifteen of 
 these were of twenty tons weight, with cylinders fifteen and a half 
 by twenty, and wheels forty-six inches in diameter ; and two of 
 twenty-five tons weight, with cylinders seventeen and a quarter 
 by eighteen, and drivers forty-two inches in diameter. These 
 engines were the first ones on which Mr. Baldwin placed sand 
 boxes, and they were also the first built by him with roofs. On 
 all previous engines the footboard had only been inclosed by a 
 railing. On these engines for the Reading Railroad four iron 
 posts were carried up, and a wooden roof supported by them. 
 The engine-men added curtains at the sides and front, and Mr. 
 Baldwin on subsequent engines added sides, with sash and glass. 
 The cab proper, however, was of New England origin, where 
 the severity of the climate demanded it, and where it had been 
 used previous to this period. 
 
 Forty-two engines were completed in 1846, and thirty-nine in 
 1847. The only novelty to be noted among them was the engine 
 " M. G. Bright,'' built for operating the inclined plane on the 
 Madison and Indian- 
 apolis Railroad. The 
 rise of this incline 
 was one in seven- 
 teen, from the bank 
 of the Ohio River at 
 Madison. The en- 
 gine had eight wheels, 
 forty-two inches in 
 diameter, connected, 
 and worked in the 
 usual manner by outside inclined cylinders, fifteen and one-half 
 inches diameter by twenty inches stroke. A second pair of 
 cylinders, seventeen inches in diameter with eighteen inches 
 stroke of piston, was placed vertically over the boiler, midway 
 between the furnace and smoke arch. The connecting-rods 
 worked by these cylinders connected with cranks on a shaft 
 
 Baldwin Engine for Rack-Rail, 1847. 
 
42 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 under the boiler. This shaft carried a single cog-wheel at its 
 centre, and this cog-wheel engaged with another of about twice 
 its diameter on a second shaft adjacent to it and in the same 
 plane. The cog-wheel on this latter shaft worked in a rack-rail 
 placed in the centre of the track. The shaft itself had its bearings 
 in the lower ends of two vertical rods, one on each side of the 
 boiler, and these rods were united over the boiler by a horizontal 
 bar which was connected by means of a bent lever and connecting- 
 rod to the piston worked by a small horizontal cylinder placed 
 on top of the boiler. By means of this cylinder, the yoke 
 carrying the shaft and cog-wheel could be depressed and held 
 down so as to engage the cogs with the rack-rail, or raised out 
 of the way when only the ordinary drivers were required. This 
 device was designed by Mr. Andrew Cathcart, Master Mechanic 
 of the Madison and Indianapolis Railroad. A similar machine, 
 the " John Brough," for the same plane, was built by Mr. Baldwin 
 in 1850. The incline was worked with a rack-rail and these 
 engines until it was finally abandoned and a line with easier 
 gradients substituted. 
 
 The use of iron tubes in freight engines grew in favor, and in 
 October, 1847, Mr. Baldwin noted that he was fitting his flues 
 with copper ends, " for riveting to the boiler." 
 
 The subject of burning coal continued to engage much atten- 
 tion, but the use of anthracite had not as yet been generally 
 successful. In October, 1847, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad 
 Company advertised for proposals for four engines to burn 
 Cumberland coal, and the order was taken and filled by Mr. 
 Baldwin with four of his eight-wheels-connected machines. These 
 engines had a heater on top of the boiler for heating the feed- 
 water, and a grate with a rocking-bar in the centre, having fingers 
 on each side which interlocked with projections on fixed bars, 
 one in front and one behind. The rocking-bar was operated 
 from the foot-board. This appears to have been the first 
 instance of the use of a rocking-grate in the practice of these 
 works. 
 
 The year 1848 showed a falling off in business, and only 
 twenty engines were turned out. In the following year, however, 
 there was a rapid recovery, and the production of the works 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 43 
 
 increased to thirty, followed by thirty-seven in 1850, and fifty in 
 185 1. These engines, with a few exceptions, were confined to 
 three patterns, the eight-wheeled four-coupled engine, from 
 twelve to nineteen tons in weight, for passengers and freight, and 
 the six- and eight-wheels-connected engine, for freight exclu- 
 sively, the six-wheeled machine weighing from twelve to seven- 
 teen tons, and the eight-wheeled from eighteen to twenty-seven 
 tons. The drivers of these six- and eight-wheels-connected 
 machines were made generally forty-two, with occasional varia- 
 tions up to forty-eight inches in diameter. 
 
 The exceptions referred to in the practice of these years were 
 the fast passenger engines built by Mr. Baldwin during this 
 period. Early in 1848 the Vermont Central Railroad was 
 approaching completion, and Governor Paine, the President of 
 the Company, conceived the idea that the passenger service on 
 the road required locomotives capable of running at very high 
 velocities. Henry R. Campbell, Esq., was a contractor in building 
 the line, and was authorized by Governor Paine to come to 
 Philadelphia and offer Mr. Baldwin ten thousand dollars for 
 a locomotive which could run with a passenger train at a speed 
 of sixty miles per hour. Mr. Baldwin at once undertook to 
 
 Baldwin Fast Passenger Engine, 1848. 
 
 meet these conditions. The work was begun early in 1848, and 
 in March of that year Mr. Baldwin filed a caveat for his design. 
 The engine was completed in 1849, and, was named the "Gov- 
 ernor Paine." It had one pair of driving-wheels, six and a half 
 feet in diameter, placed back of the fire-box. Another pair of 
 
44 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 wheels, but smaller and unconnected, was placed directly in front 
 of the fire-box, and a four-wheeled truck carried the front of the 
 engine. The cylinders were seventeen and a quarter inches 
 diameter and twenty inches stroke, and were placed horizontally 
 between the frames and the boiler, at about the middle of the 
 waist. The connecting-rods took hold of " half-cranks" inside of 
 the driving-wheels. The object of placing the cylinders at the 
 middle of the boiler was to lessen or obviate the lateral motion 
 of the engine, produced when the cylinders were attached to the 
 smoke-arch. The bearings on the two rear axles were so con- 
 trived that, by means of a lever, a part of the weight of the 
 engine usually carried on the wheels in front of the fire-box 
 could be transferred to the driving-axle. The " Governor Paine" 
 was used for several years on the Vermont Central Railroad, and 
 then rebuilt into a four-coupled machine. During its career, it 
 was stated by the officers of the road that it could be started 
 from a state of rest and run a mile in forty-three seconds. Three 
 engines on the same plan, but with cylinders fourteen by twenty, 
 and six-feet driving-wheels, the "Mifflin," "Blair," and "Indiana," 
 were also built for the Pennsylvania Railroad Company in 1849. 
 They weighed each about forty-seven thousand pounds, dis- 
 tributed as follows : eighteen thousand on the drivers, fourteen 
 thousand on the pair of wheels in front of the fire-box, and 
 fifteen thousand on the truck. By applying the lever, the weight 
 on the drivers could be increased to about twenty-four thousand 
 pounds, the weight on the wheels in front of the fire-box being 
 correspondingly reduced. A speed of four miles in three minutes 
 is recorded for them, and upon one occasion President Taylor 
 was taken in a special train over the road by one of these 
 machines at a speed of sixty miles an hour. One other engine 
 of this pattern, the " Susquehanna," was built for the Hudson 
 River Railroad Company in 1850. Its cylinders were fifteen 
 inches diameter by twenty inches stroke, and drivers six feet 
 in diameter. All these engines, however, were short-lived, and 
 died young, of insufficient adhesion. 
 
 Eight engines with four drivers connected and half crank axles 
 were built for the New York and Erie Railroad Company in 
 1849, with seventeen by twenty-inch cylinders; one-half of the 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 45 
 
 number with six-feet and the rest with iive-feet drivers. These 
 machines were among the last on which the half-crank axle was 
 used. Thereafter, outside-connected engines were constructed 
 almost exclusively. 
 
 In May, 1848, Mr. Baldwin filed a caveat for a four-cylinder 
 locomotive, but never carried the design into execution. The 
 first instance of the use of steel axles in the practice of the 
 establishment occurred during the same year, — a set being placed 
 as an experiment under an engine constructed for the Pennsyl- 
 vania Railroad Company. In 1850 the old form of dome-boiler, 
 which had characterized the Baldwin engine since 1834, was 
 abandoned, and the wagon-top form substituted. 
 
 The business in 1851 had reached the full capacity of the 
 shop, and the next year marked the completion of about an 
 equal number of engines (forty-nine). Contracts for work ex- 
 tended a year ahead, and, to meet the demand, the facilities in 
 the various departments were increased, and resulted in the con- 
 struction of sixty engines in 1853, ^^^ sixty-two in 1854. 
 
 At the beginning of the latter year, Mr. Matthew Baird, who 
 had been connected with the works since 1836 as one of its 
 foremen, entered into partnership with Mr. Baldwin, and the 
 style of the firm was made M. W. Baldwin & Co. 
 
 The only novelty in the general plan of engines during this 
 period was the addition of a ten -wheeled engine to the patterns 
 of the establishment. The success of Mr. Baldwin's engines 
 with all six or eight wheels connected, and the two front pairs 
 combined by the parallel beams into a flexible truck, had been 
 so marked that it was riatural that he should oppose any other 
 plan for freight service. The ten-wheeled engine, with six 
 drivers connected, had, however, now become a competitor. 
 This plan of engine was first patented by Septimus Norris, of 
 Philadelphia, in 1846, and the original design was apparently 
 to produce an engine which should have equal tractive power 
 with the Baldwin six-wheels-connected machine. This the Norris 
 patent sought to accomplish by proposing an engine with six 
 drivers connected, and so disposed as to carry substantially the 
 whole weight, the forward drivers being in advance of the centre 
 of gravity of the engine, and the truck only serving as a guide. 
 
46 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 the front of the engine being connected with it by a pivot-pin, 
 but without a bearing on the centre-plate. Mr. Norris's first 
 engine on this plan was tried in April, 1847, and was found 
 not to pass curves so readily as was expected. As the truck 
 carried little or no weight, it would not keep the track. The 
 New York and Erie Railroad Company, of which John Brandt 
 was then Master Mechanic, shortly afterward adopted the ten- 
 wheeled engine, modified in plan so as to carry a part of the 
 weight on the truck. Mr. Baldwin filled an order for this com- 
 pany, in 1850, of four eight-wheels-connected engines, and in 
 making the contract he agreed to substitute a truck for the front 
 pair of wheels if desired after trial. This, however, he was not 
 called upon to do. 
 
 In February, 1852, Mr. J. Edgar Thomson, President of the 
 Pennsylvania Railroad Company, invited proposals for a number 
 of freight locomotives of fifty-si.x thousand pounds weight each. 
 They were to be adapted to burn bituminous coal, and to have 
 si.K wheels connected and a truck in front, which might be either 
 of two or four wheels. Mr. Baldwin secured the contract, and 
 built twelve engines of the prescribed dimensions, viz., cylinders 
 eighteen by twenty-two ; drivers forty-four inches diameter, with 
 chilled tires. Several of these engines were constructed with a 
 single pair of truck-wheels in front of the drivers, but back of 
 the cylinders. It was found, however, after the engines were 
 put in service, that the two truck-wheels carried eighteen thou- 
 sand or nineteen thousand pounds, and this was objected to by 
 the company as too great a weight to be carried on a single 
 pair of wheels. On the rest of the engines of the order, there- 
 fore, a four-wheeled truck in front was employed. 
 
 The ten-wheeled engine thereafter assumed a place in the 
 Baldwin classification, but it was some years — not until after 
 i860, however — before this pattern of engine wholly superseded 
 in Mr. Baldwin's practice the old plan of freight engine on six 
 or eight wheels, all connected. 
 
