A picture truly worth a thousand words

[doctorwayne]

Thanks to all for the information included in this thread.  I grew up in Hamilton, and do remember much of what was there at one time.

The TH&B was literally right across the street from our front porch, on an elevated r-o-w, and I watched the steamers (and their replacements) from there.

The TH&B Berks and Hudsons certainly wouldn't have gone into the STELCO blast furnaces, but were likely cut-up, at STELCO, down near the Bay, then went into the open hearth furnaces.  A lot of American steam met its end there, too, including articulated locos and quite a few Berkshires - their tenders, cut-down and modifed, served long lives as slab carriers...there are photos to be found HERE.

I later worked at STELCO so am quite familair with operations there. 

The tender from one of the TH&B Hudsons was converted into a steam generator car, and eventually ended-up at Steam Town.

The fruit industry is still flourishing in the Niagara peninsula, but there's little left from Burlington, through Hamilton, and all the way out past Stoney Creek.  Some survives in the Winona area, and through Grimsby (my current home) and all the way down to Niagara-On-The-Lake, although it's under threat in various places from urban development.

I'm modelling the late '30s, in HO scale, and many of my industries are named for real ones which exist (or existed) in this area, so the links were a very-much-appreciated reminder of what was once here.

Wayne

 

 

[NDG]

 

Forums.

 

One reason of these Forums is to inforum others and pass on information, history and SKILLS from our lifetimes, when steam was disappearing along with so much else.

 

The Big Change came in 1960, when steam was gone for good, along with a great deal of passenger service.

 

The Seaway just opened in '59, and more change with the elimination of the smaller canals.

 

This could go on and on.

 

We haunted CNR Turcot Yards in Montreal where CN cut up over 100 steam locomotives in 1960-1961, including CN 4193-4194, Ex B&A.

 

We climbed all over CN 4190/4100, it earmarked for preservation, and wondered at the Canisters containing Marker Lamps front and rear.

 

It there, too. but SAFE.

 

Found out about the lamps, eventually.

 

 

To CP Angus Shops, Montreal.

 

Rows and rows of steam. Even MORE rows of just TENDERS, going for OCS Water Car Service.

 

CP 9003 and 9005 ( ' Gas Electrics ' ) in getting cut up as we watched, ex Maritime Service.

 

A later visit to CN London saw many of the CNR CLC locomotives meeting their end. Some of the Steeple Cabs were there from Oshawa, Ont.

 

Back in the day was a weekly glossy magazine named 'The Star Weekly ' which had a detailed photo expose of steam locomotives being cut up in Hamilton.

 

A row of 8-coupled all lettered Chesapeake and Ohio.

 

A view from an overhead crane of a BIG PILE of JUST the boiler segment tube sheet to tube sheet of locomotive boilers, domes still atop.

 

Another BIG pile of cylinder castings.

 

BIG Travelling Crane.

 

A view somewhere of an articulated, Main rods off, crossing Southern Ontario bound for Hamilton.

 

Another Saturday expose in the Montreal Star of a CN steam crane ripping the cab off a Pacific, other cabs, their wood lining burning, in the background. A pile of Pyle National headlights, a pile of Driving Box Journals.

 

A steam locomotive shorn of it's cab is LOST, DOOMED! a crew moving in with torches while we watched.

 

Well covered at the time, in the Media. 

 

Won't mention piles of burning streetcars and 12-whl. heavyweights.  

 

One Sunday we rode the GMD Yard Goat and the list said to lift and space Five steam locomotives for scrapping, Monday Morning.

 

Church Bells were ringing across the Canal, in St. Henri.

 

We coupled on to a string of about Thirty, and pulled the pin behind Five, 

 

Noise, smoke, sand and wheel slip. No movement account the grass below.

 

Cut off Two, and moved on, up thru the switches to the scrapping area and spaced as requested.

 

Had to back down the long way around and bring up the other Two and set them over on top of the Three.

