The NW Class J 611

[nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org]

Many thanks Luiz! It is appreciated.

Regarding other photos of the unstreamlined Class J, or J1. In service 
shots are rare to say the least, much less a right hand side view. To 
my knowledge of the company photographic files, which is fairly 
extensive, there were three views shot by the company photographer, 
builder portraits; the two in the book, one left hand side view, a 3/4 
view at East End Shops, and a front end view (not published in the 
book) negative numbers 30898, 30899, 30900, all 8x10 negatives, made 
January 25, 1944.  The other view (No. 502506, a 4x5 negative) on 
September 17, 1944 of the double header with the K2 in the book was 
unknown. I found the negative while going through the files probably 
about 1977, prior to my finding it, the negative had never been 
printed.

It was probably an accident to have even been shot. In my interviews 
with the company photographers, none could remember specific 
instructions about not shooting the locomotives, but there was 
commentary that since they did not appear like the Class Js, and the 
photographers were shooting basically for advertising purposes, it is a 
good chance they did not snap the shutter when one came into sight, but 
waited until the arrival of another train with a streamlined 
locomotive. With as many passenger  trains running as there were then, 
another train would not be long in arriving, and the chances of a 
streamliner were pretty good.

There is an article in the N&W company magazine August 1944, pages 
374-375, entitled "An afternoon at Portsmouth (Ohio) Passenger Station" 
a couple of other photos by George Perkinson, snapshots with a view of 
a the 608 and possibly the 606, at Portsmouth. It is diffiicult to make 
out whether it is a 6 or 8 in the halftone. These photos are clearly 
snapshot-type photos, made by the local correspondent. It is quite 
possible that prints were just provided to the magazine department and 
discarded after article was published and the negatives were never 
actually made a part of the company files, or were purged when the 
files were cleaned out in the 1960s or so. And yes, that did happen.

If anyone wants, I'll be glad to scan and provide these pages to Ron 
for posting on the web.

I do know of a couple of reels of 16mm company film that are out takes 
from the 1944 film "Modern Coal Burning Steam Locomotives" that include 
films of a couple of J1's in service. If you have seen the film, you 
know there is not a sign of a J1 in the finished film, even though they 
were running around all over at this time. I am working on the film to 
bring it to market in the future. They are only glimpses of the J1s, 
one on a train, one at Shaffers Crossing but how many have you seen in 
live and in color?

Best

Ken Miller

On Aug 8, 2005, at 6:18 PM, nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org wrote:


> Dear Kenneth Miller,

>

> You wrote a GREAT book! I recomend it to any N&W fan!

>

> Please excuse me for disturbe you, but your book presents one of the 

> few pictures of the un-streamlined pictures in actual service. Are 

> there any other pictures? Are them available, or printes in any othe 

> book?

>

> tks,

>

> Luiz Affonso Saraiva

> a N&W fan from Brazil