“Queen of the West End” versus Allegheny Summit

“Queen of the West End.” (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

First of all, I should say that Nickel Plate 765 (2-8-4), once called “the Queen of the West End,” is by far the BEST restored steam-locomotive I have ever ridden behind.
And I’ve ridden behind a few — some of the best — Union-Pacific Challenger #3985 (4-6-6-4), Norfolk & Western #1218, also an articulated like 3985, but 2-6-6-4, and Norfolk & Western J #611, 4-8-4, semi-streamlined, before the Dismal Swamp derailment, which limited it to 45 mph.
When I rode it, 611 cruised at 80+!
765 is not remarkable like 611 was, but it’s run hard and fast, mainly because it can.
I rode behind 765 through New River Gorge in WV back in the early ‘90s, and we cruised at 70-75 mph!
I will never forget it! That’s goin’ to my grave.
We chuffed lazily out of the yard in Huntington, WV, and Chessie gave us the railroad, green lights as far as I could see.
The engineer, who was probably Rich Melvin, took the throttle to the roof: wide-open.
I clocked it: 75 mph!
We passed a coal-train stopped in a siding; zoom-zoom-zoom-zoom!
I was in the right-hand dutch-door of the first coach, shooting video, and I wasn’t leaving my post.
I had to wear swim-goggles to keep 765’s cinders out of my eyes. I returned to my motel looking like a coal-miner, covered with soot.
A gondola-car was in front of us, between the engine and the first coach. It was carrying a large diesel generator to provide electricity for our coaches.
That gondola was rockin’-and-rollin’ — flexing along its side-panels. That gondola had probably never gone that fast.
On the old Chessie main in WV we crested Scary Hill at 60+. Little kids were at trackside waving just like I was at that age. It started me crying.
And 765‘s whistle is the best I’ve ever heard. I have it as my cellphone ringtone.
A diesel-locomotive air-horn is wimpy by comparison.
765‘s whistle will wake the dead.
It was a semi-religious experience, almost an epiphany. When I called my wife later that night — she wasn’t with me — I started crying again. Never in all my born days had I had such an experience.
Nickel Plate was merged by Norfolk & Western in 1964, and Norfolk Southern is a 1982 merger of Norfolk & Western and Southern Railway, so now the old Nickel Plate is Norfolk Southern.
Nickel Plate, as so nicknamed, is the New York, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad (it never attained New York City). It got its nickname from a New York Central executive, because it was so competitive.
New York, Chicago & St. Louis Railroad was was constructed in 1881 along the south shore of the Great Lakes connecting Buffalo and Chicago to compete with the New York Central’s Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway. —Before NYC&SL, LS&MS had a monopoly; it was the only railroad.
The whole idea of NYC&SL was to provide competing railroad-service from the midwest into Buffalo. The railroad still competes to Buffalo, although now the competition is CSX, their old New York Central lines.
Nickel Plate prided itself on high-speed freight-railway service. It was an alternative to NYC (LS&MS).
It was a level and fast railroad. Operation could be quick across Ohio and Indiana.
The Nickel Plate Berks (“Berkshire;” named after the mountains in western Massachusetts, for which it was developed) were a successful attempt at high-speed freight-railway service into Buffalo. They were a final attempt by Nickel Plate to use steam locomotion, and 765 was one of the best.
765 has been around quite a while in railfan excursion service.
Pere-Marquette (“Pair Mar-KETT) #1225, the Polar Express engine, pretty much the same as NKP 765, ran side-by-side trips with 765 in WV, and 765 skonked it royally.
I fact, 1225 crippled.
And I think 765 was pulling a coal-train.
765 can run hard and fast. 3985 can run fast too, we cruised at 60+ when I rode behind it.
But it was pulling only five passenger-cars, although it can pull many more.
When I rode behind 765 we were pulling 33 cars, almost too much train for 765.
Yet we were boomin’-and-zoomin’. —And the grade was .4-.5 percent, not too bad, but all uphill.
765 is a Lima (Locomotive; “LYE-muh,” as in “lima-bean”) SuperPower Berkshire. (Lima also fielded a SuperPower 2-10-4, also a SuperPower 2-6-6-6 articulated.)
Lima’s SuperPower locomotives maximized performance of steam-locomotives: a hot-rodded steam-locomotive.
Steam-locomotion is boiling water into steam used for propulsion.
The limitation is generating enough steam to continue operation at high speed.
Steam-locomotives can run out of steam.
SuperPower was aimed at continuous steam-generation at high speed.
Give it a gigantic boiler, and a firebox big enough to maximize coal-burning.
Nickel Plate was the prime element of the so-called “Alphabet Route” service, which used various railroads to get to the northeast, avoiding Pennsy and New York Central (and Erie and B&O).
