BONHAMS TO SELL HISTORIC LOCOMOTIVES FROM EARLY DAYS OF RAILWAYS

 

 

 BONHAMS TO SELL HISTORIC LOCOMOTIVES

FROM EARLY DAYS OF RAILWAYS

 

 

 British 1834 loco used in USA Civil War

 

 

Bonhams is to sell five significant pieces of transportation history from the Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago.

 

The locomotives and cars have been housed at the museum on full-time display for over 80 years and will now be sold at Bonhams’ “Preserving the Automobile” auction at the Simeone Foundation Automotive Museum in Philadelphia on October 5^th.

 

 

Confederacy and Union Civil War History

 

Heading the collection is the enormously significant locomotive Mississippi. A rare surviving example of a British-built steam locomotive in America it dates from 1834. In the formative years of American railroading, many locomotives were built in Britain and shipped to North America for assembly. The Mississippi is believed to be the first locomotive in the South and certainly the very first locomotive to operate in the state of Mississippi. It went on to be used by the Confederate Army and subsequently, after capture, by the Union Army during the Civil War. It is therefore a machine of national importance – not just to America’s transportation history and the critical formative years the railroad played in nation building, but also to the Civil War and to the technological link between Great Britain and the United States and the Industrial Revolution itself.  Mississippi is estimated at US$250,000-400,000.

 

 

American National and Municipal History

 

Also offered from the collection is a replica of the 1825-built John Stevens, constructed by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company in 1929. The original machine was the first locomotive to operate on rails in the United States and helped demonstrate the potential of steam-propelled rail vehicles to move passengers and freight over land at a reasonable cost. It was donated by the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1932 and has been in the museum’s ownership ever since.

 

A related locomotive is the replica of the 1831 York, designed by watchmaker Phineas Davis. The York was one of the first coal-burning engines in the United States and won that year’s locomotive contest sponsored by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. It was part of the lineage of domestically designed and built steam locomotives derived from contemporary maritime technology that emerged in the developmental years of American railroading.

Other artifacts from the museum include the exact replica 1859 horse car Archer Avenue No. 10 that was donated to the museum by the Chicago City Railway Company in 1930. These beautiful, craftsman-built, horse-drawn rail cars were operated in congested urban areas, such as Chicago, Philadelphia and New York, where steam locomotive transportation was impractical. They were the antecedent of the electric streetcar that later dominated urban public transport.

 

 

 

Another impressive handbuilt replica donated to the museum over 80 years ago is a 1920 steam locomotive cab that was part of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company's display at the Century of Progress Fair. 

 

All of these transportation artifacts from the Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago will be sold alongside numerous exquisite automobiles from other owners – including many charismatic Brass Era examples, as well as Formula racers from the prominent Family du Pont – in Philadelphia on Monday, October 5^th at the award-winning Simeone Foundation Automotive Museum.

 

 

Please note that the items from the Museum of Science and Industry will not be present in Philadelphia due to the nature of their size. Interested buyers may contact the following Bonhams director to arrange a preview in advance of the auction:

Mark Osborne • 415-503-3353 • mark.osborne@bonhams.com

 

For more information about this highly anticipated auction with its once-in-a-lifetime offering, including ordering a catalog, registering to bid and viewing the motorcars on offer, please visit bonhams.com/simeone.