In celebration of the sesquicentennial of the founding of the Philadelphia & Reading Railroad, a series of excursions were conducted on various Reading lines. With no serviceable Reading steam locomotives available for the celebration, Canadian Pacific 4-6-0 972 was tapped for the duty. On October 1, 1983, a trip ran from Reading to Pottsville, Pennsylvania on the former Reading main line. A cold rainy day greeted the riders as they filled the ex-Reading coaches to be pulled by the ten-wheeler, now sporting “P&R” lettering on its tender as well as “Philadelphia & Reading Railroad” lettering on its auxiliary tender. Here the special crosses the Schuylkill River near Tuckerton on the Peacock’s Lock Viaduct, completed in 1856. The stone structure is notable for its pierced spandrels, the openings between the arches. This feature is common in Europe, but the Peacock’s Lock Viaduct may be the only structure in the United States to have pierced spandrels.
