Locomotive discovered beneath banks of coal
BY RORY SCHULER
Staff Writer
07/14/2001
There were always stories about treasure buried under the rolling hills of Ginther Coal Co. in Cumbola.
Unsteady miniature mountains of spent and unspent energy sit idle, evidence of more than a century of New Philadelphia mining heritage.
Two years ago, in the fall of 1999, a Ginther employee was routinely shoveling at a refuse bank.
Then something happened.
"He hit something, and it caught our attention right away," said Brian R. Bevan, Ginther Coal Co. foreman.
At first, it appeared to be just a large metal pipe, but as the sooty earth was slowly cleared away, the pipe became a smokestack, and the smokestack became the tip of a long forgotten, steam-driven locomotive.
Probably buried in the 1930s, the locomotive most likely fell victim to a boiler explosion, said Kurt R. Bell, librarian/archivist and historian with the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, Strasburg.
As Bell shuffled through photographs of the locomotive's unearthing, his eyes grew larger with each image.
"We wish we had one of these," Bell said. "It looks like a small, industrial saddle tank locomotive, like the ones built by Vulcan Iron Works around the turn of the century. Vulcan built these by the thousands."
John W. Rich Jr., president of Reading Anthracite Co., has volunteered to restore the locomotive. It now rests on-site at his Gilberton salvage yard.
Old-timers often told stories of an old locomotive buried somewhere on the Ginther Coal Co. property. Bevan was beginning to think it didn't exist.
Mystery surrounds the discovery. Little is known about who may have purchased the locomotive.
Vulcan thrived
The records of the now defunct Vulcan Iron Works are now part of the Railroad Museum archives. However, they list only the name
The REPUBLICAN & Herald
BY RORY SCHULER
Staff Writer
07/14/2001
There were always stories about treasure buried under the rolling hills of Ginther Coal Co. in Cumbola.
Unsteady miniature mountains of spent and unspent energy sit idle, evidence of more than a century of New Philadelphia mining heritage.
Two years ago, in the fall of 1999, a Ginther employee was routinely shoveling at a refuse bank.
Then something happened.
"He hit something, and it caught our attention right away," said Brian R. Bevan, Ginther Coal Co. foreman.
At first, it appeared to be just a large metal pipe, but as the sooty earth was slowly cleared away, the pipe became a smokestack, and the smokestack became the tip of a long forgotten, steam-driven locomotive.
Probably buried in the 1930s, the locomotive most likely fell victim to a boiler explosion, said Kurt R. Bell, librarian/archivist and historian with the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, Strasburg.
As Bell shuffled through photographs of the locomotive's unearthing, his eyes grew larger with each image.
"We wish we had one of these," Bell said. "It looks like a small, industrial saddle tank locomotive, like the ones built by Vulcan Iron Works around the turn of the century. Vulcan built these by the thousands."
John W. Rich Jr., president of Reading Anthracite Co., has volunteered to restore the locomotive. It now rests on-site at his Gilberton salvage yard.
Old-timers often told stories of an old locomotive buried somewhere on the Ginther Coal Co. property. Bevan was beginning to think it didn't exist.
Mystery surrounds the discovery. Little is known about who may have purchased the locomotive.
Vulcan thrived
The records of the now defunct Vulcan Iron Works are now part of the Railroad Museum archives. However, they list only the name
The REPUBLICAN & Herald
