Great Northern Steam Roster (Built Since 1900)

Published: November 13, 2026

Presented here is the Great Northern's steam fleet in the post-1900 era, featuring all of the railroad's modern designs it operated including 2-8-2s, 4-8-4s, 4-6-6-4s, and other large articulateds.

Great Northern 0-8-0 835 switching in the Twin Cities in the fall of 1955

0-8-0 No. 835 switching in the Twin Cities during the fall of 1955. It is one of the Baldwin C-1s, 810–849, built in 1918. Ed Olsen photo. American-Rails.com collection.

On this page: At a glance · Switchers · Prairies and Consolidations · Mikados and Santa Fes · Articulateds · Passenger power · Roster

At a glance

Item	Detail
Railroad	Great Northern. Company Great Northern. Successor Burlington Northern, operations at 12:01 a.m. on March 2, 1970
Scope	Built since 1900. Drury’s table, 56 rows. The A-10 and G-3 rows begin in the 1890s
Quantity column	1,376
Frames, counted once	1,178. Taken out: the 20 F-6s, the 24 F-9s, the 45 L-2s, 22 of the L-1s, 22 of the M-1s, the 15 P-1s, 35 of the E-14s, and 15 Prairies. Eleven 0-8-0s whose notes do not name the 2-8-0, and the overlap of E-8 and E-14 at 1053 and 1054, stay in both counts
Last steam	August 1957, without ceremony. Drury names no engine
Steam, as 1951 began	568, in the railroad’s own count of 844 locomotives. Not this list
Diesels	Diesel roster

Switchers

The railroad worked its yards with six-wheel switchers from about 1880 into 1917. The five 0-6-0 rows in the table are the A-8s of 1900, two groups of A-9s, the A-10s of Brooks in 1898–1900, and two Limas of 1917, Nos. 30 and 31. The second A-9 row prints the numbers as 1...94 and the quantity as 56. That is not a solid block from 1 to 94. The missing numbers are not in the table.

In 1918 Baldwin delivered 40 eight-wheel switchers, larger than the United States Railroad Administration 0-8-0. They are the C-1 class, 810–849. Drury calls them the top-rank switchers, and they outlasted the 0-8-0s created by taking the lead trucks off Consolidations. No. 835, in the Twin Cities in the fall of 1955, is one of them.

The other four 0-8-0 rows are those rebuilds. C-2, 850–869, is the F-6 class after the conversion, and the F-6 row leaves the original numbers blank. C-3, 875–899, is the F-9 conversion plus one number. The F-9 note says the 24 engines went to 0-8-0s 875–898, and that row also leaves the original numbers blank. No. 899 is only on the C-3 line. C-4, 780–786, and C-5, 870–873, say rebuilt from a 2-8-0 and do not name the engines. They stay in the quantity column and they are not taken out of the frame count.

Prairies and Consolidations

The freight the chapter names is lumber, wheat, and iron ore off the Mesabi. The company page has the railroad that moved it. The Twelve-Wheelers in the table are the G-3s, Rogers, 1899–1900, and the G-4s, Brooks, 1900. Drury describes the 1890s 4-8-0s as mountain engines on 55-inch drivers, one of them briefly the world’s largest, some of them later superheated and given piston valves. The table does not show a 4-8-0 rebuilt into a switcher. The 0-8-0 notes name 2-8-0s.

The Consolidations are six rows. F-5, 1095–1109, is Rogers, 1901. F-7, 1134–1139, is Cooke, 1901. F-8, 1140–1253, is the large class, Rogers and Baldwin, 1901–1905, quantity 114. F-12 is two Alcos of 1907, Nos. 1326 and 1327. F-6 and F-9 are the blank-number rows already tied to the 0-8-0s.

