Description
Book SynopsisThe Diesel That Did It tells the story of the legendary diesel-electric locomotive, the FT.
Trade ReviewWallace W. Abbey had already embarked on a long career as a participant in and observer of the rail industry when in 1945 he witnessed the arrival of the first Santa Fe FT diesel in Chicago. The teenaged Abbey knew he was seeing the future. Gifted as both a writer and photographer — with an insatiable curiosity about railroading — Abbey spent decades gathering material about the Santa Fe's landmark FT fleet, and this marvelous book is the result.
-- Robert S. McGonigal, Editor,
Classic Trains magazineAbbey's book is a must-read for serious students of dieselization and the constructive disruption it brought to North American railroads. Electro-Motive's FT was a radical new locomotive created by engineers who dreamt a future. Santa Fe was the first railway to grasp the FT's significance: a fleet of 320 units engaged in an industrial duel in the wartime American southwest. Steam was convincingly shoved ingloriously offstage into history's shadows and a permanent past.
-- Michael Iden, P.E., retired Union Pacific motive chief
Yes, this is the story of a locomotive, the FT diesel. But it is also the story of a company, the glorious Santa Fe Railway, that clasped the FT to its bosom and demonstrated during World War II that here was a mighty workhorse. With that, the steam locomotive was doomed. Who but Wally Abbey could spin this tale so well? After all, he grew up with the FT and alongside the Santa Fe and knew and understood both. So sit back and be seduced by Wally's relaxing narrative about a time long ago and a revolutionary locomotive long gone (but not forgotten).
-- Fred W. Frailey, author and longtime
Trains magazine columnist
Table of ContentsForeword
Acknowledgments
1. Ride with the Ghost of the Santa Fe: The Legacy of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe
2. Too Many Santa Fes! Overview of the Railroad that Introduced the FT
3. Mechanical Motion, Set to Music: Santa Fe Steam at the Dawn of the FT
4. Hamilton, Winton, Kettering: The Evolution of Electro-Motive
5. Finally, a Locomotive Prime Mover: The Birth of the Legendary 567 Engine
6. The Model F Standard: In the End, Electro-Motive Had to Prove It Could Haul Freight
7. A Mikado on the Prairies, a Mallet in the Mountains: The 103 Goes to Work on the Santa Fe Trail
8. Lessons Learned from the 103: What the 103 Did, and Did Not Do, on the Santa Fe
9. A Big Coming-Out Party: Santa Fe Rolls Out Its First Freight Diesel
10. Electro-Motive Goes to War: A Locomotive Builder Serves the US Navy
11. The Unions and the Laws: The Challenges to Operating Efficiency
12. Eighty Locomotives the Hard Way: Building the Fleet One EMD Order at a Time
13. A Class by Itself: The Author's Retrospective
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