Oregon-American Lumber Company 2-8-2 "Mikado" Locomotives in the USA

Class 100 (Locobase 14275)

Data from []; and American Locomotive Company data card for specification no A-9859-A, supplied by Ellis Tammelleo's Locmotive Dossier Google Drive, accessed 9 October 2. See also Edward J. Kamholz, Jim Blain, Gregory Kamholz, The Oregon-American Lumber Company: Ain't No More, (Stanford University Press, 2003), p. 53; and Edward Kamholz, "Oregon-American Lumber Company", Oregon Encyclopedia at []; and Nehalem River Watershed Assessment at []; and []; [], all four last accessed 6 February 2023 . Works numbers were 61857-61859 in 1920.

The first of three oil-burning logging Mikados was delivered with the Portland, Astoria & Pacific herald on the tender, but the other two were intended directly for the Oregon-American Lumber Company. The design was of a typical size for a logger and had nice lines on a relatively long wheelbase. According to the Kamholz-Blain-Kamholz book, the PA&P intended these as mainline engines to handle a 40-mile (64 km) run to Rafton.

O-A's 30,000 acres of timber in the Nehalem Valley region yielded 2.5 billion board feet of lumber from 1917-1957. Kamholtz's OE entry describes the extraordinary lushness of the reserve:

"O-A's timber, considered one of the finest old-growth stands of Douglas-fir timber known to modern man, was notable for its uniformity of character and density. The company's timber was generally 300 to 600 years old. In the era when an average stand of old-growth Douglas-fir held 55,000 board-feet to the acre and an excellent one contained up to 90,000 board-feet, the O-A tract had ten entire sections (a section is 640 acres) that contained or exceeded 100,000 board-feet per acre."

But the area proved vulnerable to massive fires, the biggest of which--the 1933 Tillamook Burn--not only scorched 270,000 acres of timberland but seriously impaired water quality in much of the watershed as well as drove many timber companies out of business. With the conveyance of this valley to State Board of Forestry, continues the NRWA, the embedded value of the timber "in combination with an effort to minimize future fire risk, spurred a reforestation program which began in 1949. Nearly 76 million Douglas Fir seedlings were planted over 96,753 acres of the original Tillamook Burn area and 118,065 acres were seeded by helicopter (Fick & Martin, 1992). Rehabilitation was completed in 1973. The trees that were planted during this period are nearing first harvest size."

In 2020, The Oregon Department of Forestry voted unanimously to approve a plan, "crafted with substantial public input, to protect the Tillamook Rainforest for fish, wildlife and people. Important wildlife and recreation corridors will be protected along the Nehalem River, Salmonberry River, Kilchis River, Wilson River, Trask River and the Kings and Elk Mountain areas. All major salmon streams will be protected by 120-foot forested buffers. And the plan would be federally approved and remain in effect for 70 years. It's an enduring conservation legacy to leave for generations of Oregonians to come."

When that railroad was taken over by the Eccleses, however, they concluded that the three should be used for logging traffic. But they were big and that long wheelbase was but one reason, says the trio, that these engines were "miscast for their new role as woods engines." In fact, 101 never actually operated on the O-A, being sold instead to California's Minarets & Western; see Locobase 14276. 100 was barely used at all before being shelved and 102 was too heavy for the unballasted rail.

In 1925, the O-A sold the 100 to Weed Lumber of Tennant, Calif, but two years later, Long-Bell Lumber bought the 100 and brought it to Longview, Wash, where it labored for decades before being sold to the Yreka Western, which scrapped it in November of that year.

O-A held on to the 102 until 1939 before selling it to Canadian firm Albernie Lumber Company as their #6. ALC sold the 6 to McMillan & Bloedel in 1953 as their 1055. Two years later, the 1055 went to Canadian Forest Products of Englewood, BC as their 113. As late as 1995, the 113 still remained operational at British Columbia's Woss Camp.