Pickens Railway - Pickens Locomotive History

Pickens Locomotive History

The first Pickens locomotive was a secondhand 4-4-0 that was damaged in a derailment on its first trip. It was replaced in 1909 with a new 2-6-2 from Baldwin Locomotive Works and was numbered 1.

The line dieselized in 1947 with a Baldwin VO-660 (built as Singer Manufacturing #2), It was numbered 2 and was later named T. Grady Welborn. The 2-6-2 steam engine was sidelined until 1955 when it was sold for scrap. Number 2 is still on the property on the original Pickens trackage but has been out of service for some time as a switcher for CLCX, Inc. as of 2009.

In 1963, after the line was acquired by James F. Jones, the Pickens acquired an EMC SW locomotive. It was built for the Union Terminal Railroad Of St. Joseph as their #5, it later served as Missouri Pacific Railroad #6005 before it became Pickens #3. It was sold to Duke Power in the mid-1970s, which used it to haul construction materials for the building of the Cherokee Nuclear Power Plant near Gaffney, South Carolina. When the plant was sidelined in the early 80s, the unit, as well as the unfinished power plant, was sold to a movie company before being acquired by the Thermal Belt Railway in 1989, becoming their #1.

In the early 1970s a Baldwin S-8 was purchased by Pickens. It was built as Youngstown Sheet and Tube #701 in 1951. It became Pickens #5 (which named it Allan M. Baum) and was used as a backup locomotive. Pickens sold off #5 to SMS Rail Service in 2001.

When the Pickens expanded in the early 1990s, it acquired a pair of ALCO S1s numbered 6 and 7. These were repowered with Caterpillar prime movers. Number 6 remained on the property, stored inoperable, until 2010 when it was scrapped onsite.

In 2000, the Pickens acquired a fleet of former CSX GE U18Bs numbered 9500-9508. Three (9501, 9503, 9507) are used for parts.