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110-563: The company was formed by the merger of seven locomotive manufacturers and Schenectady Locomotive Engine Manufactory of Schenectady, New York . A subsidiary, American Locomotive Automobile Company, designed and manufactured automobiles under the Alco brand from 1905 to 1913. ALCO also produced nuclear reactors from 1954 to 1962. After World War II , Alco closed all of its manufacturing plants except those in Schenectady and Montreal. In 1955,

220-726: A consortium with General Electric (electrical equipment) and Ingersoll-Rand ( diesel engine ). This locomotive was sold to the Central Railroad of New Jersey . It built additional locomotives for the Long Island Rail Road and the Chicago and North Western Railway . The company bought the McIntosh & Seymour Diesel Engine Company in 1929 and henceforth produced its own diesel engines, though it always bought its electrical equipment from GE. The diesel program

330-484: A daring raid. Using his European connections and a reputation for having "bested" Jay Gould in a battle for control of the Kansas Pacific Railroad years before, Villard solicited and raised $ 8,000,000 million dollars from his associates. This was his famous "Blind Pool," Villard's associates were not told what the money would be used for. In this case, the funds were used by him to purchase control of

440-420: A healthy fleet of Alcos DL540 running commuter and cargo trains. The Glenbrook Vintage Railway New Zealand, has a 2-4-4-2 articulated compound mallet, built by Alco in 1912. Only four mallets with this wheel arrangement were ever built; the other three by Baldwin. This unique loco is currently out of service awaiting overhaul. During the 1970s, Romania's UCMR Resita made licensed engines from ALCo, putting

550-525: A large area, including extensive trackage in the western Federal territories and later states of Idaho , Minnesota, Montana , North Dakota , Oregon , Washington , and Wisconsin . In addition, the N.P. had an international branch running north to Winnipeg , capital of the province of Manitoba , in the newly organized Canada . The main activities were shipping wheat and other farm products, cattle, timber, and minerals; bringing in consumer goods, transporting passengers; and selling land. The Northern Pacific

660-562: A mile and half (2.4 km) of track each day. In early September, as the line neared completion. To celebrate, and to gain national publicity for investment opportunities in his region, Villard chartered four trains to carry guests from the East to Gold Creek in western Montana Territory No expense was spared, and the list of dignitaries included Frederick Billings, former 18th President Ulysses S. Grant (served 1869-1877), only two years before his tragic death from cancer, and Villard's in-laws,

770-545: A prototype gas-turbine–electric locomotive to address the concerns of operators such as Union Pacific that sought to minimize the number of locomotive units needed for large power requirements. In 1949, ALCo embarked on a clean-sheet design project to replace the 244. 1949 also saw the introduction of the EMD GP7 road–switcher, a direct challenge in ALCo's bread-and-butter market. In 1953, General Electric , dissatisfied with

880-442: A short amount of time for completion, and a large penalty if the deadline were missed. While crews worked on the tunnel, the railroad built a temporary switchback route across the pass. With numerous timber trestles and grades which approached six percent, the temporary line required two M class 2-10-0s —the two largest locomotives in the world (at that time)—to handle a tiny five-car train. On May 3, 1888, crews holed through

990-480: A small quantity of ALCO DL-109 dual-service engines and its proven steam designs, while EMD (formerly EMC) was allocated the construction of mainline road freight diesels (the production of straight passenger-service engines was prohibited by the War Production Board ). Still, ALCo ranked 34th among United States corporations in the value of wartime production contracts. Alco's RS-1 road switcher

1100-608: A stable path to that important interchange. At the same time, E. H. Harriman , head of the Union Pacific Railroad , was also looking for a road which could connect his company to Chicago. The road both Harriman and Hill looked at was the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy. To Harriman, the Burlington was a road which paralleled much of his own and offered tantalizing direct access to Chicago. For Hill as well, there

1210-644: A step in the automotive career of Walter P. Chrysler , who worked as the plant manager. In 1911 he left Alco for Buick in Detroit, Michigan , where he subsequently founded the Chrysler Corporation in 1925. Alco made 60-ton center-cab electric freight motors from 1912 through the 1920s for electric railway lines in Oregon. Already a leader in steam locomotives , Alco produced the first commercially successful diesel–electric switch engine in 1924 in

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1320-738: A subsidiary of Nitram Energy. Following the sale of these assets, Smithco remained in business, manufacturing other heat exchange products. In 1985, the assets acquired from Smithco were assigned by Bos-Hatten to its parent, Nitram. In 2008, Nitram was acquired by Peerless Manufacturing Co In 2015, Peerless sold its heat exchanger business to Koch Heat Transfer Co. After the closure of Alco's Schenectady works, locomotives to Alco designs continued to be manufactured in Canada by Montreal Locomotive Works and in Australia by AE Goodwin . In addition, Until 2022, Alco-derived locomotives accounted for most of

1430-573: A threat in certain quarters. German-born former war correspondent / journalist and later newspaper / magazine publisher Henry Villard (6th President N.P.R.R. 1881-1884), had raised capital for western railroads in Europe (especially in the recently unified German Empire ), from 1871 to 1873. After returning to New York City in 1874, he invested on behalf of his clients in railroads in Oregon . Through Villard's work, most of these lines became properties of