Two of the F-8s are still around. No. 1147 is at Wenatchee, Washington. No. 1246 is at the Northwest Railway Museum in Snoqualmie. The museum says 1246 was retired in 1953, given to the City of Seattle for display at the Woodland Park Zoo, and later came to Snoqualmie. The museum dates that engine to 1907. The F-8 cell in the table is 1901–1905. The cell is copied as printed.

Baldwin built 150 Prairies in 1906 and 1907, the J-1s, 1500–1549, and the J-2s, 1550–1649. They had 69-inch drivers. Drury says they were unstable at speed, useful on branch lines, and that 15 of them were rebuilt into low-drivered Pacifics for dual service. Those 15 are the H-6 class. The chapter says the rest of the Prairies were scrapped in the late 1930s and early 1940s.

Mikados and Santa Fes

The O-1 Mikados replaced the early articulateds in ordinary freight. Baldwin delivered 145 of them, 3000–3144, from 1911 through 1918. Drury gives them 63-inch drivers, 28-by-32-inch cylinders, a weight of 280,000 pounds, and a tractive effort of 60,930 pounds, heavier and simpler than the L-2 2-6-6-2s. No. 3059, one of them, is displayed at Williston, North Dakota. The O-2 is a single Alco of 1915, No. 3149, which the chapter says came with a merger. The table does not name the railroad it came from.

The O-3s are nine United States Railroad Administration Mikados, 3200–3208, Alco, 1919–1920, one row in the table with the note USRA. The chapter splits that nine into four engines diverted from the Spokane, Portland & Seattle and five received in 1920 from the El Paso & Southwestern. The table is copied as the one row. Baldwin’s 45 O-4s of 1920, 3210–3254, kept the O-1 cylinder and driver dimensions, were a little more powerful, and were the first Great Northern engines with Vanderbilt tenders.

The later Mikados were shop work. The 45 L-2 Mallets became O-5s 3300–3344 in 1922–1925, with 63-inch drivers and 25-by-30-inch cylinders, about the weight of an O-1 and less powerful. Twenty-two of the L-1s became O-6s 3350–3371 in 1925 and 1926, also on 63-inch drivers. The L-1 rows total 25, so three of those articulateds are not in the O-6 line. Between 1929 and 1931 the shops rebuilt 22 of the 2-6-8-0s into O-7s 3375–3396, with 69-inch drivers. In 1932 the shops built three O-8s, 3397–3399, from scratch, on 69-inch drivers and an axle loading of more than 80,000 pounds. In the 1940s the O-7s were rebuilt to O-8 specifications. That rebuilding is not a new row. Drury gives the O-8 class the honors for the heaviest, fastest, and most powerful Mikados in North America.

The chapter says development of new locomotives ended in 1930, with the S-2 Northerns and the R-2 articulateds. The three O-8s of 1932 are still in the table, built new. Both statements are the chapter’s.

Heavy freight after the 2-8-8-0s used the Santa Fe type. Adding a fifth driving axle to the O-4 produced the Q-1, thirty Baldwins of 1923, 2100–2129. The Q-2s, 2175–2189, are the fifteen P-1 Mountains rebuilt by the shops in 1928. Drury calls them a little heavier than the Administration light 2-10-2 and considerably more powerful. They are the only Great Northern 4-8-2s rebuilt to another wheel arrangement.

Articulateds

The early articulateds were Cascade helpers. The chapter dates the first Cascade Tunnel to 1901 and a reduction of the grade between Wenatchee and Seattle from 4 percent to 2.2 percent. The railroad’s own 1951 history, followed on the company page, dates that bore to 1900, 2.63 miles, with the summit reduced from 4,059 feet to 3,383. The locomotives below do not depend on the year.

