Steamtown
Steamtown NHS was developed around the old Lackawanna Railroad maintenance facility in Scranton, PA. The turntable and sections of the roundhouse were restored/replaced to Serbs as visitor center, museum, locomotive exhibits and, of course, locomotive and rolling stock maintenance.
In the museum we learned that every conductor's ticket punch was a unique shape. Who knew?
We learned a lot on the guided tour, especially from this cutaway locomotive. Yellow is hot, white is steam and blue is water.
Coal is shoveled into the firebox on the left. The hot gas does through the tubes on the boiler and on to the smoke box then out the stack. Steam from the heated water rises into the steam dome where it is routed to the cylinders that power the drive wheels.
Engine 26 has been restored to operating condition. It is in the shop for pressure testing prior to going into service on April 15th pulling an excursion train.
Part of the magic of steam locomotives is that all the moving parts are on the outside.
In the cab, Carl could show Sandy where the throttle lever was but had no clue about the rest of the valves.
Even the small locomotives are big
and the big ones are HUGE. This monster is one of 25 built for Union Pacific to haul coal trains across the Wasach Mountains in Wyoming. It is 132 feet long and weighs almost 1,200,000 pounds!
In the museum section were exhibits about the people who operated and rode on the early trains, including immigrants. This quotation caught our eye.
Sandy & Carl
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