 In 1855-56, two of twenty-seven tons weight, nineteen by 
 twenty-two cylinders, forts'-eight inches drivers, were built for 
 the Portage Railroad, and three for the Pennsylvania Railroad. 
 In 1855, '56, and '57, fourteen of the same dimensions were 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 47 
 
 built for the Cleveland and Pittsburg Railroad ; four for the 
 Pittsburg, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railroad ; and one for the 
 Marietta and Cincinnati Railroad. In 1858 and '59, one was 
 constructed for the South Carolina Railroad, of the same size, 
 and six lighter ten-wheelers, with cylinders fifteen and a half by 
 twenty-two, and four-feet drivers, and two with cylinders sixteen 
 by twenty-two, and four-feet drivers, were sent out to railroads 
 in Cuba. 
 
 On three locomotives — the "Clinton," "Athens," and "Sparta ' 
 — completed for the Central Railroad of Georgia in July, 1852, 
 the driving boxes were made with a slot or cavity in the line of 
 the vertical bearing on the journal. The object was to produce 
 a more uniform distribution of the wear over the entire surface 
 of the bearing. This was the first instance in which this device, 
 which has since come into general use, was employed in the 
 Works, and the boxes were so made by direction of Mr. Charles 
 Whiting,' then Master Mechanic of the Central Railroad of 
 Georgia. He subsequently informed Mr. Baldwin that this 
 method of fitting up driving-boxes had been in use on the road 
 for several years previous to his connection with the company. 
 As this device was subsequently made the subject of a patent by 
 Mr. David Matthew, these facts may not be without interest. 
 
 In 1853, Mr. Charles Ellet, Chief Engineer of the Virginia 
 Central Railroad, laid a temporary track across the Blue Ridge, 
 at Rock Fish Gap, for use during the construction of a tunnel 
 through the mountain. This track was twelve thousand five 
 hundred feet in length on the eastern slope, ascending in that 
 distance six hundred and ten feet, or at the average rate of one 
 in twenty and a half feet. The maximum grade was calculated 
 for two hundred and ninety-six feet per mile, and prevailed for 
 half a mile. It was found, however, in fact, that the grade in 
 places exceeded three hundred feet per mile. The shortest 
 radius of curvature was two hundred and thirty-eight feet. On 
 the western slope, which was ten thousand six hundred and fifty 
 feet in length, the maximum grade was two hundred and eighty 
 feet per mile, and the ruling radius of curvature three hundred 
 feet. This track was worked by two of the Baldwin six-wheels- 
 connected flexible-beam truck locomotives constructed in 1853- 
 
HISTORY OF THE 
 
 54. From a description of this track, and the mode of working 
 it, published by Mr. Ellet in 1856, the following is extracted: 
 
 " The locomotives mainly relied on for this severe duty were designed and con- 
 structed by the firm of M. W. Baldvi^in & Company, of Philadelphia. The slight 
 modifications introduced at the instance of the writer to adapt them better to the 
 particular service to be performed in crossing the Blue Ridge, did not touch the 
 working proportions or principle of the engines, the merits of which are due to the 
 patentee, M. W. Baldwin, Esq. 
 
 " These engines are mounted on Six wheels, all of which are drivers, and coupled, 
 and forty-two inches diameter. The wheels are set very close, so that the distance 
 between the extreme points of contact of the wheels and the rail, of the front and 
 rear drivers, is nine feet four inches. This closeness of the wheels, of course, 
 greatly reduces the difficulty of turning the short curves of the road. The diameter 
 of the cylinders is sixteen and a half inches, and the length of the stroke twenty 
 inches. To increase the adhesion, and at the same time avoid the resistance of a 
 tender, the engine carries its tank upon the boiler, and the footboard is lengthened 
 out and provided with suspended side-boxes, where a supply of fuel may be stored. 
 By this means the weight of wood and water, instead of abstracting from the effective 
 power of the engine, contributes to its adhesion and consequent ability to climb the 
 mountain. The total weight of these engines is fifty five thousand pounds, or twenty- 
 seven and a half tons, when the boiler and tank are supplied with water, and fuel 
 enough for a trip of eight miles is on board. The capacity of the tank is sufficient 
 to hold one hundred cubic feet of water, and it has storage-room on top for one 
 hundred cubic feet of wood, in addition to what may be carried in the side-boxes 
 and on the footboard. 
 
 " To enable the engines better to adapt themselves to the flexures of the road, the 
 front and middle pairs of drivers are held in position by wrought-iron beams, having 
 cylindrical boxes in each end for the journal-bearings, which beams vibrate on 
 spherical pins fixed in the frame of the engine on each side, and resting on the 
 centres of the beams. The object of this arrangement is to form a truck, somewhat 
 flexible, which enables the drivers more readily to traverse the curves of the road. 
 
 " The writer has never permitted the power of the engines on this mountain road 
 to be fully tested. The object has been to work the line regularly, economically, 
 and, above all, safety ; and these conditions are incompatible with experimental 
 loads subjecting the machinery to severe strains. The regular daily service of each 
 of the engines is to make four trips, of eight miles, over the mountain, drawing one 
 eight-wheel baggage car, together with two eight-wheel passenger cars, in each 
 direction. 
 
 " In conveying freight, the regular train on the mountain is three of the eic^ht- 
 wheel house-cars, fully loaded, or four of them when empty or partly loaded. 
 
 " These three cars, when full, weigh, with their loads, from forty to forty-three 
 tons. Sometimes, though rarely, when the business has been unusually heavy, the 
 loads have exceeded fifty tons. 
 
 " With such trains the engines are stopped on the track, ascending or descending, 
 and are started again, on the steepest grades, at the discretion of the engineer. 
 
 " Water, for the supply of the engines, has been found diflicult to obtain on the 
 
BALDWIN LOCO.MOTIVE WORKS. 49 
 
 mountain ; and, since the road was constructed, a tank has been established on the 
 eastern slope, where the ascending engines stop doily on a grade of two hundred 
 and eighty feet per mile, and are there held by the brakes while the tank is being 
 filled, and started again at the signal and without any difficulty. 
 
 " The ordinary speed of the engines, when loaded, is seven and a half miles an 
 liour on the ascending grades, and from five and a half to six miles an hour on the 
 descent. 
 
 " When the road was first opened, it speedily appeared that the difference of forty- 
 three feet on the western side, and fifty-eight on the eastern side, between the grades 
 on curves of three hundred feet radii and those on straight lines, was not sufficient 
 to compensate for the increased friction due to such curvature. The velocity, with a 
 constant supply of steam, was promptly retarded on passing from a straight line to a 
 curve, and promptly accelerated again on passing from the curve to the straight line. 
 But, after a little experience in the working of the road, it was found advisable to 
 supply a small amount of grease to the flange of the engine by means of a sponge, 
 saturated with oil, which, w^hen needed, is kept in contact with the wheel by a spring. 
 Since the use of the oil was introduced, the difficulty of turning the curves has been 
 so far diminished, that it is no longer possible to determine whether grades of two 
 hundred and thirty-seven and six-tenths feet per mile on curves of three hundred feet 
 radius, or grades of two hundred and ninety-six feet per mile on straight lines, are 
 traversed most rapidly by the engine. 
 
 "When the track is in good condition, the brakes of only two of the cars possess 
 sufficient power to control and regulate the movement of the train, — that is to say, 
 they will hold back the two cars and the engine. When there are three or more 
 cars in the train, the brakes on the cars, of course, command the train so much the 
 more easily. 
 
 " But the safety of the train is not dependent on the brakes of the car. There is 
 also a valve or air-cock in the steam-chest, under the control of the engineer. This 
 air-cock forms an independent brake, exclusively at the command of the engineer, 
 and which can always be applied when the engine itself is in working order. The 
 action of this power may be made ever so gradual, either slightly relieving the duty 
 of the brakes on the cars, or bringing into play the entire power of the engine. The 
 train is thus held in complete command.'' 
 
 The Mountain Top Track, it may be added, was worked suc- 
 cessfully for several years, by the engines described in the above 
 e.xtract, until it was abandoned on the completion of the tunnel. 
 The exceptionally steep grades and short curves which charac- 
 terized the line, afforded a complete and satisfactory test of the 
 adaptation of these machines to such peculiar service. 
 
 But the period now under consideration was marked by 
 another, and a most important, step in the progress of American 
 locomotive practice. We refer to the introduction of the link- 
 motion. Although this device was first employed by William T. 
 James, of New York, in 1832, and eleven years later by the 
 
 4 
 
50 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 Stephensons, in England, and was by them applied thenceforward 
 on their engines, it was not until 1849 that it was adopted in 
 this country. In that year Mr. Thomas Rogers, of the Rogers 
 Locomotive and Machine Company, introduced it in his practice. 
 Other builders, however, strenuously resisted the innovation, and 
 none more so than Mr. Baldwin. The theoretical objections 
 which confessedly apply to the device, but which practically have 
 been proved to be unimportant, were urged from the first by Mr. 
 Baldwin as arguments against its use. The strong claim of the 
 advocates of the link-motion, that it gave a means of cutting off 
 steam at any point of the stroke, could not be gainsaid, and this 
 was admitted to be a consideration of the first importance. This 
 very circumstance undoubtedly turned Mr. Baldwin's attention 
 to the subject of methods for cutting off steam, and one of the 
 first results was his " Variable Cut-off," patented April 27, 1852. 
 This device consisted of two valves, the upper sliding upon the 
 lower, and worked by an eccentric and rock-shaft in the usual 
 manner. The lower valve fitted steam-tight to the sides of the 
 steam-chest and the under surface of the upper valve. When 
 the piston reached each end of its stroke, the full pressure of 
 steam from the boiler was admitted around the upper valve, and 
 transferred the lower valve instantaneousl)' from one end of the 
 steam-chest to the other. The openings through the two vah-es 
 were so arranged that steam was admitted to the cylinder^nly 
 for a part of the stroke. The effect was, therefore, to cut off 
 steam at a given point, and to open the induction and exhaust 
 ports substantialh' at the same instant and to their full extent. 
 The exhaust port, in addition, remained fully opened while the 
 induction port was gradually closing, and after it had entirely 
 closed. Although this device was never put in use, it may be 
 noted in passing that it contained substantially the principle of 
 the steam-pump, as since patented and constructed. 
 
 Early in 1853, Mr. Baldwin abandoned the half-stroke cut off, 
 previously described, and which he had been using since 1845, 
 and adopted the variable cut-off, which was already employed by 
 other builders. One of his letters, written in January, 1853, 
 states his position, as follows : 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 51 
 
 " I shall put on an improvement in the shape of a variable cut-off, which can be 
 operated by the engineer while the machine is running, and which will cut off any- 
 where from six to twelve inches, according to the load and amount of steam wanted, 
 and this without the link-motion, which I could never be entirely satisfied with. I 
 still have the independent cut-off, and the additional machinery to mal<e it variable 
 will be simple and not liable to be deranged." 
 
 This form of cut-off was a separate valve, sliding on a partition 
 plate between it and the main steam-valve, and worked by an 
 independent eccentric and rock-shaft. The upper arm of the 
 rock-shaft was curved so as to form a radius-arm, on which a 
 shding-block, forming the termination of the upper valve-rod, 
 could be adjusted and held at varying distances from the axis, 
 thus producing a variable travel of the upper valve. This device 
 did not give an absolutely perfect cut-off, as it was not operative 
 in backward gear, but when running forward it would cut off with 
 great accuracy at any point of the stroke, was quick in its move- 
 ment, and economical in the consumption of fuel. 
 
 After a short experience with this arrangement of the cut-off, 
 the partition plate was omitted, and the upper valve was made to 
 slide directly on the lower. This was eventually found objection- 
 able, however, as the lower valve would soon cut a hollow in the 
 valve-face. Several unsuccessful attempts were made to remedy 
 this defect by making the lower valve of brass, with long bear- 
 ings, and making the valve-face of the cylinder of hardened 
 steel ; finally, however, the plan of one valve on the other was 
 
 Variable Cut-off Adjustment. 
 
 abandoned and a recourse was again had to an interposed parti- 
 tion plate, as in the original half-stroke cut-off. 
 
