Rich, love hearing your recollections about seeing the 9000s in person. If I had a time machine, i’d be traveling back to the 40s to see and FEEL big steam power pounding the hills.
SP 5021 is a personal favorite of mine at Rail Giants. It is beautifully preserved and they take marvelous care of her. The compressed air that goes to her whistle happens to be the highest pressure in the whole air system. I believe it has around 180-200 psi usually. A special request to a volunteer may give you a chance to pull it. It is a very melodious and loud SP 6 chime whistle.
A fun fact about 5021 is that she was still operational when SP donated her in the early 60s. The museum voluteers actually steamed it a few times and ran it on a length of track. When SP caught wind of this, they told the museum if they did it again, they would take the engine back and cut it up. They were concerned about some volunteers causing a boiler explosion on an engine that said Southern Pacific on the side. 5021 was also considered to pull the Freedom Train.
