Now before someone say it, Southern 1401 Can Not be restored. The way the Smithsonian was built was after the locomotive was place inside . If they try to remove that wall the main supports would fall in causing major damage to the building itself. Lastly there's not enough room inside to take this thing apart and that's the only way that I could see to remove this engine. Thanks for the post and your time.
The Smithsonian was not built around the locomotive, the museum just wont give it up. Southern tried to get the 1401 back for the Southern Steam Program, but the museum declined simply because they just didn't want to.
Excellent. I got to run a couple of steam locomotives during my railroad career and they are fun to operate. I have the MTH Rail King version of this locomotive, but it is #1396. I'm not sure why they didn't use 1401. A very good video.
Not Graham Clayton but Graham Claytor. I once worked - well, twice - at The Great Train Store outside Atlanta when a young mother came to my cash register and paid for her child’s toy with a check on the account of Graham Claytor. “Your husband looks a little young and, uh, alive to be the former president of the Southern Railway,” I told her. “Oh, he’s a nephew. They are all named that,” she replied with a laugh. Speaking of Roosevelt, during my student days at Georgia State University I worked nights at Patterson’s Springhill Funeral Home. Patterson’s was called to the Little White House to embalm Pres. Roosevelt. In the “private office which was really a museum, were pages from old Atlanta Journal and Constitution newspapers. On those pages about Roosevelt’s death I saw photos of younger versions of several of the men I was working with 1969-1971.
Southern Railway, not Southern Railroad. (Though Railway is British, Railroad is American jargon). The distinction harks back to the many bankruptcies that occured over the years, with reorganized RRs emerging with different corporate names simply by changing from XX Railroad to XX Railway, so they didn't have to repaint any equipment. Southern's reporting marks have long been SOU, not SRR.
The various PS-class Pacifics were standard designs dictated by the United States Railway Administration (USRA), created to operate all US RRs during WW1. These successful, standardized designs simplified manufacturing and were used in many configurations built by various builders long after WWI ended.
The PS4 Pacific was in fact, not a USRA design it was heavily based off of the USRA design but with notable differences in appearance and performance this is one of my favorite steam locomotives. I’ve researched it a lot.
Don’t forget about the two non-Southern Ps-4s; Atlanta & West Point/Western Railroad of Alabama P-74 pacifics 190 and 290. A&WP 290 is even preserved in Duluth, Georgia, at the Southeastern Railway Museum. She’s currently undergoing some major repairs.