 Mr. Baldwin did not adopt this form of cut-off without some 
 modification of his own, and the modification in this instance 
 consisted of a peculiar device, patented September 13, 1835, for 
 
HISTORV OF THE 
 
 raising and lowering the block on the radius-arm. A quadrant 
 was placed so that its circumference bore nearly against a curved 
 arm projecting down from the sliding-block, and which curved in 
 the reverse direction from the quadrant. Two steel straps side 
 by side were interposed between the quadrant and this curved 
 arm. One of the straps was connected to the lower end of the 
 quadrant and the upper end of the curved arm ; the other, to the 
 upper end of the quadrant and the lower end of the curved arm. 
 The effect was the same as if the quadrant and arm geared into 
 each other in any position by teeth, and theoretically the block 
 was kept steady in whatever position placed on the radius-arm of 
 the rock-shaft. This was the object sought to be accomplished, 
 and was stated in the specification of the patent as follows : 
 
 " The principle of varying the cut-off" by means of a vibrating arm and sliding 
 pivot-block has long been known, but the contrivances for changing the position of 
 the block upon the arm have been very defective. The radius of motion of the link 
 by which the sliding-block is changed on the arm, and the radius of motion of that 
 part of the vibrating arm on which the block is placed, have, in this kind of valve 
 gear, as heretofore constructed, been different, which produced a continual rubbing 
 of the sliding-block upon the arm while the arm is vibrating ; and as the block for 
 the greater part of the time occupies one position on the arm, and only has to be 
 moved toward either extremity occasionally, that part of the arm on which the block 
 is most used soon becomes so worn that the block is loose, and jars." 
 
 This method of varying the cut-off was first applied on the 
 engine " Belle," delivered to the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, 
 December 6, 1854, and thereafter was for some time einployed 
 by Mr. Baldwin. It was found, however, in practice that the 
 steel straps would stretch sufficiently to allow them to buckle 
 and break, and hence they were soon abandoned, and chains 
 substituted between the quadrant and curved arm of the sliding- 
 block. These chains in turn proved little better, as they length- 
 ened, allowing lost motion, or broke altogether, so that eventually 
 the quadrant was wholly abandoned, and recourse was finally 
 had to the lever and link for raising and lowering the sliding- 
 block. As thus arranged, the cut-off was substantially what was 
 known as the " Cuyahoga Cut-off," as introduced by Mr. Ethan 
 Rogers, of the Cuyahoga Works, Cleveland, Ohio, except that 
 Mr. Baldwin used a partition plate between the upper and the 
 lower valve. 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 53 
 
 But while Mr. Baldwin, in common with many other builders, 
 was thus resolutely opposing the link-motion, it was nevertheless 
 rapidly gaining favor with Railroad managers. Engineers and 
 master mechanics were everywhere learning to admire its sim- 
 plicity, and were manifesting an enthusiastic preference for 
 engines so constructed. At length, therefore, he was forced to 
 succumb; and the link was applied to the "Pennsylvania," one 
 of two engines completed for the Central Railroad of Georgia, 
 in February, 1854. The other engine of the order, the "New 
 Hampshire," had the variable cut-off, and Mr. Baldwin, while 
 yielding to the demand in the former engine, was undoubtedly 
 sanguine that the working of the latter would demonstrate the 
 inferiority of the new device. In this, however, he was disap- 
 pointed, for in the following year the same company ordered 
 three more engines, on which they specified the link-motion. 
 In 1856 seventeen engines for nine different companies had this 
 form of valve-gear, and its use was thus incorporated in his 
 practice. It was not, however, until 1857 that he was induced 
 to adopt it exclusively. 
 
 February 14, 1854, Mr. Baldwin and Mr. David Clark, Master 
 Mechanic of the Mine Hill Railroad, took out conjointly a patent 
 for a feed-water heater, placed at the base of a locomotive chim- 
 ney, and consisting of one large vertical flue, surrounded by a 
 number of smaller ones. The exhaust steam was discharged 
 from the nozzles through the large central flue, creating a draft 
 of the products of combustion through the smaller surrounding 
 flues. The pumps forced the feed- water into the chamber around 
 these flues, whence it passed to a boiler by the pipe from the back 
 of the stack. This heater was applied on several engines for the 
 Mine Hill Railroad, and on a few other roads ; but its use was 
 exceptional, and lasted only for a year or two. 
 
 In December of the same year, Mr. Baldwin filed a caveat for 
 a variable exhaust, operated automatically, by the pressure of 
 steam, so as to close when the pressure was lowest in the boiler, 
 and open with the increase of pressure. The device was never 
 put in service. 
 
 The use of coal, both bituminous and anthracite, as a fuel for 
 locomotives, had by this time become a practical success. The 
 
54 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 economical combustion of bituminous coal, however, engaged 
 considerable attention. It was felt that much remained to be 
 accomplished in consuming the smoke and deriving the maxi- 
 mum of useful effect from the fuel. Mr. Baird, who was now 
 associated with Mr. Baldwin in the management of the business, 
 made this matter a subject of careful study and investigation. 
 An e.xperiment was conducted under his direction, by placing a 
 sheet-iron deflector in the fire-box of an engine on the German- 
 town and Norristown Railroad. The success of the trial was 
 such as to show conclusively that a more complete combustion 
 resulted. As, however, a deflector formed by a single plate of 
 iron would soon be destroyed by the action of the fire, Mr. Baird 
 proposed to use a water-leg projecting upward and backward from 
 the front of the fire-box under the flues. Drawings and a model 
 of the device were prepared, with a view of patenting it, but 
 subsequently the intention was abandoned, Mr. Baird concluding 
 that a fire-brick arch as a deflector to accomplish the same object 
 was preferable. This was accordingly tried on two locomotives 
 built for the Pennsylvania Railroad Company in 1854, and was 
 found so valuable an appliance that its use was at once established, 
 and it was put on a number of engines built for railroads in Cuba 
 and elsewhere. For several years the fire-bricks were supported 
 on side plugs; but in 1858, in the "Media," built for the West 
 Chester and Philadelphia Railroad Company, water-pipes extend- 
 ing from the crown obliquely downward and cur\ing to the sides 
 of the fire-box at the bottom were successfulh' used for the 
 purpose. 
 
 The adoption of the link-motion may be regarded as the 
 dividing line between the present and the early and transitional 
 stage of locomotive practice. Changes since that event have 
 been principally in matters of detail, but it is the gradual per- 
 fection of these details which has made the locomotive the sj-m- 
 metrical, efficient, and wonderfully complete piece of mechanism 
 it is to-day. In perfecting these minutiae, the Baldwin Locomotive 
 Works has borne its part, and it only remains to state briefly its 
 contributions in this direction. 
 
 The production of the establishment during the six years from 
 1855 to i860, inclusive, was as follows: forty-seven eno-ines in 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 55 
 
 1855; fifty-nine in 1856; sixty-six in 1857; thirty-three in 1858; 
 seventy in 1859; ^^'^ eighty-three in i860. The greater number 
 of these were of the ordinary type, four drivers coupled, and 
 a four-wheeled truck, and varying in weight from fifteen ton 
 engines, with cylinders twelve by twenty-two, to twenty-seven 
 ton engines, with cylinders sixteen by twenty-four. A few ten- 
 wheeled engines were built, as has been previously noted, and 
 the remainder were the Baldwin flexible-truck six- and eight- 
 wheels-connected engines. The demand for these, however, was 
 now rapidly falling off, the ten-wheeled and heavy " C" engines 
 taking their place, and by 1859 they ceased to be built, save in 
 exceptional cases, as for some foreign roads, from which orders 
 for this pattern were still occasionally received. 
 
 A few novelties characterizing the engines of this period may 
 be mentioned. Several engines built in 1855 had cross-flues 
 placed in the fire-box, under the crown, in order to increase the 
 heating surface. This feature, however, was found impracticable, 
 and was soon abandoned. The intense heat to which the flues 
 wprp ^ pnsed converted the water contained in them into highly 
 superheated steam, which would force its way out through the 
 water around the fire-box with violent ebullitions. Four engines 
 were built for the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, in 1856-57, 
 with straight boilers and two domes. The " Delano" grate, by 
 means of which the coal was forced into the fire-box from below, 
 was applied on four ten-wheeled engines for the Cleveland and 
 Pittsburg Railroad in 1857. In 1859 several engines were built 
 with the form of boiler introduced on the Cumberland Valley 
 Railroad in 185 i by Mr. A. F. Smith, and which consisted of a 
 combustion-chamber in the waist of the boiler, next the fire-box. 
 This form of boiler was for some years thereafter largely used 
 in engines for soft coal. It was at first constructed with the 
 " water-leg," which was a vertical water-space, connecting the top 
 and bottom sheets of the combustion-chamber, but eventually 
 this feature was omitted, and an unobstructed combustion- 
 chamber employed. Several engines were built for the Philadel- 
 phia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad Company in 1859, ^"^ 
 thereafter, with the " Dimpfel" boiler, in which the tubes contain 
 water, and, starting downward from the crown-sheet, are curved 
 
56 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 to the horizontal, and terminate in a narrow water-space next the 
 smoke-box. The whole waist of the boiler, therefore, forms a 
 combustion-chamber, and the heat and gases, after passing for 
 their whole length along and around the tubes, emerge into the 
 lower part of the smoke-box. 
 
 In i860 an engine was built for the Mine Hill Railroad, with 
 a boiler of a peculiar form. The top sheets sloped upward from 
 both ends toward the centre, thus making a raised part or hump 
 in the centre. The engine was designed to work on heavy 
 grades, and the object sought by Mr. Wilder, the Superintendent 
 of the Mine Hill Railroad, was to have the water always at the 
 same height in the space from which steam was drawn, whether 
 going up or down grade. 
 
 All these experiments are indicative of the interest then pre- 
 vailing upon the subject of coal-burning. The result of experi- 
 ence and study had meantime satisfied Mr. Baldwin that to burn 
 soft coal successfully required no peculiar devices ; that the 
 ordinary form of boiler, with plain fire-box, was right, with 
 perhaps the addition of a fire-brick deflector; and that the secret 
 of the economical and successful use of coal was in the mode of 
 firing, rather than in a different form of furnace. 
 
 The year 1861 witnessed a marked falling off in the production. 
 The breaking out of the civil war at first unsettled business, and 
 by many it was thought that railroad traffic would be so largel)- 
 reduced that the demand for locomotives must cease altogether. 
 A large number of hands were discharged from the works, and 
 only forty locomotives were turned out during the year. It was 
 even seriously contemplated to turn the resources of the estab- 
 lishment to the manufacture of shot and shell, and other muni- 
 tions of war, the belief being entertained that the building of 
 locomotives would have to be altogether suspended. So far, 
 however, was this from being the case, that, after the first ex- 
 citement had subsided, it was found that the demand for trans- 
 portation by the general government, and b\- the branches of 
 trade and production stimulated by the war, was likely to tax 
 the carrying capacity of the principal Northern railroads to the 
 fullest extent. The government itself became a large purchaser 
 of locomotives, and it is noticeable, as indicating the increase of 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 57 
 
 travel and freight transportation, that heavier machines than had 
 ever before been built became the rule. Seventy-five engines 
 were sent from the works in 1862; ninety-six in 1863; one 
 hundred and thirty in 1864; and one hundred and fifteen in 
 1865. During two years of this period, from May, 1862, to 
 June, 1864, thirty-three engines were built for the United States 
 Military Railroads. The demand from the various coal-carrying 
 roads in Penns}'lvania and vicinity was particularly active, and 
 large numbers of ten-wheeled engines, and of the heaviest eight- 
 wheeled four-coupled engines, were built. Of the latter class, 
 the majority were fifteen- and sixteen-inch cylinders, and of the 
 former, seventeen- and eighteen-inch cylinders. 
 
