Here's lookin' atcha

Here's lookin' atcha. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

GG1 (“Gee-Gee-One”) #4896 (pictured above) is looking at me from the display on my new computer.
4896 is the desktop-picture on my new Apple iBook Pro laptop computer.
“Desktop-picture” is “wallpaper” to youz Windows users, who are in the majority.
4896 was also the desktop-picture on my prior machine, where all previous blogs were generated.
I'm a railfan, and have been since age two. (That's 64 years ago.)
The Pennsylvania Railroad's GG1 electric locomotive was the greatest railroad locomotive of all time, manufactured in the '30s and early '40s.
”GG1” because it's two 4-6-0 wheel arrangements connected by a central hinge. A 4-6-0 steam-locomotive in Pennsy parlance was their G series.
An original GG1 design was road-tested against a 4-8-4 R series electric locomotive, but the GG1 tracked more stably at speed.
139 examples were thereafter built, and turned out to be the greatest railroad locomotive of all time.
Industrial-designer Raymond Loewy (“LO-eeee;” as in “oh”) was brought in to improve the GG1's basic steeplecab design.
Lucky Strike cigarettes and the Coke bottle are both Loewy designs.
Loewy convinced the railroad to use an all-welded steel shell, instead of the original shell of riveted small panels.
He also improved the body curvature around the headllght, giving the engine a cyclops eye.
As a teenager, I saw many GG1s, living as I did in northern DE along what later became Amtrak's Northeast Corridor, the Pennsylvania Railroad's fabulous New York to Washington DC electrified line.
And every time I saw one it was doing 80-100 mph.
The GG1 could temporarily put 9,000 horsepower to the railheads, which is extraordinary.
Temporary because at that rate its traction-motors would overheat.
In constant use a GG1 was rated about 4,000 horsepower.
Current single-unit diesel locomotive technology is around 4,000 horsepower.
In 1959 I rode behind a GG1 taking the “Congressional Limited” from Philadelphia south to Wilmington, DE.
27 cars, which with passenger equipment is a heavy train.
In no time we were boomin'-and-zoomin' at 80-90 mph.
The GG1 lasted over 40 years. The last was retired in 1983; that's almost 50.
A typical steam-locomotive might last 30 years; diesels about 20.
I saw 4896 many times, but only snagged this one photograph, at the maintenance shops in Wilmington, DE.
4896 is also the only GG1 I was shown through, in early 1966 at 1 a.m., at Washington Union Station.
I was there as part of a college seminar to consider government employ, but spent most of my time at Washington Union Station.
It was an epiphany; the GG1 was the greatest railroad locomotive ever.
So I long ago put 4896 on my computer desktop here at home.
I had other desktop pictures at the mighty Mezz.
The picture is from a scan of the negative done long ago at Visual Studies Workshop.
I've tried scanning the print, but it looks awful.


(Photo by Tom Hughes.)

So now 4896 is on my new laptop.
That makes it my computer.
4896 was scrapped, although 16 GG1s remain, but none are operable.
They had transformers inside that had to be drained of PCB-laden coolant.
Some were filled with concrete or sand.
A GG1 is in Syracuse, NY, #4933.
The best one remaining is #4935 at Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, pictured above.

• The “mighty Mezz” is the Canandaigua Daily-Messenger newspaper, from where I retired over four years ago. Best job I ever had. (“Canandaigua” [“cannon-DAY-gwuh”] is a small city nearby where we live in Western NY. The city is also within a rural town called “Canandaigua.” The name is Indian, and means “Chosen Spot.” —It’s about 15 miles away.)
• “ Tom Hughes” is my brother-from-Delaware’s only son. Like me he's also a railfan.