A decades old steam engine is slated to get a major makeover.
An iconic blast from the past is thrilling people all over the country. A decades old steam engine is slated to get a major makeover.
Called Big Boy 4014, it’s only one of 25 locomotives that were built specifically for Union Pacific. Big Boy No. 4014 was delivered in December of 1941. It retired 20 years later in 1961.
Over the course of those two decades when it was in service, the locomotive traveled over 1 million miles. Used for display only, it is going to be brought back to its former operational glory.
Big Boy 4014 is currently being towed to Cheyenne, Wyoming with arrival scheduled by May 8th. There, the steam engine will undergo a full restoration. Unfortunately we won’t be able to see the final result anytime soon.
The goal is to have Big Boy 4014 restored for the ‘150th anniversary of the driving of the Golden Spike in Utah, which linked the Union Pacific with the Central Pacific and completed the first transcontinental railroad’.
That event is scheduled to take place on May 10th, 2019 in Promontory Summit. Big Boy 4014 had previously been displayed at the RailGiants Train Museum in Pomona.
The museum kept it in pristine condition, leading Union Pacific to trade in pieces of other equipment to acquire the locomotive back so it can be restored.
