Chicago, Burlington & Quincy No. 902 was a Class E-5A 2-10-2 "Santa Fe" type steam locomotive. It, along with four other engines of the type, was built in 1915 by the Baldwin Locomotive Works for the Colorado and Southern Railroad, owned by the CB&Q.
The E-5a's had a driving wheel diameter of 59 inches, 30-by-32 inch cylinders, and about 200 psi boiler pressure. With a grate area of 88 square feet, they weighed 367,850 pounds and exerted 71,400 pounds of tractive effort.
The class was not the only one ordered for the C&S; in 1919, five USRA Heavy Santa Fe's were allocated to the road as sub-class E-5B and given road numbers 905 to 909. The last 2-10-2's came to the road in 1922, when five Baldwin-built engines were delivered (Class E-5C, numbers 910-914). These were essentially copies of the E-5A's built seven years before. Both classes were withdrawn and scrapped from 1954 to 1960.
Unlike other US railroads, which deemed the 2-10-2's redundant by the 1930's, the CB&Q's subsidiary company kept the E-5's busy until the end of steam, hauling freight trains between Denver, Co. and Cheyenne, Wy.
The first E5-a was withdrawn and scrapped in 1956; 902 was the last of the class to be withdrawn in 1960, and was scrapped the following year. This engine somehow outlived the 2-10-2's from its parent company by six-and-a-half years. None of these chunky mountain-climbing 2-10-2's survived the cutter's torch.
Trivia[]
Four E5-a's were rebuilt with Elesco feed water heaters, but 902 was the only one not to receive one. Instead, it got a Worthington feed water heater.