El Paso & Southwestern Railroad Locomotive Number One
El Paso, El Paso County, Texas
Marker Inscription
One of the oldest survivors of America's steam railroading era, this locomotive was built 29 years after the steam engine was first developed for transportation. Breese, Kneeland & Company of Jersey City, New Jersey also operated as the New York Locomotive Works and is represented by the No. 73 on the locomotive builders plate. The company used its standard style, based on a design patented by Henry Roe Campbell in 1836. Known as a 4-4-0 "Classic American" for its wheel configuration, this particular locomotive was manufactured in 1857 for the Milwaukee & Mississippi Railroad Company. Believed to have been named Spring Green, the locomotive served the upper midwestern United States for more than 30 years. By 1889, the Arizona & Southeastern Railroad Company, which later became the El Paso & Southwestern Railroad (EP&SW), had acquired it and converted it from a wood-burner to a coal-burner. The smokestack was also likely reconfigured from a funnel type to a straight type at that time. Calling it Locomotive No. One, EP&SW utilized it in the development of Bisbee, Arizona and in other mining and industrial operations of the Southwest. EP&SW retired Old Number One after more than 50 years of service, moving it to a park adjacent to company headquarters at 416 N. Stanton Street in 1909. Except for its brief role in the 1938 film Let Freedom Ring, it remained there until 1960, even after the rail company became part of the Southern Pacific Railroad system in 1924. In 1960, the railroad donated it it Texas Western College (now The University of Texas at El Paso), which placed it at the Centennial Museum. In 2000, the City of El Paso received state and national funds to restore the engine to its 1909 appearance, moving it to the present site at El Paso's Union Plaza Transit Terminal. (1968, 2005)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Built in 1857 as a 4-4-0 "Classic American" locomotive, this engine began life hauling freight and passengers across the upper Midwest before a second career in the Southwest. By 1889 the line that became the El Paso & Southwestern Railroad had acquired it, converted it from wood to coal, and put it to work opening the mining country around Bisbee, Arizona. Dubbed "Old Number One," it served more than fifty years before retirement, later starring briefly on film and finding a permanent home in El Paso.
Why it matters
Few survivors of America's early steam era remain, and this locomotive embodies how the railroad stitched together the mining and industrial development of the far Southwest.
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