A week ago I was in Juneau Alaska\u2026 for exactly 71 hours\u2026 Kyle Wyatt (see the occasional Kyle\u2019s corner on this site) and I were consulting for the Alaska State Museum on how to approach a narrow gauge electric locomotive for a new display\u2026\u00a0\u00a0 Their very professional staff generally finds themselves addressing small, less industrial objects\u2026 their collection of Indian baskets is spectacular\u2026 they have a wide variety of kayaks\u2026 there are stuffed and mounted birds and animals\u2026\u00a0 they have Sarah Pallen\u2019s rifle (it was given to the Governor of Alaska by the NRA, so is state property\u2026 and now in the museum\u2026 not on display, but down in storage in the basement)<\/p>\n
Juneau Alaska has a long and rich history of mining, complete with railroads to support that mining.<\/p>\n
The locomotive is a Baldwin\/Westinghouse 18 ton, 3\u2019gauge electric, built in 1914 for Alaska Gastenau Gold Mining Company.\u00a0 After the A-G shut down in 1921, it and a sister, and cars were sold to Santa Cruz Portland Cement in Davenport, north of Santa Cruz.\u00a0 After Santa Cruz converted to a conveyer system about 1980, this loco and the sister eventually joined the collection of the California State Railroad Museum.\u00a0 A few years ago this locomotive was given to the Alaska State Museum.<\/p>\n
Their staff frequently uses Q-tips to clean objects\u2026 a Q-tip is the correct tool when cleaning a basket but is probably the wrong strategy when dealing with a locomotive\u2026 The museum\u2019s staff understands Q-tips are not the answer\u2026 but needed help in identifying the answer\u2026 so we were asked to join them for a few days\u2026 we also did a couple of radio interviews, and gave a evening lecture\u2026 So our mission was two fold, dealing with railroad locomotives as museum objects, and the stories this told about local history\u2026<\/p>\n
So the railroad locomotive as museum object was pretty easy, it is what we both do\u2026\u00a0 but the history required some work\u2026\u00a0 We both spent some time\u2026 both in Alaska, but also before, catching up on local railroad history\u2026\u00a0 local mining history\u2026 \u00a0and local history in general\u2026 Kyle went up a week early with his wife Deb\u2026 by chance, her grandfather worked for Alaska Treadwell, and he (her grandfather) is considered a notable area pioneer.\u00a0 Deb left for points south a few hours before I arrived\u2026 so Kyle and I were without our local history muse\u2026<\/p>\n
Kyle and I had rosters published in the 2nd<\/sup> addition of Clifford\u2019s Yukon-Alaska Railroads (originally published as Rails North, the new edition is much revised and improved) research in Baldwin and Porter records and some random newspaper clippings\u2026 We had access to photos and drawings from the associated Alaska State Archives\u2026\u00a0 We are both pretty good with Google and web searches\u2026\u00a0 We kind of looked like the pro\u2019s from Dover\u2026 we knew more than anyone else we met\u2026<\/p>\n The talk went well, the radio interviews went well\u2026 the Locomotive as museum object went very well (although there is a written report due)<\/p>\n Along the way, we may have solved the great mystery of local railroad history\u2026 identifying the remains of a locomotive buried wheels up in the woods\u2026 a locomotive that neither of us has seen, but both have seen in photos\u2026 a locomotive, apparently built by Risdon of San Francisco, inside geared, of steam outline (but could be compressed air, and may or may not still have a boiler or air tank attached)\u00a0 Kyle had a newspaper clipping received years earlier\u2026 which suggests a Risdon locomotive was being built for a railroad in Sheep Creek for Nowell\u2026 of course it is also reported in sources including Clifford as Howell\u2026 and while the remains are about 24\u201d gauge the Porter list suggests that Nowell or Howell also bought a 30\u201d gauge loco later\u2026\u00a0 Sheep Creek was later the site of the A-G operation with 36\u201d gauge haul railroad (home of our locomotive) and a 26\u201d gauge mining operations\u2026 so, we possibly have 4 gauges in a single place over a period of 40 years\u2026<\/p>\n It appears that gauge is important\u2026 between the three big mines, and their railroads, the two smaller tramways, the two dam construction railroads we have at least 5 and maybe more gauges.\u00a0 We have steam locomotives (rod locomotives from 5 builders, maybe more, including a shay), compressed air locomotives, electric trolley and electric battery locomotives (with at least three manufacturers represented amount the electrics).<\/p>\n Now home\u2026 I am finding more on the area railroads\u2026 It turns out a friend, Don Marenzi is the expert of record on the area (we knew that)\u2026 He did the rosters in the new version of Clifford, but much of what he submitted wasn\u2019t included\u2026\u00a0 At this point I suspect Kyle and I know more about local railroads than anyone else except Don\u2026 and we know a few things Don doesn\u2019t\u2026\u00a0 Kyle is pulling stuff out of the Pennsylvania State Archives\u2026 I have found some additional newspaper reports and a couple of maps\u2026 Don, looking at files he compiled years ago is finding things\u2026<\/p>\n The result will likely be a number of pages on this site covering the railroads near Juneau.<\/p>\n Randy<\/p>\n PS… the blog continues to be a fly trap for spam comments, mostly for on line drug stores, but also shoes and web directories promising to grow out audience… the number is significant… so significant that I generally don’t read them, just id them as spam and go on… if you have a comment it is probablly better submitted on our forum…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A week ago I was in Juneau Alaska\u2026 for exactly 71 hours\u2026 Kyle Wyatt (see the occasional Kyle\u2019s corner on this site) and I were consulting for the Alaska State Museum on how to approach a narrow gauge electric locomotive for a new display\u2026\u00a0\u00a0 Their very professional staff generally finds themselves addressing small, less industrial 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