1540-528: A time. At some later point, some of the heat exchanger products were manufactured by the Alco Products Division of Smithco Engineering in Tulsa, Oklahoma (Smithco). In January 1983, certain assets of the Alco Products Division of Smithco, namely double-pipe and hairpin-type heat exchanger products sold under the "Alco Twin" name, mark and style, were sold in an asset sale by Smithco to Bos-Hatten,

1650-912: Is now being restored by the Railroad Heritage of Midwest America museum. Alco and MLW locomotives still work on many regional and tourist railroads across the United States and Canada, including the Delaware-Lackawanna Railroad in Scranton, Pennsylvania , the Catskill Mountain Railroad in Kingston ; the Livonia, Avon and Lakeville Railroad family of lines based in Lakeville, New York ,

1760-619: Is now occupied by a large industrial park. Alco diversified into areas other than automobiles with greater success. During World War II , Alco built munitions for the war effort, in addition to locomotive production; this continued throughout the Korean War . After the Korean War, Alco began making oil production equipment and heat exchangers for nuclear plants. In 1955, the company was renamed Alco Products, Incorporated. By this stage, locomotive production only accounted for 20% of

1870-602: Is still manufactured by Fairbanks-Morse of Beloit, Wisconsin , a company which also manufactured diesel locomotives. Additionally, Alco diesel engines are used to power the NASA Crawler Transporter . Some Alcos survive on Australian networks, as well as in Bangladesh and Pakistan. Another fleet of Alco Bombardier locomotives run in rugged terrain on the Sri Lanka railway network. Argentina also has

1980-400: The 630 (the first AC/DC transmission), the 430 and the 636 , the first 3,600 horsepower (2.7 MW) locomotive, failed to keep the enterprise going. Third-place in the market proved to be an impossible position; ALCo products had neither the market position nor reputation for reliability of EMD's products, nor the financing muscle and customer support of GE. It could not earn enough profits. In

2090-803: The Arcade & Attica Railroad in Arcade, New York. It returned to service in May 2009 after a six-year overhaul to bring it into compliance with the FRA's new steam locomotive regulations. Great Western 60 , a 2-8-0 built in Schenectady in 1937, currently operates in passenger service on the Black River & Western Railroad in Ringoes, NJ. Oregon Coast Scenic Railroad in Garibaldi, Oregon . This railroad owns

2200-741: The Cape Horn to the Pacific Ocean. In Minnesota, the Lake Superior and Mississippi Railroad completed construction of its 155-mile (249 km) line stretching from Saint Paul east to Lake Superior at Duluth in 1870. It was leased to the Northern Pacific line six years later in the American Centennial celebration year of 1876 and was eventually absorbed by the Northern Pacific. The famed North Coast Limited

2310-665: The Four Aces to No. 2626 and ran it on the North Coast Limited , as well as its pool trains between Seattle, Washington , and Portland, Oregon , and excursions, through 1957. During World War II, Alco produced many 2-10-0 Decapods for the USSR . Many went undelivered, and ten of these were sold to Finland in 1947. One, Alco builder's No. 75214, is preserved at the Finnish Railway Museum . Though

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2420-571: The Great Lakes ). The backing and promotions of famed New York City / Wall Street financier Jay Cooke , in the summer of 1870 brought the first real momentum to the railway company. Over the course of 1871, the Northern Pacific pushed westward from Minnesota Territory into the newer Dakota Territory (present-day state of North Dakota ). Surveyors and construction crews had to maneuver through swamps, bogs, and tamarack forests. The difficult terrain and insufficient funding delayed by six months

2530-759: The Hellenic Railways Organisation (OSE) in Greece. The oldest of them (class A.201, DL532B) were delivered to the former Hellenic State Railways (SEK) in 1962. In addition to a variety of standard gauge locomotives, the fleet includes 11 metre gauge Alco locomotives, mainly used for departmental trains in the Peloponnese network. The MX627 and MX636 locomotives have been extensively rebuilt at Piraeus Central Factory of OSE. The remaining Alco locomotives are also being rebuilt, starting with models DL532B and DL537. The ALCO 251 diesel engine

2640-533: The McCloud Railway 25 . One of only 4 prairie type (2-6-2) locomotives ever built by ALCO. This locomotive is operational, and is used in daily service six months of the year and weekend service an additional four months of the year. This locomotive appeared in the film " Stand by Me ". While regular production of steam locomotives by Alco ended in the 1950s, Alco-built steam engines have been preserved in locations across North America. They can be found on

2750-929: The Nevada Northern Railway in Ely, Nevada; at the Orange Empire Railway Museum in California, on the Lake Whatcom Railway in Washington and on the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad in Colorado. Schenectady Locomotive Works The Schenectady Locomotive Works built railroad locomotives from its founding in 1848 through its merger into American Locomotive Company (ALCO) in 1901. After

2860-718: The New York Central Railroad , the Union Pacific Railroad and the Milwaukee Road . Among Alco's better-known steam locomotives were the 4-6-4 Hudson , 4-8-2 Mohawk , and the 4-8-4 Niagara built for the New York Central; and the 4-8-4 FEF and the 4-6-6-4 Challenger built for the Union Pacific. Alco built many of the biggest locomotives ever constructed, including Union Pacific's Big Boy ( 4-8-8-4 ). Alco also built

2970-749: The Northern Securities Company , a move which would be undone by the Supreme Court in 1904 under the auspices of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act . Harriman was not immune either; he was forced to break up his holdings in the Union Pacific Railroad and the Southern Pacific Railroad a few years later. In 1903, Hill finally got his way with the House of Morgan. Howard Elliott , another veteran of

