The

Chicago and North Western Railway The Chicago and North Western was a Class I railroad in the Midwestern United States. It was also known as the "North Western". The railroad operated more than of track at the turn of the 20th century, and over of track in seven states befor ...

's Class E-2 was a

4-6-2 Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, represents the wheel arrangement of four leading wheels on two axles, six powered and coupled driving wheels on three axles and two trailing wheels on one axle. The locomo ...

"Pacific" type locomotive built by the American Locomotive Company in

Schenectady, New York Schenectady () is a city in Schenectady County, New York, United States, of which it is the county seat. As of the 2020 census, the city's population of 67,047 made it the state's ninth-largest city by population. The city is in eastern New Y ...

in 1923. Twelve were originally built, and all were later converted. Four of these locomotives gained the Class E-2-a designation in late 1934 when they were converted to burn oil instead of coal, upgraded with larger drivers, and had other changes made in order to run at higher speeds in preparation for pulling the

Twin Cities Twin cities are a special case of two neighboring cities or urban centres that grow into a single conurbation – or narrowly separated urban areas – over time. There are no formal criteria, but twin cities are generally comparable in sta ...

–

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

400 __NOTOC__ Year 400 ( CD) was a leap year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. In the Roman Empire, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Stilicho and Aurelianus (or, less frequently, year ...

'' the next year. The other eight were converted to Class E-2-b, which was similar except they remained coal-fired. The E-2-a was among the fastest steam locomotives in the world in 1935. It was recorded running in excess of on a fall evening that year as it raced the from Milwaukee to Chicago in 65 minutes, attaining its highest speeds between Highland Park and Evanston. While fast for its day, it was not quite a match for the

Milwaukee Road class A The Milwaukee Road Class "A" was a class of high-speed, streamlined 4-4-2 "Atlantic" type steam locomotives built by the American Locomotive Company (ALCO) from 1935 to 1937 to haul the Milwaukee Road's ''Hiawatha'' express passenger trains. Num ...

and later F7 engines, which ran the rival ''

Hiawatha Hiawatha ( , also : ), also known as Ayenwathaaa or Aiionwatha, was a precolonial Native American leader and co-founder of the Iroquois Confederacy. He was a leader of the Onondaga people, the Mohawk people, or both. According to some account ...

''. Unlike the ''Hiawatha'' engines, the E-2s never ran with streamlined shrouds, though it appeared for a time that they would be replaced by streamlined class E-4 4-6-4 "Hudson" locomotives on the ''400'' route. C&NW ordered eight E-4s in 1937, later adding one more order to the total. However, the railway decided instead to use diesel-electric EMD E3 locomotives for the ''400'', which replaced the E-2-a engines on the route in 1939.

References

4-6-2 locomotives E-2 class ALCO locomotives Steam locomotives of the United States Railway locomotives introduced in 1923 Scrapped locomotives Standard gauge locomotives of the United States Passenger locomotives {{steam-loco-stub