A pair of Norfolk & Western locomotives are shown working at the coal loading facility in Huron. Notice the hopper pushers to the left of N&W 2961. The top image shows the full scene while the bottom image is a closer crop.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
It might have been a grubby day in Brewster in early 1973, but the opportunity to photograph a Fairbanks Morse locomotive was not one to be missed. Norfolk & Western H-12-44 No. 2140 is shown in the top photograph working in Brewster Yard. The locomotive was built for the Nickel Plate Road in March 1957.
In the bottom image, No. 2149 is also shown in Brewster. Built for the NKP in April 1948, this image was made in the late 1960s or early 1970s.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
Norfolk & Western No. 3597 is shown in Bellevue in June 1973. The former Wabash unit is an Alco-repowered Fairbanks Morse Train Master.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
The wayback machine has landed us in Brewster on Sept. 3, 1980. This was Norfolk & Western territory then after having been in the domain of the Nickel Plate Road for more than a decade and of the original Wheeling & Lake Erie for several decades before that. Laid out before us is a nice array of N&W motive power of the early 1980s. Note that this was during the transition between N&W heralds.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
Norfolk & Western No. 2149, a former Nickel Plate Road Fairbanks-Morse H12-44 sits outside the shops in Brewster in June 1975. The unit is worn and a little battered, but that comes with the territory of having been a hard worker for all these years on the railroad.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
Sometimes I forget just how large the Wheeling & Lake Erie/Nickel Plate/Norfolk & Western shops are at Brewster.
I haven’t been to the shops in nearly two decades, but on the Sunday afternoon of Nov. 3, 1968, I was there.
Permission for photography everywhere but inside the shops was quickly given and I went out to take photos.
I must have had my wide-angle lens on my camera to get so much (but not all) of the building in the scene. More than likely I was taking a photo of the locomotives (FM H12-44, EMD SD7 or EMD SD9, and Alco switcher) more than of the scene.
Looking at the shops then, I probably did not realize that the W&LE had built steam locomotives inside the shops. To find only three locomotives outside was a surprise since often five to seven would have been in this scene.
Memories brought on by images such as this make me remember how blessed I am.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
Norfolk & Western SD45 No. 1804 leads train DJ-12 eastbound in Orrville on July 25, 1984. The originated at Oakwood Yard in Detroit and was bound for the Chessie System at Connellsville, Pennsylvania.
Note the open auto rack car second in the consist behind the motive power. Such a practice was common once but would not be done today.
The train is operating on the original Wheeling & Lake Erie, which has since reverted back to the modern version of the W&LE.
Norfolk & Western Alco RS36 No. 2871 and Baldwin AS16 No. 7903 are moving four cabooses in Bellevue in late 1973. No. 7903 had by this time been repowered by EMD. Not ethe Bessemer & Lake Erie locomotive behind the cabooses. Both N&W units were originally built for the Nickel Plate Road.
Norfolk & Western Alco RS36 No. 2865 is paired with an Alco-repowered FM Train Master as hump power in Bellevue on May 28, 1973. As far as I know, I never took the two together in one photo. The 2865 was built for the Nickel Plate Road in February 1962 as No. 865.
All of the images shown above were made on May 30, 1968, in Kent.
The tracks shown were originally the Conotton Valley then became part of the original Wheeling & Lake Erie. Over the years they were merged into the Nickel Plate Road and then the Norfolk & Western.
Today, they make up the Cleveland Subdivision of the modern W&LE.
The series was made in several locations and feature the former passenger station and the bridge over the Baltimore & Ohio.
N&W No. 2496, is a GP9 while No. 2570 is an Alco RS11. Both were built for the NKP.
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