3080-468: The RS-1 , the first road–switcher locomotive. The versatile road–switcher design gained favor for short-haul applications, which would provide ALCo a secure market niche through the 1940s. The entry of the United States into World War II froze ALCo's development of road diesel locomotives. During that time, ALCo was allocated the construction of diesel switching locomotives, their new road–switcher locomotives,

3190-575: The Schenectady Locomotive Engine Manufactory of Schenectady, New York : The consolidation of the seven manufacturers was the brainchild of financier Pliny Fisk Sr. of the brokerage house Harvey Fisk & Sons. The consolidated ALCO was intended to compete with Baldwin Locomotive Co. which controlled two-fifths of the industry. The new company was headquartered in Schenectady. Samuel R. Callaway left

3300-606: The Snake River near Wallula, Washington . The Union Pacific and Central Pacific lines had completed the first trans-continental route 12 years earlier in 1869. Within a decade of his return, Villard was head of a transportation empire in the Pacific Northwest that had but one real competitor, the Northern Pacific Railroad. The Northern Pacific's trans-continental route completion threatened

3410-555: The Studebaker corporation in 1967 to form Studebaker-Worthington , Alco remaining a wholly owned subsidiary. Former divisions of Alco became semi-independent subsidiaries in 1968. After the termination of locomotive production in 1969, the locomotive designs (but not the engine development rights) were transferred to the Montreal Locomotive Works , which continued their manufacture. The diesel engine business

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3520-445: The northern Great Plains of central Canada to the northern states of the U.S . and especially its Midwestern big cities, manufacturing centers and markets. The U.S. Congress granted the Northern Pacific Railroad a generous potential bonanza of 60 million acres (94,000 sq mi; 240,000 km ) of land adjacent to the line in exchange for building rail transportation to an undeveloped western territory. Josiah Perham

3630-539: The 1870s, began anew. Virgil Bogue , a veteran civil engineer , was sent to explore the Cascades again. On March 19, 1881, he discovered Stampede Pass . In 1883, John W. Sprague , the head of the new Pacific Division, drove the Golden Spike to mark the beginning of the railroad from what would become Kalama, Washington . He resigned a months later due to impaired health. In 1884, after the departure of Villard,

3740-637: The 1901 merger, ALCO made the Schenectady plant its headquarters in Schenectady, New York . One of the better-known locomotives to come out of the Schenectady shops was Central Pacific Railroad type 4-4-0 No. 60, the Jupiter (built in September 1868), one of two steam locomotives to take part in the " Golden Spike Ceremony" to celebrate the completion of the First transcontinental railroad . Although

3850-430: The 1930s and its established service infrastructure. ALCo would prove unable to overcome that lead. In 1946, ALCo controlled 26% of the diesel locomotive market. The ubiquitous S series ( 660 and 1000 horsepower) switchers and RS series ( 1000 and 1500 horsepower) road switchers represented ALCo well during the late 1940s. Much of its success in this period can be tied to its pioneering RS locomotives, representing

3960-523: The Berliet license was abandoned, and the company began to produce its own designs instead. An Alco racing car won the Vanderbilt Cup in both 1909 and 1910 and competed in the first Indianapolis 500 in 1911, driven on all three occasions by Harry Grant . ALCO's automotive venture was unprofitable, and they abandoned automobile manufacture in 1913. The Alco automobile story is notable chiefly as

4070-479: The Chicago, Burlington and Quincy, became president of the Northern Pacific on October 23. Elliott was a relative of the Burlington's crusty chieftain Charles Elliott Perkins, and more distantly the Burlington's great backer, John Murray Forbes . He had spent 20 years in the trenches of Midwest railroading, where rebates, pooling, expansion and rate wars had brought ruinous competition. Having seen

4180-560: The Dakota Territory conducted expeditions to protect the railroad survey and construction crews in Dakota and Montana Territories. In 1877, construction resumed in a small way. Northern Pacific pushed a branch line southeast from Tacoma to Puyallup, Washington and on to the coal fields around Wilkeson, Washington . Much of the coal was destined for export through Tacoma to San Francisco, California , where it would be thrown into

4290-550: The Delaware & Hudson's 1924 addition of SKF roller bearings to the drivers and main and side rods of their own 4-6-2 locomotives). This was Timken 1111 , a 4-8-4 commissioned in 1930 by Timken Roller Bearing Company and ultimately used for 100,000 miles (160,000 km) on 15 major United States railroads before it was purchased in 1933 by the Northern Pacific Railway . The Northern Pacific renumbered

4400-602: The East after 1873, led by the Credit Mobilier Scandal and the Union Pacific Railroad stock fraud, caused a nationwide economic recession and financial panic in New York City's Wall Street financial district, stopping further railroad building for twelve years during the latter 1870s and early 1880s. In 1886, the company restarted and put down 164 miles (264 km) of main line across the northern Dakotas, with an additional 45 miles (72 km) from

4510-569: The Electro-Motive Division of General Motors. Joseph Burroughs Ennis (1879–1955) was a senior vice president between 1917 and 1947 and was responsible for the design of many of the company's locomotives. The company diversified into the automobile business in 1906, producing French Berliet designs under license. Production was located at Alco's Rhode Island Locomotive Works in Providence, Rhode Island . Two years later,

