| ARB. Here is a duplicate 35mm color slide of the first of two successive photos by David R. Sweetland that were taken in Altoona, Pennsylvania, in July of 1959. Shown here (R to L) is PRR engine #9517 and two more "EF" Class units whose road numbers are not recorded. All were built by GM-EMD and rated at 1,500 horsepower each. #9517 was built in May of 1948 and retired in September of 1962 after just 14 years of revenue service. They are about to pass under the 8th Street Bridge in Juniata with a long string of retired PRR steam locomotives that are about to be recycled. This was one of at least three such "Graveyard Trains." The final one merited a photo in the "Altoona Mirror" of 28 August 1959, captioned as follows: "A solid train of 15 old Pennsylvania Railroad [I-1SA (2-10-0) "Decapod"] steam locomotives [are shown here] moving around the famed Horseshoe Curve near Altoona. The engines, representing 3,211 tons of metal, were en route from Altoona to a Midwestern steel mill to be cut up for scrap. The Pennsy, which once owned as many as 7,630 steam engines, became completely dieselized or electrified more than two years ago." |