Reading Steam Program

I don't know much about the Reading, but I've heard of their steam program and seen pictures as well. I also know they went bankrupt and were folded into Conrail. How did the railroad justify a steam program and the associated expenses when it was having money trouble? Or was the bankruptcy a sudden issue?

The short story (dates are approximate) is that the Rdg had been running specials for years, but from 1959 to 1964 ran 51 Iron Horse Rambles using 4 of their home-built class T-1 Northerns. According to a Trains mag from that year, they stopped the program because of more red ink than black.(Also the last year they gave out desk calendars with a near N-scale bronze replica of a T-1-you can find 'em on ebay!) From 1964 until bankruptcy and reorganization in 1972, they operated mostly in the red, but did turn a profit for a while. The reorganization under trustee and later UP CEO Drew Lewis kept the Rdg a first class operation right until Conrail, even when part owner Chessie (pre-CSX) dumped their 45 percent share of Rdg stock in 1972. They did still run dozens of specials for various NRHS chapters right up til Conrail, however. You hard core Rdg guys can cough up the exact dates from here! Hope this helps!
SLR Mitch

There were likely a few other reasons to run the trips as well. The locomotives were still owned by the company and not generating any revenue at all and were in decent mechanical shape (unlike the T-1s that were leased to the PRR). Also there is good PR value in steam trips, then as well as now and even if the trip itself did not generate extra revenue if it would atract shippers it would be worth it.

One hearsay rumor I heard was that the supervisory people didn't like working on weekends, even on a Steam Special.

I was told by a friend whose dad worked as a supervisor in the Freight Claims Dept. that the Rambles made money, and probably generated a lot of good will for the Railroad, but the many supervisors who had to be on the trains for some reason didn't want to work the weekends and apparently made their feelings known. My guess was that they weren't being paid, or given compensatory time (unHEARD of at the time), and YOU WERE EXPECTED to show up as a condition of your position. Apparently, enough was enough!

The most common reason given for stopping the "Rambles" was that the four T-1's had reached the end of their "boiler life". The Reading would have to rebuild the boilers to continue running the engines. The Reading apparently didn't feel the benefits would have been worth the cost. Other factors could have been in play. Read an article recently where some "Rambles" carried 1000-1100 people. Most likely the double- header trips.

Well, think about it. Wouldn't it be better from a public relations standpoint if you said that the boiler time was up, rather than that the salaried employees were disgruntled? There was also the rumor that they didn't make any money, either (supposedly not true). The boiler excuse would be quite a bit more "saleable" to the fans and the public. In a way, the boiler thing doesn't make sense, since I'm sure a few old "steam men" were still working in the shops, and the facilities were certainly there to do it. It's funny how several of the T-1's went on to run again. There is also a rumor that 2124 was left full of water, and it froze up beyond economical repair by a disgruntled hostler who didn't like those "dirty old @%#!! steamers". Also note that the boiler excuse was used for "retiring" that loco if the freeze-up rumor is true.

[quote="geep39"]There is also a rumor that 2124 was left full of water, and it froze up beyond economical repair by a disgruntled hostler who didn't like those "dirty old @%#!! steamers". Also note that the boiler excuse was used for "retiring" that loco if the freeze-up rumor is true.[/quote]

That rumor was false since 2124 ran for at least one weekend in Bellows Falls before going into permenant retirement. I DID hear, however, that NKP 759 was stored with a boiler full of water.

When the community talks about the T-1s, 2123 is usually left out. Anyone out there know what happened to her? I remember seeing her in the Reading (city of) roundhouse in 1964.