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4620-652: The European creditors' holding company, the Oregon and Transcontinental Company . Of the lines held by the Oregon and Transcontinental, the most important was the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company , which ran east from Portland, Oregon along the left bank of the Columbia River to a connection with the Union Pacific Railroad 's Oregon Short Line at the confluence of the Columbia River and

4730-459: The Gladstone Shops, which closed in 1915. On May 24, 1879, Frederick H. Billings became the fifth president of the company. Billings' tenure would be short but ferocious. Reorganization, bond sales, and improvement in the U.S. economy allowed Northern Pacific to strike out across the upper Missouri River by letting a contract to build 100 miles (160 km) of railroad west of the river. The railroad's new-found strength, however, would be seen as

4840-514: The Lake Whatcom Railway in Wickersham, Washington and the Middletown & Hummelstown Railroad in Middletown, Pennsylvania . The latter owns one of the last true ALCO switchers ever built, #1016. The 1016 is a T-6 type switcher engine. This and ALCO sister 151 (ex Western Maryland Railway S-6 ) provide daily service in Middletown. Two original Alco RS-2's that were delivered to the Nevada Northern Railway are still in operation. ALCO-Cooke 2-8-0 #18, built in 1920, survives in passenger service on

4950-425: The Mississippi River as the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy had done, Villard chose to lease the Wisconsin Central . Some backers of the Wisconsin Central had long associations with Villard, and an expensive lease was worked out between the two companies which was only undone by the Northern Pacific's second bankruptcy. The ultimate result was that the Northern Pacific was left without a direct connection to Chicago,

5060-434: The N.P. reached the shores of the upper Missouri River at Edwinton, Dakota Territory (now the state capital of Bismarck, North Dakota) . In the west sector, the N.P. track extended 25 miles (40 km) north from Kalama. Surveys were carried out in the Dakota Territory protected by 600 troops of the horse cavalry of the United States Army , under command of Civil War hero, General Winfield Scott Hancock , nicknamed "Hancock

5170-417: The No. 2 position from ALCo, and eventually eclipsed EMD in overall production. Despite continual innovation in its designs (the first AC/DC transmission among others), ALCo gradually succumbed to its competition, in which its former ally, General Electric, was an important element. India during 1960s began gradual withdrawal of Steam locomotives from Indian Railways so the Diesel electric locomotive WDM series

5280-429: The Northern Pacific Corner. By the end of the day, he was short just 40,000 shares of common stock. Harriman placed an order to cover this, but was overridden by his broker, Jacob Schiff , of Kuhn, Loeb & Co. Hill, on the other hand, reached the vacationing Morgan in Italy and managed to place an order for 150,000 shares of common stock. Though Harriman might be able to control the preferred stock, Hill knew

5390-417: The Northern Pacific Railway Company on July 2, 1864, with the goals of connecting the Great Lakes with Puget Sound on the northwestern coast of the United States on the Pacific Ocean , opening vast new lands for farming, ranching, lumbering and mining, and linking the Federal territories and later newly admitted to the Union as states of Washington and Oregon to the rest of the country (plus connecting

5500-410: The Northern Pacific began building toward Stampede Pass from Wallula in the east and the area of Wilkeson in the west. By the end of the year, rails had reached Yakima, Washington in the east. A 77-mile (124 km) gap remained in 1886. In January of that year, Nelson Bennett was given a contract to construct a 9,850-foot (1.9 mi; 3.0 km) tunnel under Stampede Pass . The contract specified

5610-447: The Northern Pacific closer to the orbit of James J. Hill. In the late 1880s, the Villard regime, in another one of its costly missteps, attempted to stretch the Northern Pacific from the Twin Cities to the all-important rail hub of Chicago, Illinois . A costly project was begun in creating a union station and terminal facilities for a Northern Pacific which had yet to arrive. Rather than build directly down to Chicago, perhaps following

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5720-490: The Northern Pacific experienced the first competition in the form of James Jerome Hill and his Great Northern Railway . The Great Northern, like the Northern Pacific before it, was pushing west from the Twin Cities towards Puget Sound, and would be completed in 1893. Mismanagement, sparse traffic, and the Panic of 1893 sounded the death knell for the Northern Pacific and Villard's interest in railroading. The company slipped into its second bankruptcy on October 20, 1893. Oakes

5830-425: The Northern Pacific still completed the line north along the Pacific Ocean and U.S. west coast from Kalama to Tacoma, a distance of 110 miles (180 km), before the end of 1873. On December 16, the first steam locomotive train arrived in Tacoma. But by the next year in 1874 the company was approaching insolvency. Northern Pacific slipped into its first bankruptcy on June 30, 1875. President Cass resigned to become

5940-498: The Northern Pacific's bankruptcy. Things came to a head in 1896, when first Edward Dean Adams was appointed president, then less than two months later, Edwin Winter . Ultimately, the task of straightening out the muddle of the Northern Pacific was turned over to J. P. Morgan . Morganization of the Northern Pacific, a process which befell many U.S. roads in the wake of the Panic of 1893, was handed to Morgan lieutenant Charles Henry Coster. The new president, beginning September 1, 1897,

6050-401: The Northern Pacific. Despite a tough fight, Billings and his backers were forced to capitulate; he resigned the presidency June 9, 1881. Ashbel H. Barney , former President of Wells Fargo & Company (bankers and famous Western stagecoach line), served briefly as interim caretaker of the railroad from June 19 to September 15, when Villard was elected sixth president by the stockholders. For

