Connotton Valley 2-8-0 "Consolidation" Locomotives in the USA

Class Carrollton (Locobase 11792)

Data from Baldwin Locomotive Works Specification for Engines, 1888, as digitized by the DeGolyer Library of Southern Methodist University Vol 14, p. 188. Works numbers were 5930, 5932 in November 1881 and 5992 in January 1882. See George Woodman Hilton, American Narrow-Gauge Railroads (Stanford, Calif: Stanford U Press, 1990), pp. 468-469.

The CVR and the Connotton Northern operated among cities in central Ohio that included Carrollton, Bedford, and Mapleton - the three names bestowed on the locomotive delivered to this line. Although it was built to standard-gauge standards and was one of the largest narrow-gauge systems in the east, the CVR's financial managment proved unequal to the task of supporting prosperity and the line went into receivership in 1884 and reemerged as the Cleveland & Canton Southern.

When the C & C sold the three engines, they had widely varying second careers. The Carrollton operated on the Salt Lake & Eastern until 1897, the Utah Central as #2 for a year, the Rio Grande Western in 1898, and finally the Sumpter Valley in 1900. It was scrapped in 1914.

After a brief period with the locomotive rebuilder/reseller New York Equipment, the 12 went to work on Virginia's Farmville & Powhatan, which became the Tidewater & Western until 1917, when it closed. Southern Iron & Equipment bought up the old Consolidation and soon sold it to a Cuban railroad.

Mapleton (17, now renumbered 23 on the C & C) also went to NY Equipment, which sold it to the Houston East & West Texas Railroad in 1889. The HE & WT sold it to SI & E, who sold it in 1900 to the Kingston & Central Mississippi in 1900. Two years later, a third rebuilder/recycler/reseller -- Birmingham Rail & Locomotive -- salvaged the engine and named it Laurel. Three years later in 1905, BR & L sold it to AW Stevens Lumber Company of Chatawa, Miss, which apparently operated the engine in Honduras. Finally, in 1910, the Vaccaro Brothers bought the locomotive for scrap.