[N&W] Re: Steam Loco assignments to Districts

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

[Jimmy Lisle wrote:]
 >      Now this ought to cause a real stir. In talking with one of the
 > engineers that I worked with, he said that the A's could be run north
 > but it had to be done under the Superintendent's authority because of
 > the lack of cab signals. While it is generally thought that the A's
 > never went north, he also said that he thought that they were used
 > once or twice during WWII possibly for troop movements.

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[Mason Cooper replies:]

Jimmy,
  Vance Nauman told me the A 1205 came into Shenandoah during WWII. He says
he remembers it because they had to rework the wye in order to turn it. It
was apparently a tight squeeze because there was a rock, since removed by
the quarry, north of Buchanan that was a problem. They could have used any
engine on the Shenandoah (technically) by doubleheading with an ATC equipped
locomotive in front. Of course they didn't do this, and any railfan worth
his salt would have had all the photos of Shenandoah Division locomotives
within a week.
   Dave Anderson has alot of old trainsheets I went over for the book, and by
recording the numbers for a specific period you can compile a list. You can
probably do this also by getting your hands a station book, on which they
OS'ed trains. The problem with this is getting enough books from the same
time period to get a good representative (time-frame) sample.
     Sometimes the engines did change---example-- in the 1930, the Shenandoah
Division had a number of Y5s up here, but when the Y6s came out, the Y5s
were withdrawn.