6160-516: The Superlative" but defeated Democratic Party candidate in the 1880 presidential election . Fabricating shops and foundries were established in Brainerd, Minnesota Territory , a town named by the N.P. second President John Gregory Smith for Lawrence Brainerd , the father of his wife Anna Elizabeth Brainerd and a close friend and colleague. It was here further back on the line where the Railway established its first temporary offices and headquarters. A severe stock market crash and financial collapse in

6270-440: The United States and even growing exports overseas to Europe. Most of the settlers were German and Scandinavian immigrants who bought the land cheaply and raised large families. They shipped huge quantities of wheat to Minneapolis, then Milwaukee, Chicago and St. Louis connected by rail. while buying all sorts of farming equipment and home supplies (some ordered and delivered through the beginnings of published mail-order catalogs from

6380-561: The Yellowstone region by Sioux , Cheyenne , Arapaho , and Kiowa native warriors in northern Dakota and Minnesota Territories became so prevalent that the company received protection from additional mounted troops in units of the U.S. Army. In 1886, the Northern Pacific also opened colonization / emigration offices in Europe especially the newly unified German Empire and north to the kingdoms of Scandinavia , with good reliable steamship lines, attracting Nordic farmers with package deals of cheap land and transportation and purchase deals in

6490-493: The big cities warehouses, to be shipped in by rail. The N.P. used its federal land grants as security to borrow money to build its system. The federal government kept every other alternate section of land, and gave it away free to native and immigrant homesteaders / farmers under the Homestead Act of 1862. At first the railroad sold much of its holdings at low prices to land speculators in order to realize quick cash profits, and also to eliminate sizable annual tax bills. By 1905,

6600-413: The business. The first nuclear power plant connected to the electrical grid, the SM-1, was built for the Army Nuclear Power Program at Fort Belvoir in Virginia in 1957. Another complete plant, the PM-2A, was shipped to and constructed at Camp Century in Greenland. The Camp Century plant was filmed by the U.S. Army. The company was purchased in 1964 by the Worthington Corporation , which merged with

6710-571: The civilian Pennsylvania Railroad , organized the Northern Pacific Beneficial Association in 1881. Inspired by the progressive medical care and insurance program then being introduced in the German Empire in Europe and a forerunner of the modern health maintenance organization , the N.P.B.A. ultimately established a series of four medical hospitals across the N.P.R.R. route system in Saint Paul, Minnesota ; Glendive, Montana ; Missoula, Montana ; and Tacoma, Washington , to care for its railroad employees, retirees, and their families. On January 15, 1883,

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6820-481: The company bylaws allowed for the holders of the common stock to vote to retire the preferred. In three days, the Harriman-Hill imbroglio managed to wreak havoc on the stock market. Northern Pacific stock was quoted at $ 150 a share on May 6 and is reported to have traded as much as $ 1,000 a share behind the scenes. Harriman and Hill now worked to settle the issue for brokers to avoid panic. Hill, for his part, attempted to avoid future stock raids by placing his holdings in

6930-449: The company changed its name to Alco Products, Incorporated. In 1964, the Worthington Corporation acquired the company. The company went out of business in 1969, although Montreal Locomotive Works continued to manufacture locomotives based on Alco designs. The ALCO name is currently being used by Fairbanks Morse Engine for their FM|ALCO line. The company was created in 1901 from the merger of seven smaller locomotive manufacturers with

7040-418: The construction phase in Minnesota. The N.P. also began building its line north from Kalama, Washington Territory , on the Columbia River just outside of Portland, Oregon , towards the Puget Sound . Four small construction locomotive engines were purchased, the Minnetonka , Itaska , Ottertail and St. Cloud , the first of which was shipped to Kalama by ship all around the continent of South America and

7150-427: The country's second-largest locomotive manufacturer behind Baldwin Locomotive Works . Alco produced more than 75,000 locomotives, including more steam locomotives than any U.S. company except Baldwin Locomotive Works . (Alco outlasted Baldwin, in part by shifting more readily to diesel.) Railroads that favored Alco products included the Delaware & Hudson Railway , the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad ,

7260-433: The court-appointed receiver of the company, and Charles Barstow Wright became its fourth president. Frederick Billings , namesake of future Billings, Montana , formulated a reorganization plan which was put into effect. Throughout 1874 to 1876, elements of the 7th Cavalry Regiment of the U.S. Army under the command of Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer , operating out of Fort Abraham Lincoln and Fort Rice in

7370-444: The decade between 1881 and 1890. The Northern Pacific reached Dakota Territory at Fargo in 1872 and began its career as one of the central factors in the economic growth of the future Dakotas Territory and later its twin states North and South. The climate, although very cold in the continental interior heartland was still suitable for wheat, which was in high demand in the eastern and Mid-Western rapidly developing industrial cities of

7480-599: The diesel power on the Indian Railways . Many thousands of locomotives with Alco lineage are in regular mainline use in India. Most of these locomotives were built by the Diesel Locomotive Works (DLW) at Varanasi, India . The Diesel Loco Modernisation Works (DMW) at Patiala, India, do mid-life rebuilding and upgrading the power of these locomotives, typically the 2,600 horsepower (1.94 MW) WDM-2 to 3,100 horsepower (2.31 MW). A number of Alco and MLW diesel–electric locomotives (models DL500C, DL532B, DL537, DL543, MX627 and MX636) are in daily use hauling freight trains of