 The introduction of several important features in construction 
 marks this period. Early in i86r, four eighteen-inch cylinder 
 freight locomotives, with six coupled wheels, fifty-two inches in 
 diameter, and a Bissell pony-truck with radius-bar in front, were 
 sent to the Louisville and Nashville Railroad Company. This 
 was the first instance of the use of the Bissell truck in the 
 Baldwin Works. These engines, however, were not of the 
 regular " Mogul" type, as they were only modifications of the 
 ten-wheeler, the drivers retaining the same position well back, 
 and a pair of pony-wheels on the Bissell plan taking the place 
 of the ordinary four-wheeled truck. Other engines of the same 
 pattern, but with eighteen and one-half inch cylinders, were 
 built in 1862—63, for the same company, and for the Dom Pedro 
 II. Railway of Brazil. 
 
 The introduction of steel in locomotive-construction was a 
 distinguishing feature of the period. Steel tires were first used 
 in the works in 1862, on some engines for the Dom Pedro II. 
 Railway of South America. Their general adoption on American 
 Railroads followed slowly. No tires of this material were then 
 made in this country, and it was objected to their use that, as it 
 took from sixty to ninety days to import them, an engine, in 
 case of a breakage of one of its tires, might be laid up useless 
 for several months. To obviate this objection M. W. Baldwin 
 & Co. imported five hundred steel tires, most of which were 
 kept in stock, from which to fill orders. The steel tires as first 
 used in 1862 on the locomotives for the Dom Pedro Segundo 
 
58 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 /zyyj^^i^i 
 
 Railway were made with a " shoulder" at one edge of the internal 
 periphery, and were shrunk on the wheel-centres. The sketch 
 below shows a section of the tire as then used. 
 
 Steel fire-boxes were first built for 
 some engines for the Pennsylvania 
 Railroad Company in 1861. English 
 steel of a high temper was used, and 
 at the first attempt the fire-boxes 
 cracked in fitting them in the boilers, 
 and it became necessary to take 
 them out and substitute copper. 
 American homogeneous cast-steel 
 was then tried on engines 231 and 
 232, completed for the Pennsylvania 
 Railroad in January, 1862, and it was 
 found to work successfully. The 
 fire-boxes of nearly all engines there- 
 after built for that road were of this 
 materia], and in 1866 its use for the 
 It may be added that while all steel 
 sheets for fire-boxes or boilers are required to be thoroughly 
 annealed before delivery, those which are flanged or worked in 
 the process of boiler construction are a second time annealed 
 before riveting. 
 
 Another feature of construction gradually adopted was the 
 placing of the cylinders horizontally. This was first done in the 
 case of an outside-connected engine, the " Ocmulgee," which 
 was sent to the Southwestern Railroad Company of Georgia, 
 in January, 1858. This engine had a square smoke-box, and 
 the cylinders were bolted horizontally to its sides. The plan of 
 casting the cylinder and half-saddle in one piece and fitting it 
 to the round smoke-box was introduced b\' Mr. Baldwin, and 
 grew naturally out of his original method of construction. Mr. 
 Baldwin was the first American builder to use an outside cyl- 
 inder, and he made it for his early engines with a circular flange 
 cast to it, by which it could be bolted to the boiler. The 
 cylinders were gradually brought lower, and at a less angle, 
 and the flanges prolonged and enlarged. In 1852, three six- 
 
 Steel Tire, with Shoulder. 
 
 purpose became general. 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 59 
 
 wheels-connected engines, for the Mine Hill Railroad Com- 
 pany, were built with the cylinder flanges brought around under 
 the smoke-box until they nearly met, the space between them 
 being filled with a spark-box. This was practically equivalent 
 to making the cylinder and half-saddle in one casting. Sub- 
 sequently, on other engines on which the spark-box was not 
 used, the half-saddles were cast so as almost to meet under the 
 smoke-box, and, after the cylinders were adjusted in position, 
 wedges were fitted in the interstices and the saddles bolted 
 together. It was finally discovered that the faces of the two 
 half-saddles might be planed and finished so that they could be 
 bolted together and bring the cylinders accurately in position, 
 thus avoiding the troublesome and tedious job of adjusting them 
 by chipping and fitting to the boiler and frames. With this 
 method of construction, the cylinders were placed at a less and 
 less angle, until at length the truck-wheels were spread suffi- 
 ciently, on all new or modified classes of locomotives in the 
 Baldwin list, to admit of the cylinders being hung horizontally, 
 as is the present almost universal American practice. By the 
 year 1865 horizontal cylinders were made in all cases where the 
 patterns would allow it. The advantages of this arrangement 
 are manifestly in the interest of simplicity and economy, as the 
 cylinders are thus rights or lefts, indiscriminately, and a single 
 pattern answers for either side. 
 
 A distinguishing feature in the method of construction which 
 characterizes these works is the extensive use of a system of 
 standard gauges and templets, to which all work admitting of this 
 process is required to be made. The importance of this arrange- 
 ment, in securing absolute uniformity of essential parts in all 
 engines of the same class, is manifest, and with the increased 
 production since 1861 it became a necessity as well as a decided 
 advantage. It has already been noted that as early as 1839 Mr. 
 Baldwin felt the importance of making all like parts of similar 
 engines absolutely uniform and interchangeable. It was not 
 attempted to accomplish this object, however, by means of a 
 complete system of standard gauges, until many years later. In 
 1861 a beginning was made of organizing all the departments of 
 manufacture upon this basis, and from it has since grown an 
 
6o HISTORY OF THE 
 
 elaborate and perfected system, embracing all the essential details 
 of construction. An independent department of the works, 
 having a separate foreman and an adequate force of skilled 
 workmen, with special tools adapted to the purpose, is organized 
 as the Department of Standard Gauges. A system of standard 
 gauges and templets for every description of work to be done is 
 made and kept by thi.s department. The original templets are 
 kept as " standards," and are never used on the work itself, but 
 from them exact duplicates are made, which are issued to the 
 foremen of the various departments, and to which all work is 
 required to conform. The working gauges are compared with 
 the standards at regular intervals, and absolute uniformity is thus 
 maintained. The system is carried into every possible important 
 detail. Frames are planed and slotted to gauges, and drilled to 
 steel bushed templets. Cylinders are bored and planed, and 
 steam-ports, with valves and steam-chests, finished and fitted, to 
 gauges. Tires are bored, centres turned, axles finished, and 
 cross-heads, guides, guide-bearers, pistons, connecting- and 
 parallel-rods planed, slotted, or finished by the same method. 
 Every bolt about the engine is made to a gauge, and every hole 
 drilled and reamed to a templet. The result of the system is an 
 absolute uniformity and interchangeableness of parts in engines 
 of the same class, insuring to the purchaser the minimum cost 
 of repairs, and rendering possible, by the application of this 
 method, the large production which these works have accom- 
 plished. 
 
 Thus had been developed and perfected the various essential 
 details of existing locomotive practice when Mr. Baldwin died, 
 September 7, 1866. He had been permitted, in a life of unusual 
 activity and energy, to witness the rise and wonderful increase of 
 a material interest which had become the distinguishing- feature 
 of the century. He had done much, by his own mechanical 
 skill and inventive genius, to contribute to the development of 
 that interest. His name was as " familiar as household words" 
 wherever on the American continent the locomotive had pene- 
 trated. An ordinary ambition might well have been satisfied 
 with this achievement. But Mr. Baldwin's claim to the remem- 
 brance of his fellow-men rests not alone on the results of his 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 6 1 
 
 mechanical labors. A merely technical history, such as this, is 
 not the place to do justice to his memory as a man, as a Christian, 
 and as a philanthropist ; yet the record would be manifestly 
 imperfect, and would fail properly to reflect the sentiments of his 
 business associates who so long knew him in all relations of Ufe, 
 were no reference made to his many virtues and noble traits of 
 character. Mr. Baldwin was a man of sterling integrity and 
 singular conscientiousness. To do right, absolutely and unre- 
 servedly, in all his relations with men, was an instinctive rule of 
 his nature. His heroic struggle to meet every dollar of his 
 liabilities, principal and interest, after his failure, consequent upon 
 the general financial crash in 1837, constitutes a chapter of 
 personal self-denial and determined effort which is seldom paral- 
 leled in the annals of commercial experience. When most men 
 would have felt that an equitable compromise with creditors was 
 all that could be demanded in view of the general financial 
 embarrassment, Mr. Baldwin insisted upon paying all claims in 
 full, and succeeded in doing so only after nearly five years of 
 unremitting industry, close economy, and absolute personal sacri- 
 fices. As a philanthropist and a sincere and earnest Christian, 
 zealous in every good work, his memory is cherished by many 
 to whom his contributions to locomotive improvement are com- 
 paratively unknown. From the earliest years of his business life 
 the practice of systematic benevolence was made a duty and a 
 pleasure. His liberality constantly increased with his means. 
 Indeed, he would unhesitatingly give his notes, in large sums, for 
 charitable purposes when money was absolutely wanted to carry 
 on his business. Apart from the thousands which he expended 
 in private charities, and of which, of course, little can be known, 
 Philadelphia contains many monuments of his munificence. 
 Early taking a deep interest in all Christian effort, his contribu- 
 butions to missionary enterprise and church extension were on 
 the grandest scale, and grew with increasing wealth. Numerous 
 church edifices in this city, of the denomination to which he 
 belonged, owe their existence largely to his liberality, and two at 
 least were projected and built by him entirely at his own cost. 
 In his mental character, Mr. Baldwin was a man of remarkable 
 firmness of purpose. This trait was strongly shown during his 
 
62 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 mechanical career in the persistency with which he would work 
 at a new improvement or resist an innovation. If he was led 
 sometimes to assume an attitude of antagonism to features of 
 locomotive-construction which after-experience showed to be 
 valuable, — and a desire for historical accuracy has required the 
 mention, in previous pages, of several instances of this kind, — it 
 is at least certain that his opposition was based upon a conscien- 
 tious belief in the mechanical impolicy of the proposed changes. 
 
 After the death of Mr. Baldwin the business was reorganized, 
 in 1867, under the title of "The Baldwin Locomotive Works," 
 M. Baird & Co., Proprietors. Messrs. George Burnham and 
 Charles T. Parry, who had been connected with the establishment 
 from an early period, the former in charge of the finances, and 
 the latter as General Superintendent, were associated with Mr. 
 Baird in the copartnership. Three years later, Messrs. Edward 
 H. Williams, William P. Henszey, and Edward Longstreth became 
 members of the firm. Mr. Williams had been connected with 
 railway management on various lines since 1850. Mr. Henszey 
 had been Mechanical Engineer, and Mr. Longstreth the General 
 Superintendent of the works for several years previously. 
 
 The production of the Baldwin Locomoti\'e Works from 1866 
 to 1 87 1, both )'ears inclusive, was as follows: 
 
 1866, one hundred and eighteen locomotives. 
 
 1867, one hundred and twenty-se\'en 
 
 1868, one hundred and twenty-four 
 
 1869, two hundred and thirt\--five 
 
 1870, two hundred and eighty 
 
 1 87 1, three hundred and thirty-one 
 
 In July, 1866, the engine "Consolidation" was built for the 
 Lehigh Valley Railroad, on the plan and specification furnished 
 by Mr. Alexander Mitchell, Master Mechanic of the Mahanoy 
 Division of that Railroad. This engine was intended for working 
 the Mahanoy plane, which rises at the rate of one hundred and 
 thirty-three feet per mile. The " Consolidation" had cylinders 
 twenty by twenty-four, four pairs of drivers connected, forty-eight 
 inches in diameter, and a Bissell pony-truck in front, equalized 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 63 
 
 ■1 
 
 i^.^k 
 
 ia^iii 
 
 
 m^ 
 
 ^^^^ 
 
 * Consolidation.' 
 
 with the front drivers. The weight of the engine, in working 
 order, was ninety thousand pounds, of which all but about ten 
 thousand pounds was on the drivers. This engine has constituted 
 the first of a class to which it 
 has given its name, and " Con- 
 solidation" engines have since 
 been constructed for a large 
 number of railways, not only 
 in the United States, but in 
 Mexico, Brazil, and Australia. 
 Later engines of the class for 
 
 the four feet eight and a half inch gauge have, however, been 
 made heavier, as will be seen by reference to the description of 
 this type in the catalogue. 
 
