OVERTON — Union Pacific’s Big Boy locomotive passed through central Nebraska and make a stop in Overton on Sunday, Sept. 1.
“Big Boy No. 4014 will depart on the “Heartland of America Tour” on Wednesday, Aug. 28 from Cheyenne, Wyoming, and travel across nine additional states: Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Texas. The eight-week tour concludes in late October,” per Union Pacific.
Big Boy departed Cheyenne, Wyo. on Aug. 28 and made its way east across Nebraska. The locomotive left North Platte on Sunday, Sept. 1 and made a stop in Overton from 12:00 to 12:30 p.m.
Big Boy then departed for Grand Island and will make stops in Columbus and Omaha on Monday, Sept. 2.
The Union Pacific Big Boy steam locomotive was built between 1941 and 1944 by the American Locomotive Company, a total of 25 was produced. They were operated solely by the Union Pacific Railroad. Their cost to produce in 1941 was around $265,000, equivalent to around $4 million today.
The locomotive was originally supposed to be called the “Wasatch” series, but got the Big Boy nickname after an unknown worker scrawled the words on the front of the first locomotive of the series. No. 4014 bares the same chalk mark in honor of this.
No. 4014 was retired from service in December 1961, having traveled 1,031,205 miles in its 20 year service, according to the UP Heritage website.
The locomotives were built to haul freight over the Wasatch Mountains between Ogden, Utah and Green River, Wyo. By the late 1940s they were reassigned to Cheyenne, Wyo., where they moved cargo to Laramie, Wyo.
The Union Pacific Big Boy locomotive No. 4014 had been displayed at Fariplex Rail Giants Train Museum in Pomona, Calif., for many years until it was acquired by Union Pacific in 2013. It was restored to operational condition and then placed on excursion service in May 2019, its base being Cheyenne, Wyo.
The locomotive was large, even to its contemporaries, each was 123 feet long and weighted 1.2 million pounds. It could achieve 80 mph, producing around 6,290 horsepower at 41 mph.
They were the only locomotives in the world to use a 4-8-8-4 arrangement. The four leading wheels ensured for stability when entering curves, two sets of eight driving wheels and four wheels for the trailing truck to support the large firebox needed for the massive locomotive.
The locomotive was held in high regard by its crews, and found it to be more reliable and “user-friendly,” than other motive power, according to the book Union Pacific Volume II. Steam locomotives were slowly phased out following post-World War II increases in coal and labor. Diesel-electric became more cost effective.
