THE BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE COMPANY

Courtesy Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania

Courtesy Virginia Museum of Transportation

The M W Baldwin Company began its life in 1831 as a jewellery firm, founded in Philadelphia by Matthias W Baldwin (inset). Over the years the company moved on to manufacture book-binders tools and steam-driven cylinders, and in 1883 the Philadelphia Museum commissioned a miniature locomotive for an in-house exhibition. This proved to be an enormous success, leading to the subsequent construction of a full-scale locomotive for the Philadelphia, Germantown and Norristown Railroad. As could be expected, further requests were made, and Baldwin made its reputation building steam locomotives for the Pennsylvania Railroad, Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and many other prolific railroads in North America. In addition to this, Baldwin constructed numerous engines for Brazil, Mexico, Australia, India and England, as well as many other railways of the world. In the later stages of the steam era, Baldwin was

at the forefront of locomotive construction, annually building thousands of locomotives. The Company also became involved with developing new and improved locomotive designs for its existing customers.  By the late 1940ís it was apparent that the days of steam locomotives were over and the 3 main engine builders of the U.S. gradually merged in an effort to get a foot hold in the progressive diesel market. They made little progress, and by 1956 the merged Baldwin Company ceased production of common carrier size locomotives, having built more steam locomotives than any other manufacturer in the world.            Top