| Chicago Burlington & Quincy Railroad Alco S-2 9307 at Denver Union Station on August 20, 1964, Ektachrome by Chuck Zeiler. Built March 1944 (c/n 69871) on order S1889, it was retired October 1969 and scrapped. It is pictured assembling the eastbound Denver Zephyr. I happened to be a passenger on the Colorado Springs connection of this train. Upon arrival of the connection from Colorado Springs, the cars were switched into the waiting DZ, and the train re-assembled for its overnight run to Chicago, thus allowing me time to get off and snap this photo. The following is excerpted from the Burlington Route Historical Society's Bulletin #2, edited by F. Hol Wagner: At the start of World War II, the three major U.S. manufacturers of diesel locomotives offered or were preparing to offer a full line of motive power - passenger, freight and switching. In 1942 however, the War Production Board's Transportation Equipment Branch assumed control over the country's production facilities and soon decided that production of passenger locomotives should be suspended for the duration of the war. The WPB's General Limitation Order No. 97 (adopted April 4, 1942) further ordered Electro-Motive Division to halt switcher production and to concentrate on manufacture of its proven freight locomotive, the FT. Both Alco and Baldwin were restricted to the manufacture of all of the switchers (the restriction was to 1000 or less horsepower locomotives) needed by America's railroads, and production of road freight power in Schenectady and Eddystone was suspended until 1945. So it was when the Q found itself in dire need of additional switching power in 1942, the road turned not to EMD, from which it had received 43 switchers (both 600 and 1000 horsepower designs) since 1937, but instead to the WPB. The Washington bureaucrats cared not about standardization, minimization of parts inventory, or operating characteristics; they simply doled out switchers to railroads as the units were turned out by Alco and Baldwin. Of the 39 switchers alloted to the Q during the war, 30 were built by Baldwin, with the remaining nine coming from Alco. The Alco S-2's were numbered 9300-9308 and were equipped with the Model 539 inline six-cylinder turbocharged 1000 horsepower prime mover. They rode on Alco's unique Blunt trucks and featured General Electric electrical components, which accounts for their billing as "Alco-GE" products. Delivered in three orders, the first two S-2's (built on order S1885) arrived in April 1943, and were assigned to service in and around Chicago. Units 9302-9305 (built on order S1915) arrived in December 1943, and were placed in service at Lincoln. The final units of the group, 9306-9308 (built on order S1889), came in March 1944. Number 9306 joined its four sisters at Lincoln, while 9307-9308 were assigned to Chicago. In November 1944, all the Chicago units except 9308 moved west to Lincoln, replaced in the Windy City by new Baldwin VO-1000's. And so the situation remained until after the war. In 1948, when EMD switchers were once again being delivered, all the S-2's moved further west. Units 9302 and 9306 took up residence in Alliance, and the other seven went to Denver, where they would remain for the rest of their careers on the Q. The two units in Alliance moved to Denver in 1958, and for the first time, all nine S-2's were assigned to the same location, much to the relief of the Stores Department. Considerably lighter than their Baldwin and EMD counterparts (231,890 lbs., versus 241,620 lbs. for a VO-1000, and 249,900 lbs. for a pre-war NW-2), the 9300's were still popular with engine crews and moved their share of tonnage in the yards and industrial districts of both Lines East and Lines West. They were also frequently used as passenger switchers. Twenty Five years is the most commonly cited figure for the economic lifespan of a diesel switcher, and so it was with the 9300's. They were all retired in 1969. |