7590-434: The dual-service 4-8-4 steam locomotive had shown great promise, 1948 was the last year that steam locomotives were manufactured in Schenectady. These were the seven A-2a class 9400-series Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad 2-8-4 "Berkshires." Their tenders had to be subcontracted to Lima Locomotive Works , as Alco's tender shop had been closed. The building was converted to make diesel locomotives to compete with those of

7700-417: The easy access of cheap lumber. The Brainerd Shops to the east remained as the largest locomotive repair facility throughout the steam era. Another shops / foundry site was located at the center mid-way of the mainline in Livingston, Montana , which became the primary diesel engine maintenance facility after 1955. In St. Paul, Minnesota were the Como Shops, which maintained most of the passenger car fleet, and

7810-403: The effects of having multiple railroads attempt to serve the same destination, he was very much in tune with James J. Hill's philosophy of "community of interest," a loose affiliation or collusion among roads in an attempt to avoid duplicating routes, rate wars, weak finances and ultimately bankruptcies and reorganizations. Elliott would be left to make peace with the Hill-controlled Great Northern;

7920-632: The engines 6&12R251 into naval gensets and also with the 6R251 in FAUR factory were made locomotives known as LDH 1500 CP. (CFR Classes 67/68/70/71 and CFR Class 61). They were also exported in Iran and Greece ( OSE ) Several Alco-built mainline engines are still operational, such as Union Pacific 844 , Union Pacific Big Boy 4014 , Milwaukee Road 261 , Soo Line 1003 , and Florida East Coast 148 . UP Challenger 3985 ran in UP excursion service until 2010, but

8030-539: The family of famed longtime abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison , who had just died four years earlier. On September 8, 1883, the Gold Spike was driven near Gold Creek in the Montana Territory . Villard's fall was swifter than his ascendancy. Like Jay Cooke, he was now consumed by the enormous costs of constructing the railroad. Wall Street bears attacked the stock shortly after the Golden Spike, after

8140-598: The fastest American locomotives, the Class A Atlantic and Class F7 Hudson streamliners for the Milwaukee Road 's Twin Cities Hiawatha run. Among the ambitious state-of-the-art designs of the late steam era, Alco's Challengers, Big Boys, and high-speed streamliners stood out for their success in operations. Alco built the second production steam locomotive in North America to use roller bearings (after

8250-429: The fireboxes of Central Pacific Railroad 's steam engines locomotives. This small amount of construction was one of the largest projects the company would undertake in the years between 1874 and 1880. That same year the company built a large shop complex at Edison, Washington (now part of south Tacoma metropolitan area ). The Edison Shops became the largest on the system for building and repairing freight cars due to

8360-514: The first N.P.R.R. train reached Livingston, Montana , at the eastern foot of the Bozeman Pass . Livingston, like Brainerd and South Tacoma before it, would grow to encompass a large backshop handling heavy repairs for the Northern Pacific Railroad equipment. It would also mark the east–west dividing line on the Northern Pacific route system. Villard pushed hard for the completion of the Northern Pacific in 1883. His crews laid an average of

8470-453: The first modern road–switcher, a configuration which has long-outlasted ALCo. The success of their switcher and road–switcher locomotives was not matched with the PA and FA -type mainline units, however. The 244 engine, developed in a crash program to compete with EMD's powerful 567 engine, proved unreliable and sales of ALCo's mainline units soon went into decline. In 1948, ALCo-GE produced

8580-576: The holdings of Villard in the Northwest, and especially in Portland. Portland unfortunately could possibly become a second-class city if the Puget Sound 's deeper and larger ports at Tacoma and nearby Seattle, Washington , were further developed and connected to the East by rail. Villard, who had been building a monopoly of river and rail transportation in Oregon for several years, now launched

8690-520: The late 1960s, Alco gradually ceased locomotive production, shipping its last two locomotives, a pair of T-6 switchers to the Newburgh & South Shore Railroad (#1016 and #1017) in January 1969. ALCo closed its Schenectady locomotive plant later that year, and sold its designs to the Montreal Locomotive Works in Canada. The vast ALCo Schenectady plant was completely demolished by 2019, and its site

8800-462: The market for locomotives was declining after the height of the dieselization era and EMD's GP9 was on the market as a proven competitor backed by a service infrastructure that ALCo, since the dissolution of the GE partnership, lacked. Sales were disappointing and ALCo's profitability suffered. GE entered the export road-diesel locomotive market in 1956, then the domestic market in 1960, and quickly took

8910-454: The mounting construction costs. Cooke overestimated his managerial skills and failed to appreciate the limits of a banker's ability to be also a promoter, and the danger of freezing his assets in the bonds of the Northern Pacific. Cooke and Company went bankrupt on September 18, 1873. Soon the financial Panic of 1873 engulfed the United States, business and financial community extending to numerous industries beginning an economic depression that

9020-586: The new German Empire ), for construction funding. Construction began in 1870 and the main line opened all the way from the Great Lakes to the Pacific Ocean , just south of the United States-Canada border when Ulysses S. Grant , drove in the final "golden spike" completing the line in western Montana Territory (future State of Montana in 1889), on September 8, 1883. The railroad had about 6,800 miles (10,900 km) of track and served