Baldwin delivered five L-1 2-6-6-2s in 1906, 1800–1804. Drury gives them a weight of 355,000 pounds, about 20,000 more than Baltimore & Ohio No. 2400, and about 1,500 pounds more tractive effort. The table notes that they were renumbered 1900–1904, which freed 1800–1804 for the next class. Twenty more L-1s came in 1908, numbered 1905–1924. The L-2s are 1800–1844, Baldwin, 1907–1908, quantity 45. The chapter’s sentence numbers them 1810–1854. The table is the roster. Drury gives the L-2s the running gear and the boiler of the H-2 Pacific, a weight of 250,000 pounds, and a tractive effort of 54,520 pounds. All 45 became the O-5 Mikados.

The M-1s are 35 Baldwin 2-6-8-0s of 1910, 1950–1984. The chapter says the railroad simpled them in the early 1920s and classed them M-2, then rebuilt 22 of them into the O-7 Mikados. M-2 is not a row. The N-1s followed in 1912, twenty-five 2-8-8-0s, 2000–2024, the first of the road’s Mallets on 63-inch drivers. Drury calls them the tallest locomotives on the railroad. In the mid-1920s they were simpled and classed N-2. In the early 1940s they received new frames and roller bearings and were classed N-3. The chapter’s tractive-effort figures are 93,250 pounds as built, 100,000 pounds simpled, and 104,236 pounds after the modernization. N-2 and N-3 are not rows. The 25 frames are the N-1 line.

Simple 2-8-8-2s replaced the Mikados and Santa Fes on the mountain freight between 1925 and 1930. Baldwin built the first four R-1s, 2030–2033, in 1925, and the Great Northern shops built ten more, 2034–2043, in 1927 and 1928. The table carries all 14 as one row, builder Baldwin and the railroad, 1925–1928. The R-2s, 2044–2059, came out of the Hillyard shops in Spokane in 1929 and 1930. Both classes had 63-inch drivers. The R-1s had inboard-bearing trailing trucks. The R-2s had cast Delta trailing trucks. Drury gives the R-2 a tractive effort of 153,000 pounds and calls the class the most powerful simple articulateds in the world.

The last articulateds were not a Great Northern design. In October 1937 the Spokane, Portland & Seattle took six Northern Pacific-design 4-6-6-4s, 900–905. In November 1937, engines 903 and 904 were sold to the Great Northern and numbered 4000 and 4001, class Z-6, so the mileage would match on the Spokane, Wishram, Bend, and Bieber run. No. 4000 went back to the Spokane road in 1946. No. 4001 went back in 1950. The table note is the former numbers.

Passenger power

The Great Northern owned ten Atlantics, and only ten. The K-1s, 1700–1709, Baldwin, 1906, were balanced compounds, with the high-pressure cylinders inside on the first pair of drivers and the low-pressure cylinders outside on the second pair. Drury gives them 73-inch drivers and 23,000 pounds of tractive effort, and says they were not especially fast. In the mid-1920s the shops rebuilt them as superheated single-expansion engines with booster-equipped cast trailing trucks. With the booster cut in, the figure is 36,800 pounds. A thousand miles of prairie between St. Paul and the Rockies was the country an Atlantic could use. The chapter says the type was a flatland engine.

The Ten-Wheelers in the table are the ones Drury kept for the years after 1900. E-6, 925–939, and E-8, 1053–1072, are Rogers. E-14, 1010–1054, is Baldwin, 1909, quantity 45. E-15, 1078–1090, is Baldwin, 1910. E-2 is two Alcos of 1915, Nos. 910 and 911. E-8 and E-14 both claim 1053 and 1054. Nothing in the notes says those two numbers are the same frames, so both rows stay in the count.

The first Pacifics were six Rogers H-1s of 1905, 1400–1405, with 21-by-28-inch cylinders and 73-inch drivers. In 1906 and 1907 Baldwin delivered the H-2s, built for pull rather than speed: 69-inch drivers, 22-by-30-inch cylinders, slide valves, Walschaerts gear, and inside-journal trailing trucks. The chapter says there were 34, and that all but one were later given piston valves, 23.5-inch cylinders, and outside-frame trailing trucks and reclassed H-3. The table prints H-3s 1406–1439 as quantity 34, note “Former H-2 class,” and keeps H-2 No. 1440 as quantity 1. Both lines are copied. The 34 is not rewritten as 33.

