The Baldwin DS44-660s were a class of 660 horsepower diesel-electric switchers, and the low-power companion to the DS44-1000s.
Baldwin built one hundred and thirty-nine of the four axle DS 44-660s at its Eddystone, PA, factory between 1946 and 1949. One, two or more - even up to six - units were ordered by many railroads. However the largest order was for the Pennsylvania Railroad, with an astonishing 99 units - four more for the PRR's then subsidiary Long Island Rail Road.
Three were ordered by the Chesapeake Western Railroad, arriving on December the 2nd, 1946, and given numbers #661, #662 and #663. These three Baldwin built first-generation diesel locomotives were the first to arrive on the road, thereby completely transitioning the Chesapeake Western from steam to diesel power.
The three units were retired in 1964, replaced by Alco T-6 units. #661 was sold to and broken up by an unknown scrap dealer (possibly elsewhere in Virginia), but #662 and #663 ended up in the Virginia Scrap Iron & Metal scrap yard in Roanoke, VA.
They sat there rusting for over forty years along with three N&W Class M steam locomotives which, collectively, became known as the "Lost Engines of Roanoke". Virginia Scrap Iron & Metal donated the engines to the Virginia Museum of Transportation, which set up a series of partnerships to save all five engines from destruction.
The museum donated #663 to the Roanoke Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society in 2009 which, in exchange, agreed to carry out a cosmetic restoration of #662.