9130-602: The next four years, until the return of the Villard group, Harris worked at improving the property and ending its tangled relationship with the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company. Throughout the mid-1880s, the Northern Pacific pushed to reach Puget Sound directly, rather than by means of a roundabout route that followed the Columbia River. Surveys of the Cascade Mountains , carried out intermittently since

9240-405: The next two years, Villard and the Northern Pacific rode the whirlwind. In 1882, 360 miles (580 km) of main line and 368 miles (592 km) of branch line were completed, bringing totals to 1,347 miles (2,168 km) and 731 miles (1,176 km), respectively. On October 10, 1882, the line from Wadena, Minnesota , to Fergus Falls, Minnesota , opened for service. The upper Missouri River

9350-652: The original was scrapped in 1909, a full-scale, operating replica was completed in 1979, and now is part of an operational display at the Golden Spike National Historic Site . Following is a list (in serial number order) of preserved Schenectady locomotives built before the ALCO merger. All locations are in the United States unless otherwise noted. Northern Pacific Railway The Northern Pacific Railway ( reporting mark NP )

9460-413: The pace of ALCo's efforts to develop a replacement for the troubled 244 engine, dissolved their partnership with ALCo and took over the gas turbine–electric venture that had started series production the previous year. In 1956, ALCo made long-overdue changes, modernizing its production process and introducing road locomotives with its new 251 engine. However, the benefits to ALCo were negated by bad timing;

9570-584: The presidency of the New York Central Railroad to become president of Alco. When Callaway died on June 1, 1904, Albert J. Pitkin succeeded him as president of Alco. In 1904, the American Locomotive Company acquired control of the Locomotive and Machine Company of Montreal , Quebec, Canada; this company was eventually renamed the Montreal Locomotive Works . In 1905, Alco purchased Rogers Locomotive Works of Paterson, New Jersey ,

9680-430: The previous three years the financial house of Jay Cooke and Company in New York City had been throwing money into the construction of the Northern Pacific. As with many western transcontinentals , the staggering costs of building a railroad into a vast wilderness prairie had been drastically underestimated. Cooke had little success in marketing the N.P.R.R. bonds in Europe and overextended his house in meeting overdrafts of

9790-565: The primary interchange point for most of the large U.S. railroads. Fortunately, the Northern Pacific was not alone. James J. Hill , controller of the Great Northern Railway , which was completed between the Twin Cities and Puget Sound in 1893, also lacked a direct connection to Chicago. Hill went looking for a road with an existing route between the Twin Cities and Chicago which could be rolled into his holdings and give him

9900-509: The railroad company's land policies changed, after it was judged a costly mistake to have sold much of the land at wholesale prices. With better railroad service and improved more educated and scientific methods of farming and soil conservation in future decades in the special unique conditions on the Great Plains. The Northern Pacific then easily sold what had been heretofore termed "worthless" land directly to farmers at good prices. By 1910

10010-559: The railroad's holdings in the new state of North Dakota had been greatly reduced. In 1873, Northern Pacific made impressive strides before a terrible stumble. Rails from the east reached the Missouri River on June 4. After several years of study, Tacoma, Washington Territory near the Pacific Coast and Puget Sound for waterborne shipping port facilities was selected as the road's western terminus on July 14, 1873. For

10120-425: The realization that the Northern Pacific was a very long road with very little business. Villard himself suffered a nervous breakdown in the days after the driving of the Golden Spike, and he left the presidency of the Northern Pacific in January 1884. Again, the presidency of the Northern Pacific was handed to a professional railroader, Robert Harris , former head of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad . For

10230-586: The similar cold higher latitudes of climate of the north-central North America continent, but with richer unplowed expansive soil. The success of the N.P. was based on the abundant crops of wheat and other grains already grown and the attraction to settlers of the lower Red River Valley of the Red River of the North, Minnesota, Missouri and Mississippi Rivers basins along the Minnesota-Dakota border in

10340-608: The tunnel, and on May 27 the first train passed through directly to Puget Sound. Despite this success, the Northern Pacific, like many U.S. roads, was living on borrowed time. From 1887 until 1893, Henry Villard returned to the board of directors. Though offered the presidency, he refused. An associate of Villard dating back to his time on the Kansas Pacific, Thomas Fletcher Oakes , assumed the presidency on September 20, 1888. In an effort to garner business, Oakes pursued an aggressive policy of branch line expansion. In addition,

10450-620: The west in Washington Territory. On November 1, General George Washington Cass (formerly of the U.S. Army), became the third president of the company. General Cass had been a vice-president and on the board of directors earlier of the Pennsylvania Railroad , one of the major dominant Eastern lines and would lead the Northern Pacific through some of its most difficult times in the later 19th century. Attacks on survey parties and construction crews as they approached

10560-510: Was Charles Sanger Mellen . Though James J. Hill had purchased an interest in the Northern Pacific during the troubled days of 1896, Coster and Mellen would advocate, and follow, a staunchly independent line for the Northern Pacific for the next four years. Only the early death of Coster from overwork, and the promotion of Mellen to head the Morgan-controlled New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad in 1903, would bring

10670-776: Was an important transcontinental railroad that operated across the northern tier of the western United States , from Minnesota to the Pacific Northwest . It was approved and chartered in 1864 by the 38th Congress of the United States in the national / federal capital of Washington, D.C. , during the last years of the American Civil War (1861-1865), and given nearly 40 million acres (62,000 sq mi; 160,000 km ) of adjacent land grants , which it used to raise additional money in Europe (especially in President Henry Villard's home country of