The H-4s were the last Pacifics bought from a commercial builder, twenty from Baldwin in 1909 and twenty-five from Lima. The chapter says the Lima engines came in 1914 and 1915. The table year is 1914. They had 73-inch drivers, less tractive effort than the H-2s, and more speed. After that the new Pacific classes were shop rebuilds. H-5, 1350–1374, and H-7, 1375–1384, came from E-14 Ten-Wheelers, 25 and 10, so 35 of the 45 E-14s. H-6, 1710–1724, is the 15 Prairies. No. 1355, displayed at Sioux City, Iowa, is one of the H-5s. The preserved-locomotive list cited below says it was rebuilt from E-14 No. 1020 in May 1924, which sits inside both rows.

The P-1 Mountains, 1750–1764, Lima, 1914, were ordered with the later H-4s and followed the O-1 Mikado closely enough to carry 63-inch drivers. They were too slow for the passenger trains and went to freight. In 1928 they became the Q-2 Santa Fes. The P-2s were the opposite case. Baldwin delivered 28 in 1923, 2500–2527, with 73-inch drivers, 29-by-28-inch cylinders, and a radial-stay firebox, where most Great Northern steam used a Belpaire. Drury gives the tractive effort as 54,823 pounds, later 57,580, and 69,780 with the booster. Nos. 2507, at Wishram, Washington, and 2523, at Willmar, Minnesota, are two of them.

The first Northerns were six conservative Baldwins of 1929, class S-1, 2550–2555, Belpaire fireboxes, 73-inch drivers, a weight of 472,000 pounds, and a tractive effort of 68,500 pounds. They were bought for passenger trains and soon went to freight. The S-2s of 1930, 2575–2588, fourteen Baldwins, were the passenger 4-8-4s. Drury says they were 50,000 pounds lighter and 10,000 pounds less in tractive effort, the first 4-8-4s with 80-inch drivers, and, like the P-2s, they had radial-stay fireboxes. No. 2584 is at the depot in Havre, Montana.

By the mid-1950s the railroad was dieselized except in the wheat harvest. Drury says the last run of a steam locomotive came without ceremony in August 1957. He does not name the engine. As 1951 began, the railroad’s own history counted 568 steam locomotives in a fleet of 844. That is a census for the start of that year. It is not this list. The same history is where the company page takes the Cascade Tunnel dates used above.

Roster

The quantity column is Drury’s, and it adds to 1,376. Where the shops rebuilt a locomotive and the table lists both numbers, both lines stay. Counted once, the frames are 1,178. The pairs taken out are named in the glance. Builder names are spelled out from the table’s abbreviations. GN in a builder cell is the railroad’s own shops. BLW is Baldwin. A blank number cell is blank in the book. The F-6 and F-9 rows are blank, and the new numbers are in the note.

