If they sandblasted a little more, maybe you would see Pere Marquette appear again! As far as I know, 1225 retained Pere Marquette marking until it was retired in 1951. So somewhere along the way from retirement and storage at New Buffalo, Michigan to being donated to Michigan State University and on to Owosso, Michigan to the Steam Railroading Institute, it had a repaint to C&O...? 1225 was repainted in the 1980's, and then got a new coat of paint just prior to the Train Festival 2009 event last weekend in Owosso.
I think you are probably right. But it was truly a C&O engine since the C&O owned PM. Interestingly, Nickel Plate 765 was also painted in C&O colors at one time.
Yes, 765 had the front end modified and headlight lowered, and operated as the C&O "2765" in 1993-4, just before going out of service for the complete rebuild. My wife and I rode "2765" on the New River train in 1993. :tb-biggrin:
Oh, yeah. Wasn't there a video out called something like "New River Masquerade" shot during the fall of that?
Tim, yes it was produced by Pentrex, "Chesapeake and Ohio 2765, New River Masquerade." Here's a B&W I took at Hinton while getting ready to depart back to Huntington.
Tenders One3 thing you have all forgotten or failed to realize...IS...each tender was serial numbered and it was NOT an uncommon thing for tenders to get swapped out to another engine...it happened. SO, with that said since Tim states it was never in C&O paint, which I do not know, and as far as I do know they never painted the 1225 as a "C&O" in disguise, at one time or another the tender could have gotten swapped out with a C&O tender and it was painted PM over it...????? If someone gets the serial number off of the actual tender of the 1225 and post it I can search my tender records and tell you what it did in fact come from, PM or C&O. Remember, C&O did own the PM and towards the end of steam a lot of parts, tenders included got swapped around from loco to loco....just a thought. Dave
On a plate that was bolted or welded on the right side of the tender. This much time though it could have disappeared a long time ago. I do find it ironic though that there was C&O under there as I have never to my knowledge seen PM 1225 even remotely with anything C&O on it....maybe I am wrong...interesting to say the least! If the tender did indeed get swapped out they would have merely repainted the tender. The C&O swapped tenders out quite often. The question is and I am not a PM fan so to speak and knowledge of PM ops is very limited. With that said, when the PM started painting tenders into "Chesapeake and Ohio" and renumbering them into the 2600 series numbers how many Berks actually were painted into C&O and renumbered? Could it have been one of the PM locos that had been relocated down on the C&O to run out it's years until diesels finally championed steam, and somehow it got switched to the 1225 along the way? If we get a serial number we can find out a lot about the tender. What loco it originally came with and from there we can know or piece together possibly what happened. Dave
The Pere Marquette lettering was required to remain on all equipment that was taken over by C&O in 1947 that was not totally paid for. 1225 was scheduled to be renumbered to C&O 2659, but was retired before that happened. It could be that 1225 was paid off, so it probably was repainted to C&O before retirement...
Were you there in the fall when the video was shot? I sure hope to get down that way during the peak of color!
Tim, yes, the New River train runs in October, during the height of fall colors. It was beautiful there, and besides the foliage, there were many rafters in the New River, plus the once a year bungee/parachute jump off the really high bridge up in the gorge. The last few years the train has still run pulled by a diseasel. :tb-biggrin:
I was reading this article the C&O Historical Society mailed me and it was saying that: "On June 6, 1947 the Pere Marquette was merged into the C&O and former PM equipment soon began to carry the new name. A renumbering schedule was worked out for the 2-8-4's as follows: PM class N 1201-1215 to C&O N-3 2685-2699 PM class N-1 1216-1227 to C&O N-1 2650-2661 PM class N-2 1228-1239 to C&O N-2 2670-2681 However, one of the stipulations of the merger agreement required that any rolling stock still under equipment trust (not yet fully paid for) had to remain lettered Pere Marquette. Thus steam locomotives emerging from the backshop as late as 1949 or 1950 were still being lettered for the PM and would have, in the case of newer 2-8-4's, remained that way until 1954. Therefore, only the class N was ever renumbered among the 2-8-4 group and all of these became C&O 2600's." Later on down the article: "... In the meantime two locos, the 1223 and 1225, were granted a stay of execution and after a brief shopping were donated to posterity as park exhibits. The 1225 can now be seen on the Michigan State University campus and the 1223 is located on the State Fair Grounds at Detroit. Although each retained its old Pere Marquette number, both are lettered for the Chesapeake & Ohio." Please note this was written a while ago...being 1225 was still at State at the time. Hope this helps! -Aaron F.
Welcome aboard big-bad-2666. Glad to see another C&O guy in hear. Where do you call home? Why the interest in the C&O? I grew up with our farm next to the C&O right of way south of Peru Indiana.
Thanks for the welcome. Michigan is my home. Why do I like the C&O? Hmm... I think its because the had the H-8. The largest locomtive ever built was a plus. Also because there are a good amount of C&O locomtives and rolling stock preserved.
Yeah, sorry about that; saw that after I posted it. Where did you get your avatar? It is awesome!:tb-biggrin:
If you donate to Trainboard(I think a mere $2/month) they will make you a custom avatar. Or there are avatars available at no charge here. I saw your post on another site about rebuilding a C&O 2-8-4. Might want to check this out. http://hvrm.railfan.net/co2789.html 2789 sat in the park at Peru Indiana (my home town) for years. Then moved to its new location where it is slowly being restored. This location is in northern Indiana. I would love to see her steam again! My wife is from Michigan and we did go to Trainfest last summer. Amazing to get to see all that cool steam in one place. We rode behind 765 and a few years back I got to do throtle time on NKP765. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teeFbVJupJU N scale Allegheny: And a brass 2-8-4 And a number board from a real C&O 2-8-4
Yeah, I was trying to find out about another Kanawha to restore...I posted that on RYPN.org before I found this site. I would also love to see 2789 run again, but Indiana is a fair distance away; I was trying to get one (2727 or 2776??) moved here to Michigan so a group of volunteers could restore her.
