Narrow gauge (36”) Mikado type (2-6-0) locomotive Colorado & Southern #9 was built by the Cooke Locomotive Works in Paterson, New Jersey in 1884 for the Denver, South Park & Pacific Railroad as #72. The following year, it was renumbered #114. Four years later, the DSP&P was sold to the Denver, Leadville & Gunnison Railway, which was consolidated into the Colorado & Southern in 1899 when #114 was renumbered as Class B-3-A #9. Within a few years, #9 was re-boilered with a wagon top boiler and, in the late 1910s, it received a new frame.
#9 weighs 74,000 lbs, 64,000 lbs on its 40” drivers and has a driver wheelbase of 10’ and engine wheelbase of 16’. With internal Stephenson valve gear, 15” x 18” cylinders, a 147 sq ft grate, 100.2 sq ft firebox and total heating surface of 941 sq ft, it operated at a boiler pressure of 190 psi delivering 16,352 lbs tractive effort. The tender weighs 49,250 lbs light and has a capacity of 6 tons of coal and 1,600 gallons of water.
#9 was primarily used in passenger service, and it hauled the last passenger train from Leadville to Denver on 10th April 1937.
#9 was saved to participate in the 1939-40 New York World's Fair and officially retired in 1941. It later operated at the Chicago Railroad Fair in 1948-1949 and was leased to the Black Hills Central Railroad in South Dakota until purchased by the Colorado Historical Society in 1988.
Uhrich Locomotive of Strasburg, CO, restored #9 in time for the 2006 Georgetown Loop operating season. However, it proved too small for that operation and, after two seasons it was moved to Breckinridge, CO, where it is on static display at the Rotary Snowplow Park.
Rotary snowplow #01 was built for the White Pass & Yukon Railroad in Alaska in 1901 by the Cooke Locomotive Works in Paterson, NJ, as a coal burner. It was converted to an oil-burner
sometime between 1953 and 1956 and moved to Denver in 1988, where in underwent repairs. Six months later, it was relocated to Breckenridge. It is one of only five known narrow-gauge rotaries still in existence.
The display is on the right of way of the original Colorado & Southern High Line track from Como over Boreas Pass to Breckenridge.
Left, the tender behind #01 is apparently from a standard gauge locomotive, originally either the CB&Q or C&S.
The tender ended up at the scrap merchant Iron
& Metals in Denver, CO, where it was found by
Dan Quiat who brought the rotary plow from Oregon. The tender was moved to the Great Western shops in Loveland, CO, where it was "narrow gauged" by pressing the wheels off
the axles and machining the axles so that the wheels could be pressed back onto them at the
36" gauge.
