Brazil Railway 2-8-2 Locomotives in Brazil

Class 15 (Locobase 15179)

Data from DeGolyer, Volume 66, pp. 356+. See Todd S Diacon, Millenarian Vision, Capitalist Reality: Brazil's Contestado Rebellion, 1912v1916 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1991). Works number was 53569 in August 1920.

The Southern Brazil Lumber & Colonization Company, which had its headquarters at Tres Barras in Parana, was incorporated to exploit the timber resources on either side of a railway that straddled the disputed border between the southern Brazilian states of Parana and Santa Catarina. The concession included 6,000,000 acres (9,375 sq mi/24,300 sq km) from the federal government and over 1/2 million more acres (781 sq m) that the company acquired on its own.

Originally authorized in 1890 as a link between Sao Paulo and Santa Maria (the latter in Rio Grande do Sul State), the railway's construction finally began in 1908 and attracted as many as 8,000 workers from urban areas.

Therein lay the source of the Contestado War, waged between settlers who had been drawn by Parana State and landowners who were empowered by favorable laws to develop as much land as possible. Diacon's book offers a good overview of the origins and conduct of this four-year struggle.

By the time this small wood-burning Mikado, the only engine supplied to the SBLC by Baldwin, the issue had been settled and development continued apace. It was a wood-burner and sported a Rushton Improved spark-arresting cabbage stack, reinforcing the stipulation that "special precaution must be taken as woods catch fire very easily."

15 was intended for light 45 lb/yard (22.5 kg/metre) track and was tasked with climbing 2 1/2% grades and getting around curves with radii of 120 metres (394 feet). Its use of the relatively rare Southern valve gear is notable.