Woodward Iron Company 2-4-0 "Porter" Locomotives in the USA

Class 7 (Locobase 12147)

Data from Baldwin Locomotive Works Specification for Engines as digitized by the DeGolyer Library of Southern Methodist University Volume 19, p. 214 See also Southern Railway's 75th anniversary salute to the WIC in 1959 , archived at [] . Works number was 14235 in March 1895.

This small six-wheeler presented an unusual wheel arrangement for a mining company in Alabama. WIC's constraints on the design included a height limitation of 13 ft 2 in (4.01 m), 9 ft width (2.74 m), 20 deg curves and 3 1/2% ruling grades. An additional note underscored the height restriction when it advised Baldwin to place the chime whistle on the side of the steam dome instead on top if the total height exceeded 13 ft (3.96 m).

The cab was to be of "good size with square ventilator on roof." A small, two-axle tender needed to hold a supply of water "sufficient for 2 round trips of 6 1/2 miles [10.5 km] each considering time being occupied in shifting [i.e. switching] at upper end of road."

After it served the industrial road into the 1920s, WIC sold the 7 to the Birmingham Rail & Locomotive. BR&L rebuilt the locomotive by adding another axle apparently at the order of Elsberry Brothers company in Wimaume, Fla in May 1925. The conversion must have been unsatisfactory as EB sold the engine back to BR&L in December of the same year.

BR&L removed the extra axle, converting it to an 0-4-0, and sold the locomotive to the R L Dowling Lumber Company of Bradenton, Fla. After five years, the little engine boomeranged back to BR&L, which sold it out of the South in May 1930 to Katona Mining in West Lynn, West Virginia.