The Connecticut Antique Machinery Association is an all-volunteer organisation dedicated to the preservation, restoration and demonstration of antique machinery. It is located in Kent, CT, and is open between May and October, Wednesday to Sunday,
10.00am - 4.00.
A “Power-Up” is held each year, featuring antique steam engines, gasoline and diesel combustion engines and tractors, as well as narrow gauge (36”) Hawaii Railway #5, which is steamed up to haul passengers aboard the locomotive’s tender around a quarter mile circuit of track on the eight acre museum
site.
This narrow gauge (36”) Consolidation type (2-8-0) locomotive was built by the H. K. Porter Works in Pittsburgh, PA, in 1909 for the Dennis-Simmons Lumber Company in Wilson, NC. At some time, it was bought by the Argent Lumber Company in Hardeeville, SC.
The Argent Lumber Company started in February of 1916, when Horace W. Phillips Jr., J. Ross McNeal and William B. McNeal formed a company in order to log an 8,000 acre tract of original growth short-leaf pine twenty-five miles north of Savannah, GA.
The name "Argent" came from the friend of the company's lawyer who had a race horse of that name. In 1956, the company was sold to the Union Bag-Camp Paper Corporation of Savannah, GA. The following year, the old Argent Lumber assets were sold, including #4.
In 1960, the engine was sold to the Edaville Corporation in Wakefield, MA, and then bought by Richard May in 1991. Planning to restore it in Connecticut, May sold it to CAMA in 1994 after it had become clear that the locomotive needed more repairs than he could justify.
The engine weighs 40,000 lbs, 35,000 lbs
on its 30” drivers.
A coal burner with
11” x 14” drivers, #4 operated at a boiler pressure of 160 psi delivering 7,680 lbs tractive effort.
CAMA may restore #4 to operation at some time in the future
An 0-4-0T (tank) narrow gauge (36”) locomotive, #18 weighs 41,000 lbs and has 32” drivers and
11” x 16” cylinders. Operating at a boiler
pressure of 150 psi, it delivered 6,300 lbs
tractive effort. It was built in 1918 at the Vulcan
Iron Works in Wilkes-Barre, PA, for the Wickwire Steel Company.
The Wickwire Spencer plant opened in 1901 and encompassed several buildings with two blast furnaces, a blooming mill, billet mill and two rod mills. It mainly produced wire for use in chain link fences.
In 1920, the Wickwire Spencer Steel Corporation was founded by merger of Clinton Wright Wire Company and Wickwire Steel. Five years later, however, the company went into receivership and a new company known as the Wickwire Spencer Steel Company acquired the corporation.
At some point, #18 was sold to the Worcester Iron Company in Worcester, MA, possibly during the 1925 receivership. In 1958, it was sold to the Iron Horse Furniture Store, then occupying the old Boston & Albany depot in Westfield, MA. It later passed to the Valley Railroad.
However, Clark's museum was never created and the engine sat in Honolulu wasting away and losing various parts. In 1956, it was donated to the Oahu Railway & Land Company in Honolulu, Hawaii. In 1964, it was bought by Bob Keller, a mechanical engineer at Stanford University, who shipped the engine to his home in California and started restoration work.
In 1970, the engine started steaming on the Tahoe, Trout Creek & Pacific Railroad at South Lake Tahoe, CA. The following year, #5 moved into storage in Chama, NM.
The Columbian type (2-4-2) locomotive became the mainstay of the Hawaii Railway’s steam motive power, with 2-4-2s bought in 1883, 1900, 1912 and 1925. Each engine had a name until #5 arrived in 1925. It was built as an oil burner at the Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia, PA, at a cost of $11,901.25.
Weighing 373,000 lbs, 238,000 lbs on its 36” drivers, #5 has a 15’ 2” engine wheelbase and a 4’ driver wheelbase. With 10” x 14” cylinders, a 7.6 sq ft grate, 35 sq ft firebox and total heating surface of 281 sq ft, it operated at a boiler pressure of 165 psi, delivering 5,454 lbs tractive effort. The
tender weighs 245,000 lbs light and has a capacity of 900 gallons of water and 450 gallons of oil.
#5 worked on the Hawaii Railway hauling passenger trains as well as freight until the end of WWII when the line finally ceased operations. As the newest and largest engine on the railway, #5 was then set aside for a museum then being planned by Norman Clark.
From there, #5 made various appearances at
other events in California and Nevada before
being trucked to Connecticut, to operate on a temporary loan agreement at CAMA’s annual steam events.
In September 2000, the engine made its first trip under steam at the site. Since then, a new
engine house has been built to protect #5 and a number of improvements and replacements carried out at CAMA's expense as part of the loan agreement. Eventually, CAMA raised the funds to buy #5.
Eventually, #5 was sold to the Shorelands Corporation near San Francisco, CA, under President John G. Stevens and then, in 1991, came into the possession of the Southwest Leasing Corporation in Los Angeles, CA, as collateral against an unpaid Shorelands loan.
Soon afterwards, the little engine was then
bought by Richard May and underwent another overhaul, after which it was trucked to the 1999 Railfair in Sacramento, CA, where it operated alongside a number of other narrow gauge locomotives.
