Southern Railway 4501 is a preserved Ms class 2-8-2 "Mikado" type steam locomotive built in October 1911 by the Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania as the first of its wheel arrangement type for the Southern Railway. In 1948, the locomotive was retired from the Southern in favor of dieselization and was sold to the shortline Kentucky and Tennessee Railway (K&T) in Stearns, Kentucky to haul coal trains.
When the K&T was dieselized in 1964, No. 4501 was purchased by a railfan named Paul H. Merriman with $5,000 of his own money and brought to Chattanooga, Tennessee. Shortly thereafter it was returned to steam for main line excursion service on the Southern Railway's steam program started by the railroad's president, W. Graham Claytor Jr. in 1966 through Merriman's 4501 Corporation.
Repainted in Southern's passenger Virginian green with gold linings, No. 4501 operated as the main star of Southern's steam program until being replaced by larger steam locomotives in 1985. The locomotive ran again from 1990 until 1994, when Southern's successor, Norfolk Southern discontinued the steam program due to rising insurance cost and decreasing rail network availability.
No. 4501 continued operated for the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum (TVRM) in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Merriman was a founding member of TVRM alongside Robert "Bob" Soule, and eventually handed 4501 over from his personal property to museum property. Repainted into its original freight black livery in 1996, the locomotive was retired when its boiler ticket certificate expired in 1998.
With the upcoming of Norfolk Southern's 21st Century Steam Program and the success of TVRM's Southern Railway 630, the restoration on No. 4501 began in 2012 and completed in 2014, with period upgrades such as a feedwater heater and mechanical stroker added in which most of 4501's classmates received in the 1940s, but the locomotive itself never received. Today, No. 4501 operates in tourist excursion service at TVRM, traditionally on the longer trips to Summerville, Georgia throughout the year and TVRM's Missionary Ridge Local as needed during the weekends.
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Southern Railway 4501 Story
Non-FictionSouthern Railway 4501 runs at the TVRM "And Then There Was One"