The Nickel Plate Berks were extremely successful at high-speed service. They could be hammered hard, yet they kept boomin’-and-zoomin’.
Not only were SuperPower locomotives like the Nickel Plate Berk strong, but they stayed strong at high speed.
Older locomotives might run out of steam at such speeds, but not SuperPower.
And 765 was one of the best Berks on Nickel Plate.
It’s just that quite often speedy railroad-service is a siren-song. Railroads tend to be slow and ponderous.
But SuperPower on Nickel Plate was perfect. The route was easy and flat enough to allow fast operation.
And that was despite limitations, like street-running through Erie, PA. And Nickel Plate’s route was not that easy either. There were hills and grades near Erie not on parallel New York Central, yet NYC seemed limited by its size and grandeur, old and bloated and over-managed and fustian.
When the Berks were finally retired in 1958, #765 was donated to the City of Fort Wayne, IN, and put on display renumbered as 767, a significant engine to Fort Wayne.
It deteriorated on display, so a group of railfans, the Fort Wayne Railroad Historical Society, rescued the locomotive and renumbered it back to 765.
Restoration began in 1972, and operation began in 1975, and I’m told the motivating force was Rich Melvin, who wanted 765 to run like it did in revenue service, hard and fast.
So restoration was aimed at more than just getting the old dear running, which is all most steam-locomotive restorations can afford.
Melvin wanted 765 to run like it did in service.
So I’m told.
If so he succeeded. 765 is the best-running steam-locomotive I have ever seen. It’s not babied. It runs hard and fast just like it did years ago.
As a railfan I witnessed many steam-locomotives in revenue service, and Pennsy’s K-4 Pacifics (4-6-2) on PRSL were impressive.
“PRSL” is Pennsylvania-Reading (“RED-ing,” not “READ-ing”) Seashore Lines, an amalgamation of Pennsylvania and Reading railroad-lines in south Jersey to counter the fact the two railroads had too much parallel track. It was promulgated in 1933. It serviced mainly the south Jersey seashore from Philadelphia. —As a child I lived not far from PRSL, and PRSL is why I’m a railfan.
But I was blown away by 765. Never in all my years as a railfan have I heard anything operate like 765.
K-4s were impressive, but 765 was all over ‘em.
765’s exhaust is crisp and authoritative.
No pussyfooting! Hammer down, pedal-to-the-metal.
765 was scheduled to run employee-appreciation trips May 18th and 19th, Altoona to Gallitzin (“guh-LIT-zin;” as in “get”), then back.
That’s the old Pennsylvania Railroad’s Allegheny-Crossing, and includes world-famous Horseshoe Curve.
765 is not a Pennsy engine. It doesn’t have the trademark square-hipped Belpaire (“bell-pair”) firebox characteristic of Pennsy steam-locomotives.
Yet it can run just like a Pennsy K-4, hard and fast.
And of course the old Pennsy is now part of Norfolk Southern, which includes the old Nickel Plate.
So running 765 on the old Pennsy Allegheny Crossing is intriguing.
In fact, I’d say running 765 on Allegheny Crossing is more attractive than a restored K-4.
There aren’t any operable K-4s any more.
There are only two K-4s. One, #1361, the engine displayed at Horseshoe Curve years ago, is completely apart, and may never be reassembled enough for operation.
#3750 is assembled but on static display at Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania in Strasburg, PA. 3750 is not operable.
1361 operated years ago, but crippled. The restoration was just enough to get it operable. It couldn’t boom-and-zoom like 765.
So here it is, 765, a SuperPower locomotive unlike anything Pennsy operated.
If anything, SuperPower was a waste on Pennsy. With its grades, trains couldn’t boom-and-zoom.
765 would take employee-appreciation specials up to Allegheny Summit, but with a diesel-locomotive on the tail pushing.
That diesel was a Norfolk Southern Heritage-unit, #8102, painted to look like a Pennsy diesel.
765 would lead up The Hill, and then 8102 would lead the train back down The Hill — dragging 765 along behind.
765 is always worth seeing. Similarly the old Pennsy Allegheny Crossing. For me that’s a five-hour drive down.
My brother-from-Boston would also attend. For him it’s a nine-hour drive.
I had to pull teeth to get him to see 765 his first time years ago, but he became a 765 enthusiast.
765 is impressive. What we always say is it’s the real thing — the BEST restored steam-locomotive on the entire planet.
My brother drove to Altoona on Thursday, May 16th, his 56th birthday. I drove down Friday, May 17th. (I’m 69, and have been a railfan since age-2.)
765 had arrived earlier in the week, Monday May 13th I was told.
My brother was therefore able to scope out 765 in the yard where it was being stored.
765 came out to get its train. My brother moved and got the following photographs:


