New York Central Class B-60

 

The Shay is a geared locomotive with 3 vertical cylinders and the drive run along the right side, usually used for logging where speeds are low, grades steep and track is sketchy at best. These oddballs belonged to the New York Central and were used for switching freight on the streets of Manhattan.  The full-length boxcab was added to disguise them as a streetcar to avoid frightening passing horses. I wonder if the horses were actually fooled.

  When most of the street trackage was removed and the West Side line was electrified around 1932, the Shays were replaced by box-cab diesels. The Shays were transferred to New York Central subsidiaries Genessee Falls Railway in Rochester, and the Owasco River Railway around Auburn. The Marcellus & Otisco Lake (M&OL) RR leased #7185 in 1942. It was returned to the New York Central on 1943-01-13 with a broken frame and exchanged for #7187. No word if the bodies were removed when they left the city. All were scrapped in 1948.