The Tri-State Railway Historical Society and Operation Toy Train of New York have partnered to acquire former Hoboken Manufacturers Railroad locomotive No. 700 and Middletown & New Jersey Railroad locomotive No. 2 for historic preservation.
Both locomotives are 44-ton diesel-electric locomotives constructed in 1947 by General Electric’s factory in Erie, Pennsylvania. They are the last remaining examples of historic rail equipment from the heydays of their respective railroads.
Middletown & New Jersey No. 2 was originally built as American Cyanamid No. 5 in February of that year, and went to work at American Cyanamid’s Calco Chemical Division in Bridgewater, New Jersey. In 1963, the engine was acquired secondhand by the Middletown & New Jersey Railroad to supplement the railroad’s original 44-ton locomotive (No. 1).
The new locomotive was renumbered as M&NJ No. 2 and operated along the entire 15-mile Middletown & New Jersey line, constructed in 1868 as an important bridge route between Middletown and the New Jersey state line in Unionville, New York.
When M&NJ No. 1 was taken out of service in 1981, the No. 2 became the M&NJ’s sole operating locomotive, remaining so for 36 years until additional locomotives were purchased in 2007. The railroad was acquired by holding company Regional Rail, LLC in 2009, and the No. 2 was sent to one of Regional Rail’s contract switching operations in Manheim, Pennsylvania.
With the scrapping of M&NJ No. 1 in early 2021, the No. 2 became the sole surviving piece of equipment from the first 139 years of the M&NJ’s history.
