EXCURSION RAILWAY GETS NEW ENGINE

JACKSON -- Number 5898 weighs 330,000 pounds, is capable of running 120 mph and in its heyday was a well-known first-generation diesel engine that ran between Boston, New York and Washington, D.C.

Now the powerful E-8A Unit has found a home in Jackson with the St. Louis Iron Mountain and Southern Railway.

The engine replaces #4452, a diesel unit the railway had leased for the last three years. That engine has become a switch engine for Illinois Transit.

The streamlined new engine was built in 1950 and looks more like the engines that pull modern passenger trains. It ran on the Pennsylvania Railroad until the 1970s, then was used on Amtrak before being sold in 1985 to the Blue Mountain and Reading Railroad in Pennsylvania.

At that time, the Pennsylvania Historical Society restored the engine's original Tuscan red paint and gold leaf striping along with its number. The engine was taken out of passenger service in 1991.

Streamliners were the first generation of diesel engines that replaced steam. This one completed many mainline excursions.

"It's a pretty famous engine to the East Coast," says Dan Davis, president of the railway. "... It was on a lot of calendars, T-shirts and postcards."

Davis, a master mechanic and engineer who is in charge of training the railway's other engineers, went to Pennsylvania to make sure the engine was worthy. It then was towed to Delta, and Davis brought it to Jackson under its own power.

He said this engine has about double the power of the railway's previous engine. The engine uses 6-8 gallons of fuel per hour and can carry 3,350 gallons of diesel.

The engine runs every Wednesday and Friday at 1 p.m. and during Saturday evening dinner trains. The railway's steam engine will pull its authentic 1926 passenger cars on the other runs during the "Patriotic Weekend."