PRR S1 by Alexander

Holy cow...this has to be the "rarest of the rare".

Merry Christmas, Carey!

Mark in Oregon

Carey,

You pulled another "Rabbit out of the hat."

Merry Christmas. 🎄

Tom

Wow - what a great model and great video - thanks for sharing!  How did you find this incredible piece of history?

Another amazing post Carey.  Thanks for sharing!

Hello all thank you for your kind words

Tis was one of the easiest purchases ever. 

I have a display of vintage O scale at the March meet each year promoting "old" ....a gentleman walks up and asks if I'd be interested in an Alexander S1!

Two days later it was in my car coming home .

He found it in a Pittsburgh hobby shop many moons ago ...there is a photo of it in the 50's when out on Long Island .. beyond that is anyone's guess .

The other 2 Alexander S1's have yet to surface to my eyes .....but everything is out there somewhere...just a matter of time and space .

Very fortunate to have the S1 in the collection .

Cheers Carey

@Carey Williams posted:

I have a tender that almost matches that except that the rounded top of the side is straight across the top, no dog-leg. A photo that I have (from an ebay listing so I can not post it here) of another one shows it behind an S-1. Please post a photo (if possible) of the bottom of your tender. Note that I found my tender in a northern Florida antique mall in a booth with absolutely no other train stuff!

EDIT: I forgot add that mine has no trucks so I found a four-axle Buckeye online and a three-axle Buckeye (that I already had) to use under it if I ever decide to "finish" it off. My sense of humor tells me to use it behind one of my CLW H-10s!

BTW: Mine appears to be scratchbuilt.

Wow - talk about a case of "right place, right time"!  What March meet do you attend?  I'd love to see your display.

@Carey Williams posted:

Hello all thank you for your kind words

Tis was one of the easiest purchases ever.

I have a display of vintage O scale at the March meet each year promoting "old" ....a gentleman walks up and asks if I'd be interested in an Alexander S1!

Two days later it was in my car coming home .

He found it in a Pittsburgh hobby shop many moons ago ...there is a photo of it in the 50's when out on Long Island .. beyond that is anyone's guess .

The other 2 Alexander S1's have yet to surface to my eyes .....but everything is out there somewhere...just a matter of time and space .

Very fortunate to have the S1 in the collection .

Cheers Carey

Carey I grew up on long Island. I saw the S1 in a collection belonging to a fellow by the name of John Martin. He was somehow connected to the PRR, running fan trips and such . He was well versed in Pennsy info with a collection not only of models such as the S1 but many made of plaster that Pennsy might have used in various displays. He also had a very large paper collection including all sorts of things.  I tried back then to buy the S1 but he never would sell  it. Somethings he deemed just to precious.  I learned later on that he was ill and was selling off his collection, but I was too late.

He was a most interesting fellow and was well known on Long Island in the model railroading circle. This is probably close to 40 years ago.  At that time he & I had a mutual friend named Morris Amend who use to work with John doing the fan trips.  They were friends for many years before I came along.  Both fellows were in my opinion were gentlemen.  Both very knowledgeable about the Pennsy in particular, but also in general railroad things as well.

Hope this may connect in some way the photo you mentioned  of it on long island , as he owned it for many years long before I saw it in his basement collection.

Frank Buonaiuto  [ Franky-Ogee ]

let's cut her up and make her swivel!

I couldn't resist. Stuff has to run here in my house, or it's..... Out of here!

I took the flanges off of the middle drivers on a Texas type to get her to run on my curves.

I have a 2 rail Daylight now that will need some mods as she won't go around either.

Our grandson runs everything so I'd have to hide an engine like yours. I have a glass display case for a few engines that I keep. He got my relatives to get them out when I wasn't looking!

I just spent a week getting frogs powered to help stuff run better. Darn Lionel PH180 bricks show as a dead short when they aren't powered. Burned me again, while I searched for shorts. These toys keep me too busy. Good luck to you.

Hello all

Here is a photo of John Martin and his S1 ....I believe this is the same S1 sold 6 years ago ...cast bronze nose , box poke type drivers etc ....

Unknown if this was Alexander or some one else .

This model is a bit more stylized than mine or the ones illustrated by Alexander .....he did sell a stylized S1 as a Hudson...( Showing book ..but have never seen one ...yet) ...th  nose from the Hudson could have been used on John's/ one sold at auction ...note how there ittte a larger gap between nose casting and side sheeting ...

Engine is 35 3/4" long

Also photo of bottom of tender .

Cheers Carey

Great piece and story.  I was surprised by the clip from RMC magazine about John Martin's S1.  They published his home address -- twice!  In our world, we don't even put our email address in a forum post.

Of course the purpose was so someone could mail him a letter with information about his model.  No worries about theft back then.

Bob

Carey

Thank you for posting all this!