Click on any picture below to enlarge
Click on any picture below to enlarge
During the month of September 1868, at Schenectady Locomotive Works, in the State of New York, four wood burning locomotives, "Jupiter", "Storm", "Whirlwind", and "Leviathan" were built for Central Pacific Railroad. Like all CP locomotives built until 1870, they were dismantled from their frames, loaded onto a ship, and taken around South America's Cape Horn to San Francisco, California.
At San Francisco, the engines were loaded onto a barge and towed upriver to Central Pacific headquarters at Sacramento. There, they were reassembled and commissioned into service on March 20, 1869. Less than two months later, "Jupiter" pulled Central Pacific President Leland Stanford's special train to Promontory Summit, Utah Territory to meet Union Pacific's dignitaries for the scheduled May 8, Golden Spike Ceremony.
QUITE BY ACCIDENT
Stanford did not originally choose "Jupiter" to draw his special train to Promontory. The duty of pulling the Stanford Special first fell to "Antelope". Enroute to Promontory Summit, the Special followed a passenger train, called a regular, carrying sightseers to the "Weddin' of the Rails". As the regular train passed through a large mountain cut still being cleared, workmen did not notice a small green flag flying from the regular's locomotive. The flag indicated another train followed close behind.
Immediately after the regular passed, the workmen rolled a huge log down the side of the cut, which came to rest against the rails. Around the corner came Stanford's Special, and "Antelope" struck the log. She wasn't derailed, but was so badly damaged that Stanford's telegrapher wired the nest station to hold the regular train. After the Special limped into the station, Stanford's cars were coupled to the regular's locomotive, "Jupiter", who then took a Special place in history on May 10, 1869.
PASSAGES
After her glorious moment in 1869, "Jupiter" continued service as a Central Pacific passenger locomotive. In 1885, Central Pacific was absorbed into the Southern Pacific system. The "Jupiter" name was dropped in the 1870s when the locomotive was repainted, and in 1891, "#60" was renumbered "1195".
A name change was accompanied by even greater changes. A new boiler was installed, her bonnet stack was replaced with a diamond stack, her sand and steam domes were changed, and even her pilot, or "cow catcher", which had vertical slats, was replaced with one having horizontal slats. Then, in 1893, "1195" was converted into a coal burning locomotive.
No longer resembling "Jupiter", "1195" was sold later that same year to the Gila Valley, Globe, and Northern Railroad in Arizona. Being the first locomotive on their railroad, the GVG & N renamed her "#1". There she had a loyal following, and only one more change awaited "Ol' One Spot" as her last duty.
