This old veteran has had quite a history. It started out life as an RS-1 built for the Atlanta & St. Andrews Bay Railroad and one of the first thirteen of the class built by Alco. It was requisitioned in 1941 by the U.S. Army and rebuilt by Alco as an RSD-1 for use on the Trans Iranian Railroad to supply the Soviet Union during WWII as US 8011. After six years of storage, the locomotive worked for the Alaska Railroad from 1951 to 1956 before being reacquired by the Army. In 1974, it went to the Department of Transportation as #103, and in 1984 was donated to the Smithsonian Museum, making it the first diesel locomotive in their collection. When I took this photo, the unit was on loan from the Smithsonian but has since been transported to Fort Eustis, VA.
Not
just heritage schemes, not just commemorative schemes - this album is devoted to some of the world's most interesting paint schemes, past or present.
A collection of engines, cabooses, cars, etc., great and small that are past their prime, but represent a spirit of railroading that will never pass away!!