 A class of engines known as " Moguls," with three pairs of 
 drivers connected and a swinging pony-truck in front equalized 
 with the forward drivers, took its rise in the practice of this 
 estabHshment from the " E. A. Douglas," built for the Thomas 
 Iron Company in 1867. These engines are fully illustrated in 
 the catalogue. Several sizes of " Moguls" have been built, but 
 principally with cylinders si.xteen to nineteen inches in diameter, 
 and twenty-two or twenty-four inches stroke, and with drivers 
 from forty-four to fifty-seven inches in diameter. This plan of 
 engine has rapidly grown in favor for freight service on heavy 
 grades or where maximum loads are to be moved, and has been 
 
 adopted by several leading 
 lines. Utilizing, as it does, 
 
 • lAll ^ ,•*- nearly the entire weight of 
 
 the engine for adhesion, the 
 main and back pairs of drivers 
 being equalized together, as 
 also the front drivers and the 
 "Mogul." pony-wheels, and the con- 
 
 struction of the engine with 
 swing-truck and one pair of drivers without flanges allowing it 
 to pass short curves without difficulty, the " Mogul" is generally 
 accepted as a type of engine especially adapted to the economical 
 working of hea\}' freight traffic. 
 
64 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 In 1867, on a number of eight-wheeled four-coupled engines 
 for the Pennsylvania Railroad, the four-wheeled swing-bolster- 
 truck was first applied, and thereafter a large number of engines 
 have been so constructed. The two-wheeled or " pony-truck" 
 has been built both on the Bissell plan, with double inclined 
 slides, and with the ordinary swing-bolster, and in both cases 
 with the radius-bar pivoting from a point about four feet back 
 from the centre of the truck. The four-wheeled truck has been 
 made with swinging or sliding bolster, and both with and without 
 the radius-bar. Of the engines above referred to as the first on 
 which the swing-bolster-truck was applied, four were for express 
 passenger service, with drivers sixty-seven inches in diameter, 
 and cylinders seventeen by twenty-four. One of them, placed 
 on the road September 9, 1867, was in constant service until May 
 14, 1 87 1, without ever being off its wheels for repairs, making a 
 total mileage of one hundred and fifty-three thousand two 
 hundred and eighty miles. All of these engines have their 
 driving-wheels spread eight and one-half feet between centres. 
 
 Steel flues were first used in three ten-wheeled freight engines, 
 Numbers 211, 338, and 368, completed for the Pennsylvania 
 Railroad in August, 1868. Steel boilers were first made in 
 1868 for locomotives for the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, 
 and the use of this material for the barrels of boilers as well 
 as for the fire-boxes has now become universal in American 
 practice. 
 
 In 1854, four engines for the Pennsylvania Railroad Compan}-, 
 the " Tiger," "Leopard," " Hornet," and " Wasp," were built with 
 straight boilers and two domes each, and in 1866 this method of 
 construction was revived, and until about 1880 the practice of 
 the establishment included both the wagon-top boiler with single 
 dome, and the straight boiler with one or two domes. When 
 the straight boiler is used the waist is made about two inches 
 larger in diameter than that of the wagon-top form. About 
 equal space for water and steam is thus given in either case, and, 
 as the number of flues is the same in both forms, more room 
 for the circulation of water between the flues is afforded in the 
 straight boiler, on account of its larger diameter, than in the 
 wagon-top shape. Since 1880 the use of two domes has been 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 65 
 
 exceptional, both wagon-top and straight boilers being con- 
 structed with one dome. 
 
 In 1868, a locomotive of three and a half feet gauge was 
 constructed for the Averill Coal and Oil Company, of West 
 Virginia. This was the first narrow-gauge locomotive in the 
 practice of the works. 
 
 In 1869 three locomotives of the same gauge were constructed 
 for the Uniao Valenciana Railway of Brazil, and were the first 
 narrow-gauge locomotives constructed at these work for general 
 passenger and freight traffic. In the following year the Denver 
 and Rio Grande Railway, of Colorado, was projected on the 
 three-feet gauge, and the first locomotives for the line were 
 designed and built in 1871. Two classes, for passenger and 
 freight respectively, were constructed. The former were six- 
 wheeled, four wheels coupled forty inches in diameter, nine by 
 sixteen cylinders, and weighed each, loaded, about twenty-five 
 thousand pounds. The latter were eight-wheeled, six-wheels 
 coupled thirty-six inches in diameter, eleven by sixteen cylinders, 
 and weighed each, loaded, about thirty-five thousand pounds. 
 Each had a swinging-truck of a single pair of wheels in front of 
 the cylinders. The latter type has been maintained for freight, 
 service up to the present time, but principally of larger sizes, 
 engines as heavy as fifty thousand pounds having been turned 
 out. The former type for passenger service was found to be too 
 small and to be unsteady on the track, owing to its comparatively 
 short wheel-base. It was therefore abandoned, and the ordinary 
 " American" pattern, eight-wheeled, four-coupled, substituted. 
 Following the engines for the Denver and Rio Grande Railway, 
 others for other narrow-gauged lines were called for, and the 
 manufacture of this description of rolling stock soon assumed 
 importance. 
 
 The " Consolidation" type, as first introduced for the four feet 
 eight and one half inches gauge in 1866, was adapted to the 
 three-feet gauge in 1873. In 1877, a locomotive on this plan, 
 weighing in working order about sixty thousand pounds, with 
 cylinders fifteen by twenty, was built for working the Garland 
 extension of the Denver and Rio Grande Railway, which crosses 
 the Rocky Mountains with maximum grades of two hundred 
 
 5 
 
66 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 and eleven feet per mile, and minimum curves of thirty degrees. 
 The performance of this locomotive, the " Alamosa," is given 
 in the following extract from a letter from the then General 
 Superintendent of that railway : 
 
 " Denver, Coi,., Aug. 31, 1S77. 
 
 " On the 29th inst. I telegraphed you from Veta Pass — Sangre de Cristo Mountains 
 — that engine ' Alamosa' had just hauled from Garland to the Summit one baggage 
 car and seven coaches, containing one hundred and sixty passengers. Yesterday 
 I received your reply asking for particulars, etc. 
 
 " My estimate of the weight was eighty-five net tons, stretched over a distance of 
 three hundred and sixty feet, or including the engine, of four hundred and five feet 
 
 " The occasion of this sized train was an excursion from Denver to Garland and 
 return. The night before, in going over from La Veta, we had over two hundred 
 passengers, but it was 8 p.m., and, fearing a slippery rail, I put on engine No. 19 as 
 a pusher, although the engineer of the 'Alamosa' said he could haul the train, and 
 I believe he could have done so. The engine and train took up a few feet more 
 than the half circle at ' Mule Shore,' where the radius is one hundred and ninety- 
 three feet. The engine worked splendidly, and moved up the two hundred and 
 eleven feet grades and around the thirty degree curves seemingly with as much ease 
 as our passenger engines on 75 feet grades wiih three coaches and baggage cars. 
 
 " The ' Alamosa' hauls regularly eight loaded cars and caboose, about one hundred 
 net tons; length of train about two hundred and thirty feet. 
 
 " The distance from Garland to \' eta Pass is fourteen and one-quarter miles, and 
 the time is one hour and twenty minutes. 
 
 " Respectfully yours, 
 (Signed) " W. W. BORST, Siip't." 
 
 In addition to narrow-gauge locomotives for the United States, 
 this branch of the product has included a large number of one- 
 metre gauge locomotives for Brazil, three-feet gauge locomotives 
 for Cuba, Mexico, and Peru, and three and one-half feet eauo-e 
 stock for Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Canada, and Australia. 
 
 Locomotives for single-rail railroads were built in 1878 and 
 early in 1879, adapted respectively to the sj-stems of General 
 Roy Stone and Mr. W. W. Riley. 
 
 Mine locomotives, generally of narrow gauge, for underground 
 work, and not over five and one-half feet in height, were fir.st 
 built in 1870. These machines have generally been four- wheels- 
 connected, with inside cylinders and a crank-axle. The width 
 over all of this plan is only sixteen inches greater than the 
 gauge of the track. A number of outside-connected mine 
 locomotives have, however, also been constructed. In this 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 pattern the width is thirty-two inches greater than the gauge 
 of the track. A locomotive of twenty inches gauge for a gold 
 mine in California was built in 1876, and was found entirely 
 practicable and efficient. 
 
 In 1870, in some locomotives for the Kansas Pacific Railway 
 the steel tires were shrunk on without being secured by bolts or 
 rivets in any form, and since that time this method of putting on 
 tires has been the rule. 
 
 In 1 87 1 forty locomotives were constructed for the Ohio and 
 Mississippi Railway, the gauge of which was changed from five 
 feet six inches to four feet eight and one-half inches. The entire 
 lot of forty locomotives was completed and dehvered in about 
 twelve weeks. The gauge of the road was changed on July 4, 
 and the forty locomotives went at once into service in operating 
 the line on the standard gauge. 
 
 During the same year two "double-end" engines of Class 
 10-2614! C, as described in catalogue, were constructed for the 
 Central Railroad of New Jersey, and were the first of this pattern 
 at these works. 
 
 The product of the works, which had been steadily increasing 
 for some years in sympathy with the requirements of the numerous 
 new railroads which were constructing, reached three hundred 
 and thirty-one locomotives in 1871, and four hundred and twenty- 
 two in 1872. Orders for ninety locomotives for the Northern 
 Pacific Railroad were entered during 1870-71, and for one 
 hundred and twenty-four for the Pennsylvania Railroad during ■- 
 1872-73, and mostly executed during those years. A contract 
 was also made during 1872 with the Veronej-Rostoff Railway of 
 Russia for ten locomotives to burn Russian anthracite coal. Six 
 were " Moguls," with cylinders nineteen by twenty-four, and 
 driving-wheels four and one-half feet diameter ; and four were 
 passenger locomotives, " American" pattern, with cylinders 
 seventeen by twenty-four, and driving-wheels five and one-half 
 feet diameter. Nine " American" pattern locomotives, fifteen by 
 twenty-four cylinders, and five feet driving-wheels, were also 
 constructed in 1872-73 for the Hango-Hyvinge Railway of 
 Finland. 
 
 Early in 1873, Mr. Baird retired from the business," having sold 
 
68 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 his interest in the works to his five partners. Mr. Baird died 
 May 19, 1877. A new firm was formed under the style of 
 Burnham, Parry, WilHams & Co., dating from January i, 1873, 
 and Mr. John H. Converse, who had been connected with the 
 works since 1870, became a partner. The product of this year 
 was four hundred and thirty-seven locomotives, the greatest in 
 the history of the business. During a part of the year ten 
 locomotives per week were turned out. Nearly three thousand 
 men were employed. Forty-five locomotives for the Grand 
 Trunk Railway of Canada were built in August, September, 
 and October, 1873, ^^'^ ^1' were delivered in five weeks after 
 shipment of the first. As in the case of the Ohio and Mississippi 
 Railway, previously noted, these were to meet the requirements 
 of a change of gauge from five and one-half feet to four feet 
 eight and one half inches. In November, 1873, under circum- 
 stances of especial urgency, a small locomotive for the Meier 
 Iron Company of St. Louis was wholly made from the raw 
 material in sixteen working days. 
 
