In the course of communicating with Carpenter Technology regarding whether it owned gondolas lettered with "Carpenter Technology" or "CarTech," the person with whom I've been communicating emailed me several interesting photographs of industrial locomotives that Carpenter Technology owned. None of them are dated, but dates for all but the last posted below have been surmised from the clothing of the people in the photographs.

Below are the photographs posted with the permission of Carpenter Technology. Can anyone provide any information regarding these photographs, such as the manufacturer of the industrial locomotives?

The locomotive in the last photograph appears to be unusual in that the pistons are located inside the front drivers, and there is an unusual linkage between the pistons and the front drivers. Does anyone know who manufactured this, or does anyone recognize the builder's plate?

Also, as I mentioned above, the last photograph is not dated. However, the locomotive pictured appears to be new or close to being new. If the builder can be identified, then I believe the photograph could be dated.

Circa 1910:

Posted with the permission of Carpenter Technology Corporation

Circa 1925:

Posted with the permission of Carpenter Technology Corporation

Circa 1940s:

Posted with the permission of Carpenter Technology Corporation

Circa 1970s:

Posted with the permission of Carpenter Technology Corporation

Date unknown:

Posted with the permission of Carpenter Technology Corporation

Thanks,
Peter Zacharias

Peter - I'm taking a guess here, but my thought is that the little industrial loco only had one cylinder, so rather than pistons, it is some sort of geared locomotive similar to Heisler of Climax.

the "CRITTER" in the 4th photo looks an awful lot like the Plymouth that was donated to the RCT&HS and is at the RRHM in Hamburg...

There is a Bee Line article that I authored in the early 90's which contains most of if not all of these photos. I was formerly employed at Carpenter and was instrumental in having the Plymouth 2 foot switcher that is now at the Railroad Museum in Hamburg donated to the RCT&HS by Carpenter. (btw - another one is on the WW&F in Maine, they bought theirs) Also BTW it has come to my attention that the museum wishes to sell this Plymouth diesel as apparently money is more important to them than the history.

The single piston-ed steam engine #20 is significant in that it was used in the construction of the Panama Canal.

The Gentleman standing on the front of the Plymouth is Russ Miller, who later lost a leg in an industrial railroad accident involving the "dinky" as they were called at Carpenter. In fact that is dinky #19 which if memory serves me right, became #319 which is the very unit that is at Hamburg. You can see the draw bar coupling system that was sometimes used between the loco and the first car, usually they just used a rope with loops on them, they were often on fire or smoldering from the hot steel. Behind the unit, one can see the flat cars which were used to haul ingots between mills. That photo is in a yard on the West Shore of the plant, the Schuylkill Ave entrance side.

Next up, the photo with the camelback... This is on the east shore in the scrap yard, near the River Road entrance. You can see the Reading's Shepp's Dam Bridge on the Belt Line in the upper right corner. The Camelback is on the lead coming down from a siding along the Belt Line which led to a couple of elevated tracks in the scrap yard. The standard gauge gondolas were unloaded by overhead cranes on rails via electro magnets. I never saw any tanks cars during my career there, so I do not know their use. The loco in the photo was an earlier gas-hydraulic. Most were Plymouths but there was at least one Whitcomb.

I have more photos than Carpenter does, to be honest with you. They cannot be shared on the internet.

I don't want to engage in a debate over whether or not RCTHS should preserve all locomotive history or just Reading. I'll leave that to others. As far as Car Tech or Carpenter gondolas, I never saw any, the only Reading customer I'm familiar with that had a fleet of standard railcars is Lukens Steel
- Note the orange gondola with reporting marks LUK 218. My recollection is that most importantly, these cars were only for in-plant service and also that most had no brakes. Member NiteTrainJames will know more about the Lukens fleet.

For additional photos of the relationship between the Reading and Carpenter, see Bee Line Vol. 10 #4 1988. The article is listed as authored by Carpenter employee and RCT&HS member, Larry Mundell, we kinda co-wrote it. While only 2 of the above 5 photos appear in that article ( sorry I have seen them so many times I lost track of where I saw them) there are 7 other interesting photos including 90906, 2102, flat car loading of TOFC, loading wire coil on a Reading Trans truck in CTC shipping, ten of the older gas-hydraulic dinkys (dinkies?)and finally Carpenter families disembarking a special passenger train (at least eight coaches)at Hershey, PA for the annual family picnic. All of these photos appeared at one time or another in the Carpenter Employee News Magazine OR the Reading Railroad Co. Magazine. I went through the bound copies of the Carpenter Magazine in the company archives and photocopied every picture that had any reference to the railroad. (yeah they're somewhere in my stash) The article was in conjunction with Carpenter's 100th Anniversary, that year. This issue was presented by me to both the Carpenter P.R. Department and then CEO, Bob Cardy and noted it would be nice if Carpenter donated a Dinky to the RCT&HS, which they shortly thereafter obliged. If someone is hell bent on modeling that two-foot industrial railroad, you might want to talk to me off-line. As expected, Security would not allow photography in the plant. So no Reading Railroad history in that Carpenter Dinky in Hamburg.......... Really! BTW, not currently a member of RCT&HS, so its none of my business what they do.
Rob