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Olomana 0-4-2T

The Prototype and Fort Wilderness RR Model

This saga began when a post in the MyLargescale Rolling Stock forum made me aware of the Accucraft live steam engine being sold by the Carolwood Pacific Historic Society.  Carolwood Pacific is a Web site that commemorates a railroad that once ran in Walt Disney's back yard.  This engine is based on an Accucraft Ruby chassis with many detail upgrades.  The following two pictures are of the model.

Given the detail parts, I considered this engine to be a steal at a price of $480.  I have one on order.  This is a model of a prototype that ran at Disney World on the Fort Wilderness railroad beginning in 1972.  A number of photos of this engine appear at the Fort Wilderness Railroad Web site.  Here's one photo.  History of the four like engines as well as other photos can be seen by following the link in this paragraph.  These engines were manufactured and delivered to Disney World in 1972.

This engine was in turn a 4/5 scale model of the Olomana, a Baldwin engine delivered to the Waimanalo Sugar Company in 1883 on Oahau Island in Hawaii.  She was delivered as a 0-4-2T.  She spent 62 years on the island carrying sugar cane on small four wheel cars.  In this shot, she is still a 0-4-2T.  There are a number of other photos as well as a more detailed history at the Smithsonian "The Great Locomotive Switch" Web site.

According to the Smithsonian site, Olomana is a Baldwin Class "6-8 1/3C16."  She was retired by the sugar cane company in 1944.

After the war ended, a railroad buff and historian named Gerald M. Best, of Beverly Hills, California, decided to realize a boyhood dream: he would buy his own steam locomotive -- and run it!

After storage for a few years, in 1951 Jerry moved it to the property of Ward Kimball, a legendary Disney animation.  Ward had a full railroad in his back yard.  In 1952-53 Jerry and Ward spent over $10,000 on restoration, bringing her to the condition shown in the above picture.  Walt Disney visited Kimball's home many times and from time to time operated the Olomana.  He remarked that this was a perfect engine for Mickey Mouse.

In 1977, Best donated her to the Smithsonian, where she resided in the NMAH's Railroad Hall.  In 1999, as documented in "The Great Locomotive Switch", she was moved to the Smithsonian's Arts & Industries Building where she is a central part of a display about the history of Hawaii.

As Michael Campbell pointed out in an e-mail, WED made a number of significant changes to that version, most notably the addition of a pilot truck (which jumped the track a lot), a (too large) headlamp and squaring off the (too small) saddle tank. 

The Project

In addition to having a model of the Disney Fort Wilderness engine, I'd like to bash one of the variants of the Accucraft Ruby into the Olomana.  Check the links in the top left corner of this page for other pages about the construction of this model.

(c) 2007 Iron Horse 1:29