Southern Railway #953 or 950 4-6-0
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Click on the image to get a larger size. This photo comes from the collection of Ruth Minick. Obtained from Mac Connery, Durham, NC. It is difficult to determine the number, but the grandson of an A&Y engineer has stated that his grandfather drove Southern #953 on A&Y passenger trains. This locomotive would have been lettered for the Southern Railway in 1922 because the Southern operated the A&Y seamlessly with it's own trains up to 1924-25 when the A&Y went into receivership. At that point, the A&Y began to operate independently and leased or rented its locomotives from the Southern and lettered them for the A&Y. They kept the number from the Southern Railway. In fact, it was a pretty simple case to re-letter freight locomotives since all that was necessary was to change the cab lettering from Southern to A&Y and add the line specifying this was leased in small lettering on the bottom of the cab. If it's the 950, this ten wheeler was built in Richmond in 1894 (s/n 2424) and was scrapped in September of 1932.
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| The reference on the back of the print suggests that the first passenger train into Mount Airy, NC arrived at 8 p.m. on Saturday the 28th of ?, 1888. I do not know if that is true or false. Any information regarding the arrival of the first passenger train in Mount Airy would be appreciated! | |