The Cooke Locomotive and Machine Works, located in Paterson, New Jersey, manufactured steam railroad locomotives from 1852 until it was merged with seven other manufacturers to form American Locomotive Company (ALCO) in 1901.
History The firm was established in 1852 by former Rogers Locomotive and Machine Works superintendent (and son-in-law of William Swinburne of Swinburne, Smith and Company) John Cooke and former Montreal resident Charles Danforth as the Danforth, Cooke, and Company, as a manufacturer of steam locomotives as well as cotton machinery.Trumbull, L R. A History of Industrial Paterson : Being a Compendium of the Establishment, Growth and Present Status in Paterson, N.J., of the Silk, Cotton, Flax, Locomotive, Iron and Miscellaneous Industries : Together with Outlines of State, County and Local History, Corporate Records, Biographical Sketches, Incidents of Manufacture, Interesting Facts and Valuable Statistics. Salem, Mass., Higginson Book Co, 2016. The company was renamed Danforth Locomotive and Machine Company in 1865, with Danforth serving as president until 1871, four years before his death in 1875. Cooke succeeded Danforth as president in 1871, continuing in such capacity until his own death in 1882, after which Cooke's sons, John, Frederick, and Charles reorganized the firm as the Cooke Locomotive and Machine Works, and continued operating the company as such until the merger in 1901. In 1901, Cooke and several other locomotive manufacturers merged to form the American Locomotive Company; Cooke's plant becomes the Alco-Cooke Works, and locomotive production continued at the plant until 1926. Approximately 2600 locomotives were built by Cooke from 1852 to 1901,Lucas, W. A. “Locomotive Builders of Paterson.” The Railway and Locomotive Historical Society Bulletin, no. 11, 1926, pp. 22–30. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/43516818. Accessed 9 Dec. 2020. among the most notable engines produced by the firm are the C. P. Huntington, and the Western & Atlantic Railroad "Texas".
Exports In addition to providing motive power for North American railroads, Cooke has also produced many locomotives for Central and South America as well as other parts of the world. Examples of exported locomotives include two 0-8-2 tank locomotives for the Port Talbot Railway and Docks Company, South Wales, in 1899, as well as Barry Railway's five class K 0-6-2T locomotives the same year. The firm also produced 2-6-2T locomotives for the War Department Light Railways to be used in France during World War I, preserved examples of which can be found on the Froissy Dompierre Light Railway and Ffestiniog Railway.
Preserved Cooke locomotives The following is a list of preserved locomotives built by Cooke before the ALCO merger in 1901. They are listed here in serial number order.
Serial number Wheel arrangement(Whyte notation) Build date Name Disposition unknown 4-4-0 October 1856 Western and Atlantic Railroad 49 Texas Atlanta History Center, Atlanta, Georgia 2774-2-4TOctober 1863Central Pacific Railroad #3 C. P. Huntington, Southern Pacific Railroad 1California State Railroad Museum, Sacramento, California 1555 2-6-0 February 1884 Colorado and Southern Railway 9 Highline Park, Breckinridge, Colorado 1861 4-4-0 February 1888 Dardanelle and Russelville 8 Nevada State Railroad Museum, Carson City, Nevada 2053 4-6-0 October, 1890 Union Pacific Railroad 1242 Lion's Park, Cheyenne, Wyoming 2054 4-6-0 October, 1890 Union Pacific Railroad 1243 Durham Western Heritage Museum, Omaha, Nebraska 2197 4-6-0 April 1892 Texas and New Orleans Railroad 314 Center for Transportation and Commerce, Galveston, Texas 2202 4-6-0 April 1892 Texas and New Orleans Railroad 319 Riverdale, Georgia 2341 4-6-0 July 1896 Southern Pacific Railroad 2248 Grapevine Vintage Railroad, Grapevine, Texas 2360 4-6-0 March 1897 Southern Pacific Railroad 2252 Overlooking the Union Pacific classification yard, Roseville, California 2408 4-6-0 October 1898 Missouri Pacific Railroad 2522 Paris City Park, Paris, Arkansas
In addition to the above locomotives, the White Pass and Yukon Route railroad WP&YR owns and maintains a steam-powered snowplow built by Cooke in 1899. This unit is on static display in Skagway, Alaska (see Rotary snowplow for a photo).
The following is a list of preserved locomotives built at the Cooke factory after the ALCO merger. +Serial numberWheel arrangement(Whyte notation)Build dateNameDisposition286862-8-0September 1903Illinois Central 790Steamtown National Historic Site, Scranton, Pennsylvania558472-6-0 May 1916Waynesburg & Washington 4Greene County Historical Museum, Waynesburg, Pennsylvania571282-6-2T1916RL 1257Froissy Dompierre Light Railway, Somme, France571562-6-2T1916War Department Light Railways No. LR 10003Ffestiniog Railway, Porthmadog, Wales579782-10-2January 1918Southern Pacific 975Illinois Railway Museum, Union, Illinois592862-8-0May 1918American Railroad Company 88Museo del Tren, Isabela, Puerto Rico626242-8-0November 1920Arcade and Attica 18Arcade and Attica Railroad, Attica, New York
References
External links
Steam Locomotive Builders Steam locomotive preservation information