 

Long slow last trip, the headlight nodding and weaving out the back door of the Switcher. On The Last Trip.

 

We knew the end was no longer near, but HERE! 

 

 

Thank You.  

 

 

 

[Miningman]

NDG-- No links! Are there supposed to be links? Please repost if so.

[Overmod]

I don't want links.  Not of that.  Most of what NDG recounts, yes, but not that.

[Flintlock76]

I'm with you Overmod, I really don't want to see steam locomotives lined up for the slaughter.  if I want that I'll pull out my copy of Ron Zeil's "The Twilight of Steam Locomotives," and I don't even do that all too often.

I'd find it as disturbing as a film I saw several years ago of a pilot whale massacre in some Scandinavian country.  Supposed to be a local festival.  Really.

[Miningman]

Well I would like to see those C&O steam locomotives in Hamilton as per the Star Weekly. 

A very popular and eagerly awaited addition to many newspapers. Ours was the Hamilton Spectator. September to May every year they had a full length half page picture of a NHL hockey player dressed in their home colours. Along with a small bio and stats. Could not wait to see who was featured this week. If it was a Chicago Black Hawk it went on my wall. Bobby Hull, Stan Mikita, Glen Hall, Billy Hay, Pierre Pilot, Doug Mohns, Chico Maki..  so good. No link available! 

By the way, former media mogul Conrad Black, the founder of the National Post, revived it from the NP inaugural issue and a couple of years after that then the realities of newspaper finances hit hard. 

[Miningman]

doctorwayne-- could be an urban legend that they just rolled the TH&B Berkshires and Hudsons into the open furnaces... same story with the Algoma Central steam at Algoma Steel. Probably is. The TH&B scrapped their steam fast. Tenders removed moments after their last run ( pics of that) and then off quickly to the steel mills with the locomotive. This was the NYC influence on the TH&B. 

Local railfans raved and still do about the TH&B Geeps, but not me ever.   Paint scheme never held up well and besides who cares. Passenger declined to nothing, the magic was gone and that was that. 

[NDG]

 

 

FWIW.

 

I have not seen the images at Hamilton in Print form since the Sixties.

 

The article started off by saying " There is a Graveyard at the end of xxx Street in Hamilton " and went on.

 

There might be a Site which has The Star Weekly on line?

 

Not all steam locomotives can or should be preserved.

 

Here is one last which I found whilst looking for something else.

 

The boiler looks as if it could still be warm, the next time it feels warmth will be under the auspices of Acetylene.

 

White Lined.

 

https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7442/9527046623_5d9018137f_b.jpg

 

No other details.

 

Thank You.

 

[Flintlock76]

Thanks for the link to that forlorn Hudson NDG!

And you know, no-one's saying that ALL the steam locomotives should have been preserved, (As much as we'd secretly wish it!), that would have been totally unrealistic and impractical.

It's the wholesale slaughter, especially of certain historic and landmark types, that has us so PO'd.  

OK, business is business, and assuming most of us here are capitalists we more than understand that, but still, what a loss.

Not quite on the order of building condos or strip malls on a Civil War battlefield, but close.

[Miningman]

A head scratcher... why would American steam locomotives be scrapped in Canada? Must be something economic about it but enough so to overcome transportation and border holdups... probably brokerage and paperwork?

No capiche. 

It is possible the C&O locomotives came from St. Thomas or Sarnia refineries so already based in Canada but articulated locomotives? 

[Flintlock76]

Vince, if American steam locomotives wound up being scrapped in Canada I can only think of two reasons for the same.

1)  The Canadian scrappers offered the best price.

2)  Some might just have been up there anyway, so why bring them "home" just to kill 'em?

Just a couple of thoughts on a dirty business.

Wayne

PS:  I mentioned Ron Zeil's "Twilight Of Steam Locomotives" earlier, and in the scrapyard chapter Ron mentioned talking with the cutting torch men, and finding out they weren't too crazy about killing those magnificent machines either, but what can you do?  A job's a job.