About 30 years ago my wife and I were traveling old Rt. 30 between Somerset, PA and Bedford. At the base of the mountain, near Shellsburg there was an Antique store that had three old Porter saddle tank locomotives that were for sale. They were very rusty and well worn. I think they came from a private estate in New York, and believe that one ended up as a display at a golf course near there.
Does anyone know what happened to them ?

Kevin K.

They may have left the Rail City Museum, Sandy Pond, New York, around 1959, and arrived at Rail City from the Solvay Process Co.

Greetings:
You are correct Jim, all former Sandy Pond locos..
I would first note that these were all ALCO (Cooke) products, not H.K. Porter.

At the auction of the collection in August 1993, these three were sold to Steve Hall at Mann's Choice, PA and were offered for sale along side the road near an antique store.

c/n 62011 SPCo. #45 sold to Newtown Square Railroad Museum, Newtown, PA. This locomotive has also been listed as #61, however the c/n indicates it is #45.

c/n 62752 SPCo. #49 still owned (I think) by Steve Hall, stored near Bedford, PA.

c/n 66313 SPCo. #61 sold to Hawaiian Village Mini Golf at North Myrtle Beach, FL. Renumbered as #49 c.1994 for reasons unknown.

Let me be the first to say that it is possible that the road numbers may be transposed here or there. Anyone who visited Rail City in it's last years will recall that there was very little paint on any of the 14 locomotives scattered around the grounds let alone easily discerned road numbers. It was winter the first time I went there and every thing was covered in snow. I "drew" the road numbers in the snow on each saddletank. It was easy to tell the 11 ALCO saddletankers from the three other locomotives (an ALCO 0-6-0, a Baldwin 0-4-0T and a very lucky Vulcan 0-4-0T, now owned and operated by John & Barney Gramling as their Flagg Coal #2). I got c/ns (construction numbers) off the badge plates on the backheads of the fireboxes as possible (several were already missing). C/ns off badge plates were used with ALCO lists of owners. Note that most of Sovay's locomotive were purchased from "stock" locomotives, usually available for immediate delivery from ALCO's Cooke plant at Paterson, NJ.

Any corrections to the above would be appreciated!
Be well and stay safe!
J.David

I met Steve Hall once and he was quite an interesting guy. His place near Bedford, PA, was littered with odds & ends and I recall he had a fully restored traction engine among other things.

I'm pretty sure he sold the property and moved. I don't know what happened to the remaining Solvay/Rail City engine but a note from him on the steamlocomotive.info says it was cosmetically restored and is (or was) privately owned in Bedford.

- Alan Maples

Looking at my photos, I realized there was a second Solvay/Rail City locomotive at Steve Hall's place back in 2001. As J. David has pointed out, they are rather difficult to distinguish from one another.

- Alan Maples

I believe that one of the Solvey locos from Rail City went the Museum of Transportation at Rush, near Rochester, New York.

Ted66

Thanks guys ! I remembered them as being very rusty.

Kevin K

Dear ted66:
You are correct: ALCO c/n 66312, Solvay #62 was sold to them in 1976, long before the auction.
Be well, stay safe,
J.David

I know this is a response to a 2 year old thread. But I found it by looking for Steve Hall.

I had met Steve way back when he was selling the traction engine. At that time he still had the 2 0-4-0's and some spare parts. He sold both of them and everything else there and moved to some place like Florida he said, his plans. The two loco's are easy to separate, one had a rivet water tank and one had a welded water tank, a replacement after an accident destroyed the original rivet first one. The one marked 1932 on the side is the one that had both the cab and saddle tank replaced.

I would like to know who wound up with the one with the welded water saddle tank. Anyone have any idea ? ?

Yes he had a lot of stuff around his place to get rid of.

Dan

.

OK, I've got a question: My locomotive, HK Porter c/n #5284, has the original fuel tank, which features a round opening about the same size, in about the same place as the one on the Solvay engine marked #1932. This is also shown on the erecting card as being in line with the firedoor. One of the questions most often asked of me is what this thing is for, and the best answer that we can come up with is that it allows air to enter the cab and provide oxygen to the fire. (There are no dampers on the fire pan.) It would also give a flashback somewhere to go besides my seatbox...

Sammy,

I have always been told those holes in the bunker/rear cab wall were to allow access for long tools for cleaning tubes to be passed in. It seems like it makes sense.

Jesse

Interesting thread. I drove past the loco at the mini golf place in Myrtle last summer. Cool to find out where it came from.

Jesse,

Thanks for your reply. Your suggestion is one we considered, but on an oil burner, there is no reason to rod or brush the tubes. We just turn up the blower and dribble a little sand into the peep hole. And, even with that opening through the fuel tank, there is not enough wiggle room to install tubes through the firebox end... so we don't think that's right, either.

We're Bumfuzzled, & Thanks Again,
Sammy

Sammy - maybe that’s where you put the crank in to start it….

rimshot....... cymbal crash