 The financial difificulties which prevailed throughout the United 
 States, beginning in September, 1873, and affecting chiefly the 
 railroad interests and all branches of manufacture connected 
 therewith, have operated of course to curtail the production of 
 locomotives since that period. Hence, only two hundred and 
 five locomotives were built in 1 874, and one hundred and thirty 
 in 1875. Among these may be enumerated two sample locomo- 
 tives for burning anthracite coal (one passenger, sixteen by 
 twenty-four cylinders, and one " Mogul" freight, eighteen by 
 twenty-four cylinders) for the Technical Department of the 
 Russian Government; also, twelve " Mogul" freight locomotives, 
 nineteen by twenty-four cylinders, for the Charkoff Nicolaieff 
 Railroad of Russia. A small locomotive to work by compressed 
 air, for drawing street cars, was constructed during 1874 for the 
 Compressed Air Locomotive and Street Car Company of Louis- 
 ville, Ky. It had cylinders seven by twelve, and four wheels 
 coupled, thirty inches in diameter. Another and smaller locomo- 
 tive to work by compressed air was constructed three years later 
 for the Plymouth Cordage Company of Massachusetts, for 
 service on a track in and about their works. It had cylinders 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 69 
 
 five by ten, four wheels coupled twenty-four inches diameter, 
 weight, seven thousand pounds, and has been successfully 
 employed for the work required. 
 
 The year 1876, noted as the year of the Centennial International 
 Exhibition in Philadelphia, brought some increase of business, 
 and two hundred and thirty-two locomotives were constructed. 
 An exhibit consisting of eight locomotives was prepared for this 
 occasion. With the view of illustrating not only different types 
 of American locomotives, but the practice of different railroads, 
 the exhibit consisted chiefly of locomotives constructed to fill 
 orders from various railroad companies of the United States, and 
 from the Imperial Government of Brazil. A " Consolidation" 
 locomotive for burning anthracite coal, for the Lehigh Valley 
 Railroad, for which line the first locomotive of this type was 
 designed and built in 1866; a similar locomotive, to burn bitu- 
 minous coal, and a passenger locomotive for the same fuel for 
 the Pennsylvania Railroad ; a " Mogul" freight locomotive, the 
 " Principe do Grao Para," for the D. Pedro Segundo Railway of 
 Brazil ; and a passenger locomotive (anthracite burner) for the 
 Central Railroad of New Jersey, comprised the larger locomotives 
 contributed by these works to the Exhibition of 1876. To these 
 were added a mine locomotive and two narrow (three feet) gauge 
 locomotives which were among those used in working the Cen- 
 tennial Narrow-Gauge Railway. As this line was in many 
 respects unique, we subjoin the following extracts from an account 
 by its General Manager of the performance of the two three feet 
 gauge locomotives: 
 
 " The gauge of the line was three feet, with double track three and a half miles 
 long, or seven miles in all. For its lenglli it was probably the most crooked road in 
 the world, being made up almost wholly of curves, in order to run near all the 
 principal buildings on the Exhibition grounds. Many of these curves were on our 
 heaviest grades, some having a radius of 215, 230, and 250 feet on grades of 140 
 and 15s feet per mile. These are unusually heavy grades and curves, and when 
 combined as we had them, with only a thirty-five pound iron rail, made the task for 
 our engines exceedingly difticult. 
 
 " Your locomotive 'Schuylkill,' Class 8-18 C (eight-wheeled, four wheels coupled 
 three and a half feet diameter, cylinders twelve by sixteen, weight forty-two thousand 
 six hundred and fifty pounds), began service May 13, and made one hundred and 
 fifty-six days to the close of the Exhibition. The locomotive ' Delaware,' Class 8-l8 
 D (eight-wheeled, six wheels coupled three feet diameter, cylinders twelve by sixteen, 
 
70 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 weight thirty-nine thousand pounds), came into service June g, and made one hun- 
 dred and thirty-one days to the close of the Exhibition. The usual load of each 
 engine was five eight-wheeled passenger cars, frequently carrying over one hundred 
 passengers per car. On special occasions as many as six and seven loaded cars have 
 been drawn by one of these engines. 
 
 " Each engine averaged fully sixteen trips daily, equal to fifty-six miles, and, as 
 the stations were but a short distance apart, the Westinghouse air-brake was applied 
 in making one hundred and sixty daily stops, or a total of twenty-five thousand for 
 each engine. Neither engine was out of ser.vice an hour unless from accidents for 
 which they were in no way responsible." 
 
 [Note. — Average weight of each loaded car about twelve gross tons.] 
 
 The year 1876 was also marked by an extension of locomotive 
 engineering to a new iield in the practice of these works. In the 
 latter part of the previous year an experimental steam sti'eet 
 car was constructed for the purpose of testing the applicability 
 of steam to street railways. This car was completed in No- 
 vember, 1875, and was tried for a few days on a street railway 
 in Philadelphia. It was then sent to Brooklyn, December 25, 
 187s, where it ran from that time until June, 1876. One engineer 
 ran the car and kept it in working order. Its consumption of 
 fuel was between seven and eight pounds of coal per mile run. 
 It drew regularly, night and morning, an additional car, with 
 passengers going into New York in the morning, and returning 
 at night. On several occasions, where speed was practicable, 
 the car was run at the rate of sixteen to eighteen miles per hour. 
 
 In June, 1876, this car was withdrawn from the Atlantic 
 Avenue Railway of Brooklyn, and placed on the Market Street 
 Railway of Philadelphia. It worked with fair success, and very 
 acceptably to the public on that line, from June till nearly the 
 close of the Centennial Exhibition. 
 
 This original steam-car was built with cylinders under the 
 body of the car, the connecting-rods taking hold of a crank- 
 axle, to which the front wheels were attached. The rear wheels 
 of the car were independent, and not coupled with the front 
 wheels. The machinery of the car was attached to an iron bed- 
 plate bolted directly to the wooden framework of the car body. 
 The experiment with this car demonstrated to the satisfaction 
 of its builders the mechanical practicability of the use of steam 
 on street railways, but the defects developed by this experimental 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 71 
 
 car were : first, that it was difficult, or impossible, to make a 
 crank-axle which would not break, the same experience being 
 reached in this respect which had already presented itself in 
 locomotive construction ; second, it was found that great objec- 
 tion existed to attaching the machinery to the wooden car body, 
 which was not sufficiently rigid for the purpose, and which 
 suffered by being racked and strained by the working of the 
 machinery. 
 
 For these reasons this original steam-car was reconstructed, 
 in accordance with the experience which nearly a year's service 
 had suggested. The machinery was made " outside-connected," 
 the same as in an ordinary locomotive, and a strong iron frame- 
 work was designed, entirely independent of the car body, and 
 supporting the boiler and all the machinery. 
 
 
 Steam Street Car. 
 
 The car as thus reconstructed was named the " Baldwin," and 
 is shown by the above illustration. 
 
 The next step in this direction was the construction of a 
 separate " motor," to which one or more cars could be attached. 
 Such a machine, weighing about sixteen thousand pounds, 
 was constructed in the fall of 1876, and sent to the Citizens' 
 Railway of Baltimore, which has the maximum grades of 
 seven feet per hundred, or three hundred and sixty-nine and 
 si.K-tenths feet per mile. It ascended the three hundred and 
 sixty-nine feet grade, drawing one loaded car, when the tracks 
 were covered with mixed snow and dirt to a depth of eight to 
 
72 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 ten inches in places. Another and smaller motor, weighing 
 only thirteen thousand pounds, was constructed about the same 
 time for the Urbano Railway, of Havana, Cuba. Orders for 
 other similar machines followed, and during the ensuing years 
 1877-78-79-80 one hundred and seven separate motors and 
 
 Steam Motor for Street Cars, 
 
 twelve Steam-cars were included in the product. Various city 
 and suburban railways have been constructed with the especial 
 view of employing steam-power, and have been equipped with 
 these machines. One line, the Hill 81 West Dubuque Street 
 Railway, of Dubuqfte, Iowa, was constructed early in 1877, of 
 three and a half feet gauge, with a maximum gradient of nine 
 in one hundred, and was worlced exclusively by two of these 
 motors. The details and character of construction of these 
 machines are essentially the same as locomotive work, but they 
 are made so as to be substantially noiseless, and to show little 
 or no smoke and steam in operation. 
 
 Steel fire-boxes with vertical corrugations in the side sheets 
 were first made by these works early in 1876, in locomotives 
 for the Central Railroad of New Jersey, and for the Delaware, 
 Lackawanna and Western Railway. 
 
 The first American locomotives for New South Wales and 
 Queensland were constructed by the Baldwin Locomotive Works 
 in 1877, and have since been succeeded by additional orders. 
 Six locomotives of the " Consolidation" type for three and 
 one-half feet gauge were also constructed in the latter year for 
 the Government Railways of New Zealand, and two freight 
 locomotives, six-wheels-connected with forward truck, for the 
 Government of Victoria. Four similar locomotives (ten-wheeled, 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 71 
 
 six-coupled, with sixteen by twenty-four cylinders) were also 
 built during the same year for the Norwegian State Railways. 
 
 Forty heavy " Mogul" locomotives (nineteen by twenty-four 
 cylinders, driving-wheels four and one-half feet in diameter) 
 were constructed early in 1878 for two Russian Railways (the 
 Koursk Charkof Azof, and the Orel Griazi). The definite order 
 for these locomotives was only received on the sixteenth of 
 December, 1877^, and, as all were required to be delivered in 
 Russia by the following May, especial despatch was necessary. 
 The working force was increased from eleven hundred to twenty- 
 three hundred men in about two weeks. The first of the forty 
 engines was erected and tried under steam on January 5th, three 
 weeks after receipt of order, and was finished, ready to dismantle 
 and pack for shipment, one week later. The last engine of this 
 order was completed ' February 13th. The forty engines were 
 thus constructed in about eight weeks, besides twenty eight 
 additional engines on other orders, which were constructed 
 wholly or partially, and shipped during the same period. 
 
 The production during the years from 1872 to 1895 inclusive 
 was as follows : 
 
 1872 
 
 1873 
 1874 
 1875 
 1876 
 1877 
 1878 
 1879 
 1880 
 1881 
 1882 
 1883 
 1884 
 1885 
 1886 
 1887 
 
 422 
 
 437 
 205 
 130 
 232 
 18s 
 292 
 298 
 517 
 554 
 563 
 557 
 429 
 242 
 550 
 653 
 737 
 
 locomotives. 
 
 (6,000th locomotive completed.) 
 (7,000th locomotive completed.) 
 
 (8,oooth locomotive completed.) 
 (9,000th locomotive completed.) 
 
74 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 1889 . . 
 
 827 locomc 
 
 1890 . . 
 
 946 
 
 I89I . . 
 
 899 
 
 1892 . . 
 
 731 
 
 1893 . 
 
 772 
 
 1894 . . 
 
 313 
 
 189s . . 
 
 401 
 
 1896 
 
 547 
 
 (11, 000th locomotive completed.) 
 ( 1 2,000th locomotive completed.) 
 ([3,000th locomotive completed.) 
 
 (14,000th locomotive completed.) 
 
 (15,000th locomotive completed.) 
 
 Four tramway motors of twelve tons weight were built early 
 in 1879, on the order of the New South Wales Government, for 
 a tramway having grades of six per cent., and running from the 
 railway terminus to the Sydney Exhibition Grounds. Subse- 
 quently orders have followed for additional motors for other 
 tramways in Sydney. 
 
