Oahu Railway & Land Company 2-8-0 "Consolidation" Locomotives in the USA

Class 22 (Locobase 10782)

Data from Baldwin Locomotive Works, Record of Recent Construction ((1903), No. 35, p. 190-191. See also DeGolyer, Volume 24, p. 257. Works numbers were 20324-20325.

These powerful little Consolidations operated as Vauclain compounds for only a few years before being rebuilt in 1906 as 16 1/2" x 20" simple-expansion engines. The design sported a combustion chamber that contributed 18.6 sq ft to the firebox heating surface. In that configuration they served the OR & L for another 30-plus before being retired in 1948 with the closing of all of the line outside of terminal areas.

The OR&L opened in 1889 on a 12-mile stretch of rail between Honolulu and 'Aiea and gradually expanded to cover 160 miles that included double-tracked main and automatic block signals. At its busiest, the line ran 80 trains a day.

The OR&L served much of Oah'u up through the World War II years, then lost ground quickly to motorized freight and passenger vehicles and much of the OR & L was taken up in 1947 after a strike closed down 33 of 34 sugar plantations and a 1946 tsunami swamped much of the OR & L's tracks.