who remembers these old girls?

Does anyone here remember riding on the NEC while being pulled by a GG1? They were way before my time. It's hard to believe that these engines were in service for almost 50 years. Does anyone have any fond memories of the GG1? These are my favorite engines, I have always loved their art deco styling

My Mother had a sister that lived in Baltmore, and growing up, we made the trip a few times a year. We didn't have a car so it was the way to go.....

An HO scale model of one with a couple streamlined Pennsy coaches sits on a display shelf in my living room.

Logged many miles behind GG-1's during my time living on the NEC from '69 to '72. Not many were left marked PRR, most were black Penn Central. I understand that their cabs were a bit cramped for the crew. Regardless, GG-1's were strong pullers and fast accelerators, and were definitely well liked!

I rode back and forth from NYP to Lewistown many times in the 60's and early 70's. Have no idea if these were pulling the trains... CJ

I rode behind GG-1's several times on Amtrak in the 1970's. A vivid memory is of watching the headlight and hatch-like doorway through the window in the door of the first car of the train. The paint scheme I remember seeing was plain black with simple-print "Amtrak" in white.

The cabs were very cramped. I'm 5' 5" and I felt really cramped in one. But they were well liked. How two people worked up there I won't understand

That is the best picture I could get with an 18 mm lens.

Rode to NY on a special RF&P consist back in the 60s. in those day you were allowed to be outside the last car on the platform.

Looking at the photo, I find it hard to believe that these (and other) trains could run at high speeds on jointed rail! They must have had some great MOW workers.

choochoodood said:

Looking at the photo, I find it hard to believe that these (and other) trains could run at high speeds on jointed rail! They must have had some great MOW workers.

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The railroads employed many more people in those days.

Competition and price erosion have driven up efficiency to the point that today (with few exceptions), if the railroads weren't alraedy there, there would probably not be an economic case for actually building them.

I rode on trains pulled by GG1s on various trains between New York and Washington. I was always amazed at how quiet these monsters were compared to a diesel and certainly a steam locomotive. You could be standing on a platform like Wilmington or North Philadelphia and see the light from the train and then all of a sudden it would be pulling through the station. They were also beautiful to behold and the Pennsy colors did them proud. I didn't care for the black Penn Central...it was like getting them ready for their funeral.

jphjaxfl said:

I rode on trains pulled by GG1s on various trains between New York and Washington. I was always amazed at how quiet these monsters were compared to a diesel and certainly a steam locomotive. You could be standing on a platform like Wilmington or North Philadelphia and see the light from the train and then all of a sudden it would be pulling through the station. They were also beautiful to behold and the Pennsy colors did them proud. I didn't care for the black Penn Central...it was like getting them ready for their funeral.

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I agreee about the funeral. I think NJT did the GG1s a great service by painting 4877 Tuscan red with gold cat whiskers for its last year's on the track.

The first time I rode behind a GG-1 was in the Senator in 1965.

Rode behind them a zillion times in those Jersey Builder cars on the North Jersey Coast Line service of NJT between New York and South Amboy.

We are heading downtown early to catch the "Morning Congressional" somehow sounds better than "Northeast Regional"

I became a train geek in the Philadelphia area between 1964 and 1970. For me, the GG1 was what I first thought when I heard the word "locomotive.", Everything else was EMUs, either the PRR MP-54s or early Silverliners, and whatever it was that the Reading used. I think when I was 11, I rode an RDC on the Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines from 30th St. to Atlantic City. It might have been the first diesel train I ever rode, and that was a DMU. I'd see the pictures of the diesel streamliners in train magazines and thought of them as exotica. When I was 14, I got to ride the Denver Zephyr behind some sort of diesel power, and when I was in high school, I took the occasional joyride to Norristown on something called the "King Coal Express" a Reading train tp Pottsville that used an F unit diesel (which I think is now on display in the parking lot at Steamtown in Scranton.) Oh, and for three years I went to a camp in Mass. that involved a trip on the "camp train" from Grand Central up the Housatonic, which I think was electric to Danbury and diesel after that. But I rode up to New York behind a GG-1.

Brings to mind our beloved late friend Eric M., known as "GG-1" here on AU!

A GG-1 pulled all of the school trip specials I took in the mid-1960's from Washington DC to New York Penn Station and return. Also pulled the low-slung Evening Keystone I rode with family to New Brunswick, NJ during the year of the New York World's Fair.

Bob Dylan said:

Brings to mind our beloved late friend Eric M., known as "GG-1" here on AU!

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My first thought as well.

Bob Dylan said:

Brings to mind our beloved late friend Eric M., known as "GG-1" here on AU!

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Yes. When I saw the thread title, I experienced a split second in which I looked forward to reading his response.

It was one of those "Oh... right... " moments.

The PRR GG-1 was perhaps the finest and most beautiful locomotive ever built. They were famed industrial designer Raymond Loewy's styling masterpiece. Their art deco design looked timeless over their half century of service.

The twin-cabbed locomotive was indeed a bit tight, and sort of submarine like inside. The massive bridge-girder like beams and long noses were just what you wanted for protection during the early NEC days when there were still grade crossings.

Standing at the west end of Penn Station's Track 11/12, under 'A' Tower, and watching their headlight go from dim to bright, along with the steady blong-blong-blong of their bell, as they easily pulled the long Florida and other long haul trains on their way, was something I never tired of. I rode behind them between New York and Washington, New York and Harrisburg, and late in their lives up to New Haven. I finally got the big thrill of a cab ride aboard NJT 4879 from New York to Newark, just before their retirement.

Thank goodness so many of them have been saved and preserved at various museum's all around the country.

Seaboard92 said:

ImageUploadedByAmtrak Forum1486531715.967985.jpg

That is the best picture I could get with an 18 mm lens.

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That's a photo of an E or F unit cab, not a GG-1. Google for Images using "GG-1 cab" and you'll see the correct image. Much narrower than the standard EMD cab.

I might have the wrong one my files from there aren't the best I'll check into it