 The five thousandth locomotive, finished in April, 1880, pre- 
 sented some novel features. It was designed for fast passenger 
 service on the Bound Brook line between Philadelphia and New 
 York, and to run with a light train at a speed of sixty miles per 
 hour, using anthracite coal as fuel. It had cylinders eighteen by 
 twenty-four, one pair of driving-wheels six and one-half feet in 
 diameter, and a pair of trailing-wheels forty-five inches in diam- 
 eter, and equalized with the driving-wheels. Back of the driving- 
 wheels and over the traihng-wheels space was given for a wide 
 fire-box (eight feet long by seven feet wide inside) as required 
 for anthracite coal. By an auxiliary steam cylinder placed under 
 the waist of the boiler, just in front of the fire-box, the bearings 
 on the equalizing beams between trailing- and driving-wheels 
 could be changed to a point forward of their normal position, 
 so as to increase the weight on the driving-wheels when required. 
 The adhesion could thus be varied between the limits of thirty- 
 five thousand to forty-five thousand pounds on the single pair of 
 driving-wheels. This feature of the locomotive was made the 
 subject of a patent. 
 
 In 188 1, a compressed-air locomotive was constructed for the 
 Pneumatic Tramway Engine Company, of New York, on plans 
 prepared by Mr. Robert Hardie. Air-tanks of steel, one-half 
 inch thick, with a capacity of four hundred and sixty-five cubic 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 75 
 
 Steam Inspection Car. 
 
 feet were combined with an upright cylindrical heater, thirty-two 
 and five-eighths inches in diameter. The weight of the machine 
 was thirty-five thousand pounds, of which twenty-eight thousand 
 pounds were on four driving-wheels, forty-two inches in diameter. 
 The cylinders were twelve and a half inches diameter by eighteen 
 inches stroke. Another novelty of the year was a steam-car to 
 take the place of a hand-car. Accompanying illustration shows 
 the design. Its cylinders were 
 four by ten inches, and wheels 
 twenty-four inches diameter. 
 Built for standard gauge track, 
 its weight in working order 
 was five thousand one hun- 
 dred and ten pounds. Similar 
 cars have since been con- 
 structed. During this year 
 the largest single order ever 
 placed on the books was en- 
 tered for the Mexican National Construction Company. It was 
 for one hundred and fifty locomotives, but only a portion of 
 them were ever built. 
 
 The year 1882 was marked by a demand for locomotives 
 greater than could be met by the capacity of existing locomotive 
 works. Orders for one thousand three hundred and twenty-one 
 locomotives were entered on the books during the year, deliveries 
 of the greater part being promised only in the following year. 
 The six-thousandth locomotive was completed in January of this 
 year, and the seven-thousandth in October, 1883. 
 
 Early in 1882, an inquiry was received from the Brazilian 
 Government, for locomotives for the Cantagallo Railway, which 
 were required to meet the following conditions : — To haul a train 
 of forty gross tons of cars and lading up a grade of eight and 
 three-tenths per cent, (four hundred and thirty-eight feet per 
 mile), occurring in combination with curves of forty metres 
 radius (one hundred and thirty-one feet radius, or forty-three 
 and eight-tenths degrees). The line is laid with heavy steel rails, 
 and the gauge is one and one-tenth metres, or three feet seven and 
 one-third inches. The track upon which it was proposed to run 
 
76 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 these locomotives is a constant succession of reverse curves, it 
 being stated that ninety-one curves of the radius named occur 
 within a distance of three thousand four hundred and twenty- 
 nine metres, or about two miles. The line had previously 
 been operated on the " Fell" system, with central rack rail, and 
 it was proposed to introduce locomotives working by ordinary 
 adhesion, utilizing the central rail for the application of brake 
 power. An order was eventually received to proceed with the 
 construction of three locomotives to do this work. The engines 
 built were of the following general dimensions : viz. — Cylinders 
 eighteen by twenty inches ; six driving-wheels connected, thirty- 
 nine inches in diameter ; wheel-base nine feet six inches ; boiler 
 fifty-four inches in diameter, with one hundred and ninety flues 
 two inches diameter, ten feet nine inches long ; and with side 
 tanks, carried on the locomotive. In March, 1883, they were 
 shipped from Philadelphia, and on a trial made October 17, in 
 the presence of the officials of the road, and other prominent 
 railway officers, the guaranteed performance was accomplished. 
 One of the engines pulled a train weighing forty tons, composed 
 of three freight cars loaded with sleepers and one passenger car, 
 and made the first distance of eight kilometres to Boca do Mato 
 with a speed of twenty-four kilometres per hour; from there it 
 started, making easily an acchvity of eight and five-tenths per 
 cent, in grade, and against a curve of forty metres in radius. 
 Eight additional locomotives for this line were constructed at 
 intervals during the following ten years, and the road has been 
 worked by locomotives with ordinary adhesion since their adop- 
 tion as above described. 
 
 In 1885 a locomotive was built for the Dom Pedro Segundo 
 Railway of Brazil, having five pairs of driving-wheels connected 
 and a leading two-wheeled truck. From this has arisen the 
 title " Decapod" (having ten feet) as applied to subsequent loco- 
 motives of this type. Its cylinders were twenty-two by twenty- 
 six inches ; driving-wheels forty-five inches diameter and grouped 
 in a driving-wheel-base of seventeen feet. The rear flanged 
 driving-wheels, however, were given one-quarter of an inch more 
 total play on the rails than the next adjacent pair ; the second 
 and third pairs were without flanges, and the front pair was 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. "J"] 
 
 flanged. The locomotive could therefore pass a curve of a radius 
 as short as five hundred feet, the rails being spread one-half inch 
 wider than the gauge of track, as is usual on curves. The flanges 
 of the first and fourth pairs of driving-wheels, making practically 
 a rigid wheel-base of twelve feet eight inches, determined the 
 friction on a curve. The weight of the engine in working order 
 was one hundred and forty-one thousand pounds, of which one 
 hundred and twenty-six thousand pounds were on the driving- 
 wheels. During this year the first rack-rail locomotive in the 
 practice of these works was constructed for the Ferro Principe 
 do Grao Para Railroad of Brazil. An illustration of same is 
 given herewith. Its general dimensions were : Cylinders, twelve 
 by twenty inches; pitch line of cog-wheel, 41.35 inches; weight, 
 15.74 tons. Several additional similar locomotives, but of dif- 
 ferent weights, have since been constructed for the same line. 
 
 At the close of this year, Mr. Edward Longstreth withdrew 
 from the firm on account of ill health, and a new partnership was 
 formed, adding Messrs. William C. Stroud, WiUiam H. Morrow, 
 and WiUiam L. Austin. Mr. Stroud had been connected with 
 the business since 1867, first as book-keeper and subsequently as 
 Financial Manager. Mr. Morrow, since entering the service in 
 1 87 1, had acquired a varied and valuable experience, first in the 
 accounts, then in the department of extra work, and subsequently 
 
 Locomotive with Outside Frames. 
 
 as Assistant Superintendent, becoming General Manager on Mr. 
 Longstreth's retirement. Mr. Austin, who entered the works in 
 1870, had for several years been assistant to Mr. Henszey in all 
 matters connected with the designing of locomotives. The eight- 
 thousandth locomotive was completed in June, 1886. A loco- 
 
78 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 motive for the Antofogasta Railway (thirty inches gauge) of 
 Chili, constructed with outside frames, was completed in No- 
 vember, 1886, and is illustrated on page JJ. The advantages 
 of this method of construction of narrow-gauge locomotives in 
 certain cases were evidenced in the working of this machine, in 
 giving a greater width of fire-box between the frames and a 
 greater stability of the engine due to the outside journal 
 bearings. 
 
 In 1887 a new form of boiler was brought out in some ten- 
 wheeled locomotives constructed for the Denver and Rio Grande 
 Railroad. A long wagon-top was used, extending sufficiently 
 forward of the crown-sheet to allow the dome to be placed in 
 front of the fire-box and near the centre of the boiler, and the 
 crown-sheet was supported by radial stays from the outside .shell. 
 Many boilers of this type have since been constructed. 
 
 Mr. Charles T. Parry, who had been connected with the works 
 almost from their beginning and a partner since 1867, died on 
 July 18, 1887, after an illness of several months. 
 
 The first locomotives for Japan were shipped in June, 1887, 
 being two six-wheeled engines of three feet six inch gauge for 
 the Mie Kie mines. 
 
 Mr. William H. Morrow, a partner since January i, 1886, and 
 who had been previously associated with the business since ,1871, 
 
 died February 19, i! 
 
 The demand for steam 
 motors for street railway ser- 
 vice attained large proportions 
 at this period, and ninety-five 
 were built during the years 
 1 888 and 1 889. Two rack-rail 
 locomotives on the Riggen- 
 bach system, one with a single 
 cog-wheel and four carrying- 
 wheels, and weighing in work- 
 ing order thirt)--two thousand pounds, for the Corcovado Railway 
 of Brazil, and the other having two cog-wheels and eight carrj-- 
 ing-wheels, and weighing in working order seventy-nine thousand 
 pounds, for the Estrada de Ferro Principe do Grao Para of 
 
 Rack Locomotive, Riggenbach System. 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 79 
 
 Brazil, were constructed during this year. The general plans 
 are shown by accompanying illustrations. 
 
 In October, 1889, the first compound locomotive in the practice 
 of the works was completed and placed on the Baltimore and 
 Ohio Railroad. It was of the four-cylinder type, as designed 
 and patented by Mr. S. M. 
 Vauclain, who had been con- 
 nected with the works since 
 1883 and its General Super- 
 intendent since February 1 1 , 
 1886. The economy in fuel 
 and water and the efficiency 
 
 1,1 1 r - 1 J Rack Locomotive, with Two Cog-Wheels. 
 
 m both passenger and freight 
 
 service given by this design led to its introduction on man}' 
 leading railroads. Following the first four-cylinder compound 
 locomotive built in 1889, three were built in 1890, eighty-two 
 in 1 89 1, two hundred and thirteen in 1892, one hundred and 
 sixty in 1893, thirty in 1894, fifty-one in 1895, and one hundred 
 and seventy-three during 1896. 
 
 In 1889 a test case was made to see in how short a time a 
 locomotive could be built. On Saturday, June 22d, Mr. Robert 
 H. Coleman ordered a narrow-gauge " American" type passenger 
 locomotive and tender, which it was agreed should be ready for 
 .service on his railroad in Lebanon County, Pa., by the fourth of 
 July following. The boiler material was at once ordered and 
 was received Tuesday, June 25th. The boiler was completed 
 and taken to the Erecting, Shop on Friday, June 28th, and on 
 Monday, July 1st, the machinery, frames, wheels, etc., were 
 attached and the locomotive was tried under steam in the works. 
 The tender was completed the following day, Tuesday, July 2d, 
 thus making the record of construction of a complete locomo- 
 tive from the raw material of the art in eight working days. 
 
 The manufacture of wrought iron wheel-centres for both 
 truck and driving-wheels was begun at this time under patents 
 of Mr. S. M. Vauclain, Nos. 462,605, 462,606, and 531,487. 
 
 In 1890 the fir.st rack-rail locomotive on the Abt system 
 was constructed for the Pikes' Peak Railroad, and during this 
 year and 1893 four locomotives were built for working the 
 
8o 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 Rack Locomotive, Abt System. 
 
 grades of that line, which vary from eight to twenty-five per 
 cent. One of these locomotives, weighing in working order fifty- 
 two thousand six hundred and eighty pounds, pushes twenty-five 
 thousand pounds up the maximum grades of one in foui-. We 
 
 give herewith an illustration 
 of one of these locomotives, 
 which is a four-cylinder 
 " Compound." 
 
 Three " Mogul" locomo- 
 tives, of one metre gauge, 
 fifteen by eighteen cylin- 
 ders, driving-wheels forty- 
 one inches diameter, were 
 completed and shipped in 
 July, 1890, for working the Jaffa and Jerusalem Railway in 
 Palestine, and two additional locomotives for the same line were 
 constructed in 1892. 
 