10780-511: Was bridged with a million-dollar span on October 21, 1883. Until then, crossing of the Missouri had had to be managed with a ferry boat service for most of the year; in winter, when ice was thick enough, rails were laid across the river itself. Former Union Army General Herman Haupt , another veteran of the Civil War , builder then of the wartime United States Military Railroad lines and

10890-486: Was developed by Banaras Locomotive Works with help of American Locomotive Company (ALCO) for Indian Railways. In 1962 Alco locomotives entered in service and since then Thousands of Alco class Locomotive WDM-2 , WDM-3A , WDM-3D would be manufactured and rebuilt which would make most successful locomotives of Indian Railways serving both passenger and freight trains and still retain operational status for Indian railways today A new line of Century locomotives including

11000-504: Was elected its first president on December 7, 1864. It could not use all the land and in the end took just under two-thirds of the allotted grant of 40 million acres. For the next six years, backers of the road struggled to find financing. Though John Gregory Smith , succeeded Perham as second president on January 5, 1865, groundbreaking did not take place until February 15, 1870, at Carlton, Minnesota Territory , 25 miles (40 km) west of Duluth (western port town on Lake Superior of

11110-572: Was headquartered in Minnesota, first in Brainerd , then in the territorial / state capital of Saint Paul . It had a tumultuous financial history; the N.P. merged with other lines over a century later in 1970 to form the modern Burlington Northern Railroad , which in turn merged with the famous Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway to become the renamed BNSF Railway in 1996, operating in the western U.S. The 38th United States Congress chartered

11220-778: Was largely overseen by Perry T. Egbert , vice president in charge of diesel locomotive sales and later president of the company. In the early to mid-1930s, ALCo was the pre-eminent builder of diesel–electric switch engines in the United States. It was slower than its competition to develop reliable diesel power for full-size mainline trains, though it did provided motive power for the Gulf, Mobile and Northern Railroad 's Rebel streamliners in 1935. In 1939, ALCo started producing passenger diesel locomotives to compete with General Motors ' Electro-Motive Corporation . The following year, ALCo teamed up with General Electric ( Alco-GE ) for much-needed support in competing with EMC. In 1941, ALCo introduced

11330-682: Was named receiver and Brayton Ives , a former chairman of the New York Stock Exchange , became president. In 1894, the 10th Cavalry Regiment of the U.S. Army was involved in protecting property of the Northern Pacific Railroad from striking workers. For the next three years, the Villard-Oakes interests and the Ives interest feuded for control of the Northern Pacific. Oakes was eventually forced out as receiver, but not before three separate courts were claiming jurisdiction over

11440-476: Was one of the worse in American history prior to the infamous Great Depression of the 1930s, sixty years into the future. The downturn ruined or nearly paralyzed newer railroads throughout the country.. The Northern Pacific however luckily survived bankruptcy that year, due to austerity measures put in place by President Cass. In fact, working with last-minute loans from Director John C. Ainsworth of Portland,

11550-768: Was selected by the United States Army for a vital task: rejuvenating the Trans-Iranian Railway and extending it to the Soviet Union. This gave the U.S. ally a new supply line at a time when the German air force and navy had reduced Allied shipments to the Soviet port of Murmansk . The U.S. Army chose as locomotives the RSD-1 , a six-axle, six- traction motor variant of the light ALCo RS-1. Not only

11660-583: Was sold to White Motor Corporation in 1970, which developed White Industrial Power . In 1977 White Industrial Power was sold to the British General Electric Company (GEC) which renamed the unit Alco Power. The business was subsequently sold to the Fairbanks-Morse corporation, which continues to manufacture Alco-designed engines in addition to their own design. The heat exchanger business continued as Alco Products for

11770-504: Was the Northern Pacific's flagship passenger train and the Northern Pacific itself was built along the trail first blazed by the famed Lewis and Clark expedition first exploring the new Louisiana Purchase and the further American West in 1804 and 1805. The Northern Pacific reached Fargo, Dakota Territory (now North Dakota) on the border between Dakota and Minnesota Territories / states, early in June 1872. The following year, in June 1873,

11880-439: Was the company prevented from selling these locomotives to mainline U.S. railroads, but the 13 RS-1s that had already been built were commandeered for Iranian duty and converted to RSD-1s. The postwar era saw ALCo's steam products fall out of favor while it struggled to develop mainline diesel locomotives competitive with EMD's E and F series road locomotives, which were well-positioned from GM-EMC's large development efforts of

11990-474: Was the possibility of a high-speed link directly with Chicago. Though the Burlington did not parallel the Great Northern or the Northern Pacific, it would give them a powerful railroad in the central West. Harriman was the first to approach the Burlington's aging leader, the irascible Charles Elliott Perkins . The price for control of the Burlington, as set by Perkins, was $ 200 a share, more than Harriman

12100-441: Was willing to pay. Hill met the price, and control of the Burlington was divided equally at about 48.5 percent each between the Great Northern and the Northern Pacific. Not to be outdone, Harriman now came up with a crafty plan: buy a controlling interest in the Northern Pacific and use its power on the Burlington to place friendly directors upon its board. On May 3, 1901, Harriman began his stock raid which would become known as

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