Union Pacific’s legendary Big Boy No. 4014 took center stage in Philadelphia on the Fourth of July as tens of thousands gathered for the America250 Block Party, commemorating the nation’s 250th anniversary.
The milestone visit is part of the historic Union Pacific Big Boy No. 4014 coast-to-coast tour, which includes Big Boy’s first journey onto eastern rails since 1941 in partnership with Norfolk Southern to celebrate the nation’s 250th anniversary.
Big Boy No. 4014 served as the backdrop for a ceremony featuring Union Pacific Railroad CEO Jim Vena, Norfolk Southern President and CEO Mark George, and Chellie Cameron, president and CEO of the Chamber of Commerce for Greater Philadelphia.
The event included a ceremonial driving of a Silver Spike, which traveled with Big Boy from Sacramento, California, as it paid homage to the Golden Spike that first connected the nation at Promontory Summit, Utah, in 1869. The spike commemorates the first-ever coast-to-coast Big Boy tour and will be part of the Union Pacific Railroad Museum’s traveling Experience Car.
An actor portraying Charles Carroll – the last surviving signer of the Declaration of Independence who laid the ceremonial cornerstone for the first commercial railroad in the U.S. on July 4, 1828 – also helped highlight rail’s earliest ties to the nation’s founding.
The coast-to-coast tour brings together a unique collection of rail equipment. Norfolk Southern’s historic Marco Polo rail car is a nearly century-old passenger car once used by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
The specialty locomotive “The Bell” honors the Liberty Bell and Norfolk Southern predecessor Pennsylvania Railroad’s role in transporting it across the country. Two of Union Pacific’s commemorative locomotives – No. 1616 Abraham Lincoln locomotive and No. 1776-America250 – are also part of the historic tour.
The tour ends July 29 in Cheyenne, Wyoming, after Big Boy travels about 7,000 miles across 14 states.
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