Pittsburgh & West Virginia 4-6-2 "Pacific" Locomotives in the USA

The P&WV is one of the smaller class 1 railroads and is easy to over look. It is most famous for owning the first 2-6-6-4's in the world, and for dieselizing exclusively with Fairbank Morse H-20-44 jumbo switchers. It was folded into the Norfolk & Western in 1964, along with the Wabash, Nickel Plate, and the equally obscure Akron, Canton & Youngstown.

The P&WV was not a major passenger carrier. It never scheduled more than three trains a day, in each direction between Wheeling, WV and Pittsburgh, PA. Before 1921, it was able to cover its passenger train needs with four Atlantics, leased from its primary western connection, the Wheeling & Lake Erie. Yet, in 1921 the railroad had accumulated enough money to buy its own passenger locomotives. It bought two 4-6-2's from Alco, Brooks, and they were among the lightest Pacifics ever built. Indeed, many railroads had Pacifics with more weight on their drivers than the entire locomotive weight of the P&WV K-1 class. Considering they pulled passenger trains that were only three cars long, over a well engineered line that had minimal grades, the P&WV could get away with their compact sized Pacifics.

In 1924, a third Pacific, class K-2, was bought from Alco, Richmond. It weighed two tons more, but the tractive effort of the #202 was only slightly higher than the first two P&WV Pacifics. Passenger train service was discontinued on the P&WV November 1, 1931. K-1 #201 was scrapped in 1941, but the #200 and #202 lasted until 1947. The locomotives were used in milk train service after passenger train operations ceased.