Cotton Belt's last new steam locomotive was the #819. It was built in Pine Bluff, Arkansas and outshopped on February 8, 1943. Upon retirement in 1955 the locomotive was presented to the City of Pine Bluff. The #819 slept away the years in a city park until the early 1980s when she was taken into the care of the Cotton Belt Rail Historical Society for preservation. Today she rests at the Arkansas Railroad Museum in Pine Bluff while she is being rebuilt for another try at running on the main, likely in 2009. We see her in this Terry A. Kirkland photo of the #819 in fantrip service in Pittsburg, TEXAS.
Did I read that correctly, the loco was used for only 12 years. What was the typical life expectancy of a steam loco?
The 819, like all L-1 Northerns found its last Cotton Belt employment in the Summer of 1952. That means the 819 worked about nine years for Cotton Belt. In August 1952 the 819 was leased to the T&NO and worked about another year before being returned to Tyler and dead storage. So the 819 actually worked only about ten years before being placed in storage and eventually donated to the City of Pine Bluff. The previous L-1 Northern data is from Joe Strapac's Cotton Belt Locomotives. Cotton Belt steam lingered in the yards and on the Sherman Branch until early November 1953.
I'm actually not sure. Most steam classes I'm more familiar with are relatively late. In the US, late steam engines didn't get to live out their economic lives. Ten years, or slightly more, from last new steam to last operating steam seems typical. I've heard that diesels are (or at least were) usually designed for 25-year lives. EMDs normally outlive this, often by a lot. Older engines from other manufacturers usually didn't make it to 25, at least not on large railroads. It appears that steam engines had life expectancies at least as long as diesels and probably longer, until the diesels came. Often, much of a railroad's steam roster in the transition era would come from shortly after WWI.