 In 1 89 1 the largest locomotives in the practice of the works 
 were designed and constructed. For the St. Clair Tunnel of 
 the Grand Trunk Railway, under the St. Clair River, four tank 
 locomotives were supplied, 
 
 each with cylinders twenty- . *, ^ H life 
 
 two by twenty- eight ; five 'i. , .-""■pIHkH^- ."— ^. 
 
 pairs of driving-wheels con- 
 nected, fifty inches diameter, 
 in a wheel-base of eighteen 
 feet five inches ; boiler, sev- 
 enty-four inches diameter ; 
 fire-box, eleven feet long by 
 three and one-half feet wide ; and tanks on the boiler of twenty- 
 one hundred and ten gallons capacity. The weight in working 
 order of each engine was one hundred and eighty-six thousand 
 eight hundred pounds without fire in fire-box. The tunnel is 
 six thousand feet long, with grades of two per cent, at each 
 entrance, twenty-five hundred and nineteen hundred and fifty 
 feet long respectively. Each locomotive was required to take a 
 train load of seven hundred and sixty tons exclusive of its own 
 weight, and in actual operation each of these locomotives has 
 
 ' Decap 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 hauled from twenty-five to thirty-three loaded cars in one train 
 through the tunnel. 
 
 For the New York, Lake Erie and Western Railroad, five 
 Compound locomotives of the " Decapod" class were completed 
 in December, 1891. Their general dimensions were as follows: 
 Cylinders, high pressure sixteen inches, low pressure twenty- 
 seven inches diameter, stroke twenty-eight inches ; five pairs of 
 driving-wheels coupled fifty inches diameter in a wheel-base of 
 eighteen feet ten inches ; boiler seventy-six inches diameter ; 
 three hundred and fifty-four tubes, two inches diameter, twelve 
 feet long ; fire-box ( Wootten type) eleven feet long, eight feet 
 two inches wide inside ; combustion chamber thirty-six inches 
 long ; weight in working order one hundred and ninety-five 
 thousand pounds, weight on driving-wheels one hundred and 
 seventy-two thousand pounds ; weight of eight-wheeled tender 
 with fuel and four thousand five hundred gallons of water, eighty- 
 nine thousand four hundred and twenty pounds. The first, 
 fourth, and fifth pairs of driving-wheels were flanged, but the 
 fifth pair had one-fourth inch additional play on the track. 
 These locomotives are used as pushers on the Susquehanna Hill, 
 where curves of five degrees are combined with grades of sixty 
 feet per mile, doing the work 
 of two ordinary " Consolida- 
 tion" locomotives. From 
 one thousand two hundred 
 and fifty to one thousand 
 three hundred net tons of 
 cars and lading, making a 
 train of forty-five loaded 
 cars, are hauled by one of 
 these locomotives in con- 
 nection with a twenty by twenty-four cylinder " Consolidation." 
 
 Mr. William C. Stroud, who had been a partner since 1886, 
 died on September 21, 1891. 
 
 The first locomotives for Africa were constructed during this 
 year. They were of the " Mogul" type, with cylinders eighteen 
 by twenty-two inches, driving-wheels forty-eight inches diameter, 
 and for three feet six inches gauge. 
 
 6 
 
 S. Ellero-Saltino (Vallombrosa). 
 
82 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 The product for 1892 and 1893 included, as novelties, two 
 rack-rail locomotives for a mountain railway near Florence, Italy, 
 and twenty-five compound " Forney" locomotives for the South 
 Side Elevated Railroad, of Chicago. At the World's Columbian 
 Exposition in Chicago, May to October inclusive, an exhibit was 
 made consisting of seventeen locomotives, as follows : 
 
 "Standard Gauge. — A Decapod locomotive, similar to those 
 above described, built in 1891 for the New York, Lake Erie and 
 Western Railroad. A high-speed locomotive of new type, with 
 Vauclain compound cyhnders, a two-wheel leading truck, two 
 pairs of driving-wheels, and a pair of trailing wheels under the 
 fire-box. This locomotive was named " Columbia," and the same 
 name has been applied to the type. An express passenger loco- 
 motive of the pattern used by the Central Railroad of New Jersey ; 
 one of the pattern used by the Philadelphia and Reading Rail- 
 road, and one of the pattern used by the Baltimore and Ohio 
 Railroad. The three roads mentioned operate together the 
 " Royal Blue Line" between New York and Washington. A 
 saddle tank double-ender type locomotive, with steam windlass, 
 illustrating typical logging locomotive practice. A single ex- 
 pansion 18 X 24 cylinder American type locomotive. A single 
 expansion 19 x 24 cylinder Mogul locomotive. A single ex- 
 pansion 20 X 24 cylinder ten-wheel freight locomotive for the 
 Baltimore and Ohio Southwestern Railroad. A compound ten- 
 wheel passenger locomotive shown in connection with a train 
 exhibited by the Pullman Palace Car Co. A compound Consoli- 
 dation locomotive for the Norfolk and Western Railroad. Three 
 locomotives were shown in connection with the special exhibit of 
 the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, viz., one compound and one 
 single expansion passenger locomotive, and one ten-wheel pas- 
 senger locomotive. 
 
 Narrow-gauge. — A one-metre-gauge compound American 
 type locomotive. A three-foot-gauge ten-wheel compound 
 locomotive, with outside frames, for the Mexican National Rail- 
 road, and a thirty-inch-gauge saddle tank locomotive for mill or 
 furnace work. 
 
 The depression of business which began in the summer of 
 1893, reduced the output of the works for that year to seven 
 
BALDWIN' LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 83 
 
 hundred and seventy-two, and in 1894 to three hundred and 
 thirteen locomotives. Early in 1895, a new type of passenger 
 locomotive was brought out, illustrated by annexed cut. To this 
 the name " Atlantic" type was given. The advantages found in 
 this design are a large boiler, fitting the engine for high speed ; 
 
 Atlantic Tvpe. 
 
 a fire-box of liberal proportions and desirable form placed over 
 the rear frames, but of ample depth and width ; and the location 
 of the driving-wheels in front of the fire-box, allowing- the boiler 
 to be placed lower than in the ordinary " American" or " Ten- 
 wheeled" type. For the enginemen, who, in this class of loco- 
 motive, ride behind, instead of over the driving-wheels, greater 
 ease in riding, and greater safety in case of the breakage of a 
 side-rod, are important advantages. 
 
 The first electric locomotive was constructed in 1895, and was 
 intended for experimental work for account of the North 
 American Company. The 
 electirical parts were designed 
 by Messrs. Sprague, Duncan 
 & Hutchison, Electrical En- 
 gineers, New York. Two 
 other electric locomotives 
 for use in connection with 
 mining operations were built 
 in 1896, in co-operation with 
 the Westinghouse Electric Manufacturing Company, which sup- 
 plied the electrical parts. 
 
 A high-speed passenger locomotive, embracing several novel 
 features, was built in 1895, for service on the New York division 
 
 Electric Locomotive. 
 
84 
 
 HISTORY OF THE 
 
 of the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad. The boiler was of 
 the Wootten type, the cylinders were compound, thirteen and 
 twenty-two by twenty-six, and the driving-wheels (one pair) 
 were eighty-four and one-quarter inches diameter. The cut 
 
 below shows the general design. 
 
 High-Speed Locomotive. 
 
 The weight of the engine in working order was as follows : 
 On front truck, thirty-nine thousand pounds ; on trailing 
 wheels, twenty-eight thousand pounds ; on the driving-wheels, 
 forty-eight thousand pounds. This locomotive and a duplicate 
 built in the following year, have been regularly used in pas- 
 senger service, hauling five to eight cars, and making the dis- 
 tance between Jersey City and Philadelphia, ninety miles, in one 
 hundred and five minutes, including six stops. 
 
 In July, 1895, a combination rack and adhesion locomotive 
 
 was constructed for the San 
 Domingo Improvement Com- 
 pany, having compound cylin- 
 ders eight inches and thirteen 
 inches diameter by eighteen 
 inches stroke to operate two 
 pairs of coupled adhesion 
 
 CuMBiNATiON Rack and Adhesion Locomotive. ,,.u 1., J ■ r ■ ^ 
 
 Wheels, and a pair of smgle 
 expansion cylinders, eleven inches by eighteen inches, to operate 
 a single rack-wheel constructed upon the Abt system. 
 
 This locomotive was furnished with two complete sets of 
 machinery, entirely independent of each other, and was built 
 with the view eventually to remove the rack attachments and 
 operate the locomotive by adhesion alone. 
 
 During the years 1895 and 1896, contracts were executed for 
 
BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 85 
 
 several railroads in Russia, aggregating one hundred and thirty- 
 eight locomotives of the four-cylinder compound type. 
 
 On January i, 1896, Samuel M. Vauclain, Alba B. Johnson, 
 and George Burnham, Jr., were admitted to partnership. 
 
 Two combination rack and adhesion locomotives were built 
 in 1896 for the Penoles Mining Company, of Mexico, having 
 compound cylinders nine and 
 one-half and fifteen inches 
 diameter by twenty-two inches 
 stroke, connected to the driv- 
 ing-wheels through walking- 
 beams. Two pairs of wheels 
 are fixed on the axles and act 
 as adhesion driving-wheels, 
 and the rear wheels are loose 
 on axle and act only as carrying wheels. All three coupled axles 
 carry rack pinions of the Abt system. Those on the axles of 
 the two pairs of wheels used for adhesion are thrown into opera- 
 tion by clutches. 
 
 The record of the Baldwin Locomotive Works has thus been 
 given for sixty-five years of existence and continuous operation. 
 Over fifteen thousand locomotives have been constructed since 
 the " Old Ironsides," in 1831. That engine was nearly a year in 
 building. 
 
 The following figures indicate the growth of the works. 
 
 Combination Rack and Adhesion Locomotive. 
 
 Works established 
 
 i,OOOth locomotive b 
 
 2,000th " 
 
 3,000th 
 
 4,000th 
 
 5, 000th 
 
 6,000th 
 
 7,000th 
 
 8,000th 
 
 9,000th " 
 10,000th 
 II, 000th " 
 
 • 1831 
 1 86 1 
 
 . 1869 
 1872 
 1876 
 
 . 1880 
 1882 
 1883 
 
 . 1886 
 1888 
 1889 
 
 . 1890 
 
HISTORY OF THE BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS. 
 
 1 2,oooth locomotive built 1891 
 
 13,000th " " • 1892 
 
 14,000th " " 1894 
 
 15,000th " " . . 1896 
 
 It will be seen from the foregoing that, while thirty years were 
 occupied in building the first thousand engines, almost as many 
 were built in the single year of 1890. 
 
 The present organization, based upon an annual capacity of 
 one thousand locomotives, equal to three and one-third locomo- 
 tives per working day, is as follows : 
 
 Number of men employed . . .5100 
 
 Hours of labor per man per day. . 10 
 
 Principal departments run continuously, 
 
 hours per day . . . . 24 
 
 Horse-power employed .... 5000 
 Number of buildings comprised in Works . 24 
 Acreage comprised in Works . . 16 
 
 Number of dynamos for furnishing power 
 
 to drill presses, punching-machines, 
 
 shears, cranes, and for lighting . 26 
 
 Number of electric lamps in service . . 3000 
 Consumption of coal in net tons, per week, 
 
 approximately . . . . lOOO 
 
 Consumption of iron, in net tons, per week, 
 
 approximately . . . 1500 
 
 Consumption of other materials, in net tons, 
 
 per day, approximately . . 40 
 
 The location, in the largest manufacturing city in America, 
 gives especial facilities and advantages. Proximity to the prin- 
 cipal coal and iron regions of the counti}' renders all required 
 materials promptly available. A large permanent population of 
 skilled mechanics employed in similar branches in other Phila- 
 delphia workshops, gives an abundant force of expert workmen 
 from which to draw when necessary. All parts of locomotives 
 and tenders, except the boiler and tank plates, the steel tires, and 
 steel castings, chilled wheels, boiler tubes and special patented 
 appliances, are made in the Works from the raw materials. 
 

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