Coming. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


Going. (765 has an additional water-tender.) (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

There would be two employee-appreciation trips on Saturday, May 18th.
The train would move to Altoona’s Amtrak station to load passengers.


To the station. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

765 had a GPS transponder, and you could get an app to tell where it is on your SmartPhone.
My brother got this, but I couldn’t because my iPhone wanted an Apple password, which I don’t know.
“It’s leaving the station,” my brother cried. We were set up in Gallitzin, top of The Hill, to get it bursting out of the tunnel at the top.


Off we go (through Slope Interlocking, into The Hill). (Photo by BobbaLew.)

We could hear it coming. It whistled for the tunnel.
It burst out of the tunnel whistle shrieking.
What a thrill that was. 765’s whistle is the best-sounding whistle I’ve ever heard. (“Stand back; behind the guardrail please.”)
The train stopped past Gallitzin, and then backed down The Hill, 8102 in the lead.
765 triggered a hot-box detector as it descended.
Steam-locomotives often do that. The firebox triggers a hot-box detector.
(A hot-box is a wheel-journal overheating, like it’s out of lube.
Wheel-journals now are roller-bearings. They rarely go dry and overheat. That’s the first time I’d heard a detector give an alarm.
Years ago the wheel-journals weren’t roller-bearing, and a person in the train’s caboose looked for smoke indicating a hot-box. Cabooses are no longer used.)
My first shot at Gallitzin had a photographer blocking it, so I tried again the second trip.


STAND BACK! (Photo by BobbaLew.)

765 would make two more employee-appreciation trips on Sunday, May 19th.
My brother and I scoped out a trackside location no one else would use. Fans were everywhere, often blocking a photograph.
By then we also had a Norfolk Southern photographer with us. He had shared my room Saturday night, since otherwise I would be only one person in a suite with two single beds.
The NS photographer joined us to our fan-free location. He was thrilled. A photo-location without fans.
So there we were, trackside Sunday morning, fighting mosquitos.
Yet here it came. We could hear it whistling a grade-crossing in Altoona. We were about two miles out of town into The Hill.


(Photo by Brent Lane.)

765 hove into view, about 45 mph, which I think is track-speed for passenger-trains on The Hill — although it could be 30.
Roaring yet cruising, just bopping along.
My brother left for home after that, and the NS photographer took me back to my bed-and-breakfast in Gallitzin.
I returned to being alone, not as lonely as earlier trips, but still somewhat alone.
A Sunday afternoon trip would still occur, but I stayed too long in my room to permit driving down into Altoona for a picture, so I set up in Gallitzin, actually on an overpass.
It was a location my brother had used, but not me.
But it was foggy, up in the clouds.
The top of The Hill, Allegheny Ridge, is over 2,000 feet above sea-level, so can be up in the clouds.
I photographed 765 when it appeared, but it was too foggy. My pictures lack definition.

• “Jack Hughes” is my younger brother John Mark. He was born in 1957; me in 1944 (I’m the first-born).
• RE: “.... being alone....” — My beloved wife of over 44 years died of cancer April 17th, 2012. I miss her dearly. She accompanied me on many railfan jaunts, and was very tolerant of my railfanning. This was despite her not being a railfan. (“Chasing trains beats chasing women,” she always said.)
• “Brent Lane” is the Norfolk Southern photographer.