"New Market Wreck"
From Tipple, Loom & Rail
© Smithsonian Folkways Recordings

Steam Locomotive 1401
1926

An engine with a museum built around it
Capable of speeds of 80 miles per hour, the 1401 could keep a 15-car train of postal and baggage cars, coaches, dining car, and Pullman sleeping cars moving on a fast schedule. In April 1945, the 1401 was one of eight locomotives that pulled President Franklin Roosevelt's funeral train in relays from Warm Springs, GA, to Washington, DC. In 1952, the engine was retired and stored in the Southern Railway yard in Alexandria, VA. In 1961, the locomotive was lifted by two high-capacity railroad cranes onto a special 250-ton trailer and moved to the National Museum of American History, then under construction on the Mall. The 1401 was put into position prior to the completion of the building, and the museum was finished around it.

Web display only

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