How many 1960 and prior Class 1 railroads never owned F units? I can think of 5… VGN, N&W, NKP, IC and GTW. Are there any more? Don Corbin
GTW had F-3As 9006-9027.
D&H, GBW, Ann Arbor, DT&I, Rutland…
I don’t think these were Class 1’s. Maybe D&H.
Thanks, I wasn’t aware GTW had any. gdc
By the pre-deregulation official definition of Class 1 railroads,ALL of the roads listed in the previous post qualified.
Even the New York,Ontario,& Western was a Class 1(they owned F units). It was a matter of miles of trackage owned.
Pacific Great Eastern
While N&W never bought any F units new it ended up owning quite a few through its mergers. And many of them were repainted into N&W.
L&NE, and L&HR did not own F units. I don’t think that SP&S owned any (can someone answer that for sure?) Same for the Grand Trunk, I don’t think that they owned F units, but they had quite a few run throughs from parent CN.
New Haven partially qualifies. They did not own F units, but they did own the modified FL9s.
The original question was directed at class 1 roads prior to 1960. That took into consideration some roads acquired them via merger after 1960 as did N&W. One of the respondants advised that GTW did have aa few F3’s. I was in a quandry as well as to whether to include NH because of the FL9, but since the designation was “F” I said they did (with an asterisk). Thanks for your response.
I don’t think these were Class 1’s. Maybe D&H.
GBW was indeed Class 1 from 1918-1975; and they never had EMD locos on their roster.
I don’t think that SP&S owned any (can
someone answer that for sure?)
I can answer that. Yes, SP&S did own F units. 3 F3As and 4 F7As for passenger service. Plus 1 E7A, though that doesn’t count…
What about Texas & Pacific??? GM&O?
Thanks for the support. The determining factor wasn’t mileage, but revenues (it still is). All I had to do was remember which railroads were listed in Robert G. Lewis’ Handbook of American Railroads (1956), which documented all of the Class 1 railroads. Had I actually opened the book, I might have come up with a few more.
I was not referring to Grand Trunk and Western, I said Grand Trunk. GTW is in Michigan, GT was in New England. They were (are?) separate railroads, although both were owned by Canadian National. I believe that Grand Trunk only owned GPs and RSs.
Thanks again for your response!
FYI, Don Ball Jr.'s book “America’s Colorful Railroads” has a photo (on page 118) of a nicely-matched pair of “…two new phase IV F-3s…” of the Grand Trunk Western taken in South Bend IN in February of 1949. One is the 9020, but I can’t quite make out the number on the side of the second unit (9023???).
Alan
They may have been GM&O heritage or maybe an E unit. They had a ton of them. IC never bought any F units. gdc
How about lake Superior & Ishpeming? They were a class one back then and never owned an EMD to this day. And the GM&O had F3’s and F7’s
I remember seeing a picture of an IC train with an F-unit leading.
The Elgin, Joliet & Eastern, a class one until recently, never owned a F-unit, either.
Also, I could be mistaken about this, but I don’t seem to recall the Florida East Coast ever having F-units. They were one of the first railroads to purchase E-units, but freight was handled by postwar BL-2’s and geeps.
Sorry…Florida East Coast had F3s (eight A units, four B units) and FP7s (five units).