GG1

This is why; it would usually be sucking juice off overhead wire.

(“Jee-Jee-ONE;” I only say that because a friend was mispronouncing it “Jee-Jee-Eye”)
I’ve said it many times: “Pennsylvania Railroad’s GG1 electric is the greatest railroad locomotive I’ve ever seen.”
I saw many GG1s growing up as a teenager in northern DE in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s.
That recent diesel locomotives can put 4,400 horsepower to railhead is astounding. But a single GG1 could put over 9,000 horsepower to railhead for a short time — any longer and traction-motors overheated.
It would take two recent diesels to get 9,000 horsepower.
GG1 development began in the late ‘30s — that’s almost 80 years ago. Pennsy, unhappy with its P5 (4-6-4) electrics wanted a better locomotive to pull its passenger-expresses toward New York City on what is now Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor.
The next step was the R1 (4-8-4), but after New Haven Railroad’s success with a 4-6+6-4 electric, a GG1 was also built.
The GG1 is two 4-6-0 Gs hooked together under a single cab. A Pennsy 4-6-0 steamer was the G5.
The two-4-6-0 units were hinged = articulated.
Testing began near Claymont, DE. the GG1 was winner; it tracked and rode better. The R1 was kept and used a while, but eventually scrapped (1958).
The GG1 uses 12 of the same traction-motors used in the self-powered MP54 commuter car.
Two motors per drive-axle, of which there are six.
11,000-volt alternating-current is collected via pantograph (“pant-uh-graff”) sliding along an overhead wire, strung from a cable catenary (“kat-un-airy”).
It’s transformed in the locomotive for use in the traction-motors, which are also AC.
Time to trot out my GG1 pictures:


STAND BACK! (Photo by BobbaLew.)

About 1960 I went to Claymont station in DE along Pennsy’s electrified line. By then Claymont had become a commuter-stop.
With my father’s camera I set up trackside, my left arm hooked around a lightpole.
In earlier visits father south, expresses ran on the inside tracks, and slower trains on the outside tracks. There were four tracks.
All-of-a-sudden, here it came, a southbound GG1 express doing 90-100 mph, on the outside track, the one I’m 10 feet from.
WHAM!
Scared the daylights outta me!
Had I not hooked my arm around that lightpole, I wouldn’t be here. It was sucking me into it!
The fastest my father’s old Hawkeye would do was 1/125th of a second.
Amazingly, it stopped it.
Even now, 60 years hence, the sound and image of that GG1 is still in my head. I’ve stood trackside in Newark (DE) station along Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor — used to be Pennsy.
WHAM! AEM-7-powered MetroLiners flash past at 100+ mph.
A yellow line is on the station platform. Don’t cross it! Signs warn of trains passing at 100+ mph.
That GG1 at Claymont is goin’ to my grave. I guess the first time is more impressive.
Another time I visited “the flyover” with another railfan friend. The flyover is north of Wilmington (DE). The northbound express track flew over two yard-entrance tracks.
I guess that flyover is where express-trains went from inside to outside northbound, and vice-versa southbound.
Only Pennsy did so many flyovers, a means of keeping slower trains, like freights, from blocking express tracks.
I’m sure other railroads did ‘em too, but Pennsy did many. All along its main across PA were flyovers at yard-entrances. Most are now gone. The railroad is no longer running passenger expresses, and freights are no longer yard-to-yard.
The old Pennsy electrified line from Washington DC to New York City is now part of Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor.
The picture below is a northbound GG1 express atop the flyover, crossing the Wilmington yard-entrance (Edgemoor).
After the flyover it will go downhill back to track-level, gaining speed. It will approach 100 mph, if not exceed it.
Sensory overload! Model trains, by comparison, are just toys.


Northbound “Red Apple” crosses the Edgemoor yard entrance. (Pennsy crews called ‘em “Red Apples.”) (Photo by BobbaLew.)


Over Shellpot Creek. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

That flyover also crosses Shellpot Creek outlet into the Delaware River.
That’s the second picture.
The train just left Wilmington station, and is about five-six miles out. It’s headed for Philadelphia — probably up to 80 by now.
Quite a few GG1s were saved. Best is #4935, pictured below, at Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania in Strasburg, PA.
None are operable. They had transformer casings inside filled with cancer-causing PCB-based fluid.
Those casings were drained, then filled with concrete or sand.
I’m not sure electrification used now on the Northeast Corridor would be compatible with a GG1. It ain’t the same.
The GG1s lasted almost 50 years; 10-20 years longer than the average steam-locomotive, and 20-30 years longer than a diesel. I used to say to a fellow railfan friend “When the last GG1 is retired we’ll know we’re getting old.” —That was 30 years ago.
GG1 memories:
—A) While I was in high-school a GG1 passenger-express, doing 100+ mph, hit a bulldozer on a flatbed at a grade-crossing in Newark, DE.
The ‘dozer was sent flying and totaled. The GG1 stayed on the track, and stopped with only a dent. —Inside they were built like a truss-bridge,
—B) While in high-school our football-team played a very important game against Newark High. It would decide the conference championship.
We lost, but Newark’s stadium was next to Pennsy’s electrified line to Washington DC.
It was pouring rain, but the entire time a railfan friend and I sat in the top row and watched GG1 expresses zoom by behind us, giant arcs flashing as their pantographs bounced off the wire.
—C) Years ago my paternal grandfather rode Pennsy’s Congressional Limited. It was powered by a GG1.
He was thrilled. Boombita-zoombita!
Years later he and my grandmother had an apartment in Edgemoor, DE, within earshot of Pennsy’s main.
Doors and windows closed, you could still hear ‘em pass.
“Must be the Congressional, he’d say, awe in his voice.
It’s always a toss-up. -A) I was lucky enough to witness steam-locomotives in actual revenue service, or -B) I was lucky enough to witness GG1s, the greatest railroad locomotives ever made.
And every time I saw one it was doing 90-100 mph!
It could be said the GG1 was overkill. But engineers loved ‘em. It took four EMD E-units to equal a single GG1.
“I have no idea why they switch after this thing!”
(No wire after Harrisburg.)


#4935 in front of Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania. (Photo by Tom Hughes.)

• “Tom Hughes” is my nephew, my brother in northern DE’s only child. Like me, Tom is a railfan; his father isn’t.