Type	Class	Numbers	Qty	Builder	Built	Notes
0-6-0	A-8	70–72	3	Rogers	1900
0-6-0	A-9	380–399	20	Baldwin	1912
0-6-0	A-9	1...94	56	Great Northern, Baldwin, Rogers	1903–1912
0-6-0	A-10	95–99	5	Brooks	1898–1900
0-6-0	A-11	30, 31	2	Lima	1917
0-8-0	C-1	810–849	40	Baldwin	1918
0-8-0	C-2	850–869	20	Brooks	1901	Rebuilt from 2-8-0
0-8-0	C-3	875–899	25	Brooks	1903	Rebuilt from 2-8-0
0-8-0	C-4	780–786	7	Baldwin, Rogers	1902–1907	Rebuilt from 2-8-0
0-8-0	C-5	870–873	4	Rogers	1901	Rebuilt from 2-8-0
2-6-2	J-1	1500–1549	50	Baldwin	1906
2-6-2	J-2	1550–1649	100	Baldwin	1907
2-8-0	F-5	1095–1109	15	Rogers	1901
2-8-0	F-6		20	Brooks	1901	To 0-8-0 850–869
2-8-0	F-7	1134–1139	6	Cooke	1901
2-8-0	F-8	1140–1253	114	Rogers, Baldwin	1901–1905
2-8-0	F-9		24	Brooks	1903	To 0-8-0 875–898
2-8-0	F-12	1326, 1327	2	Alco	1907
2-8-2	O-1	3000–3144	145	Baldwin	1911–1918
2-8-2	O-2	3149	1	Alco	1915
2-8-2	O-3	3200–3208	9	Alco	1919–1920	USRA
2-8-2	O-4	3210–3254	45	Baldwin	1920
2-8-2	O-5	3300–3344	45	Great Northern	1922–1925	Rebuilt from 2-6-6-2
2-8-2	O-6	3350–3371	22	Great Northern	1925–1926	Rebuilt from 2-6-6-2
2-8-2	O-7	3375–3396	22	Great Northern	1929–1931	Rebuilt from 2-6-8-0
2-8-2	O-8	3397–3399	3	Great Northern	1932
2-10-2	Q-1	2100–2129	30	Baldwin	1923
2-10-2	Q-2	2175–2189	15	Great Northern	1928	Rebuilt from 4-8-2
2-6-6-2	L-1	1800–1804	5	Baldwin	1906	Renumbered 1900–1904
2-6-6-2	L-1	1905–1924	20	Baldwin	1908
2-6-6-2	L-2	1800–1844	45	Baldwin	1907–1908
2-6-8-0	M-1	1950–1984	35	Baldwin	1910
2-8-8-0	N-1	2000–2024	25	Baldwin	1912
2-8-8-2	R-1	2030–2043	14	Baldwin, Great Northern	1925–1928
2-8-8-2	R-2	2044–2059	16	Great Northern	1929–1930
4-6-6-4	Z-6	4000, 4001	2	Alco	1937	Spokane, Portland & Seattle 903, 904
4-4-2	K-1	1700–1709	10	Baldwin	1906
4-6-0	E-2	910, 911	2	Alco	1915
4-6-0	E-6	925–939	15	Rogers	1902
4-6-0	E-8	1053–1072	20	Rogers	1901–1903
4-6-0	E-14	1010–1054	45	Baldwin	1909
4-6-0	E-15	1078–1090	13	Baldwin	1910
4-6-2	H-1	1400–1405	6	Rogers	1905
4-6-2	H-2	1440	1	Baldwin	1907
4-6-2	H-3	1406–1439	34	Baldwin	1906–1907	Former H-2 class
4-6-2	H-4	1441–1460	20	Baldwin	1909
4-6-2	H-4	1461–1485	25	Lima	1914
4-6-2	H-5	1350–1374	25	Great Northern	1921–1927	Rebuilt from 4-6-0
4-6-2	H-6	1710–1724	15	Great Northern	1923	Rebuilt from 2-6-2
4-6-2	H-7	1375–1384	10	Great Northern	1926–1927	Rebuilt from 4-6-0
4-8-0	G-3	720–769	50	Rogers	1899–1900
4-8-0	G-4	770–779	10	Brooks	1900
4-8-2	P-1	1750–1764	15	Lima	1914	Rebuilt to 2-10-2
4-8-2	P-2	2500–2527	28	Baldwin	1923
4-8-4	S-1	2550–2555	6	Baldwin	1929
4-8-4	S-2	2575–2588	14	Baldwin	1930

Sources

George H. Drury, Guide to North American Steam Locomotives, revised edition, Great Northern chapter, pages 180–183. The table, the class narrative, the August 1957 last run, and the conflicts labeled above.
Public Relations Department, Great Northern Railway, “A Condensed History of the Great Northern Railway” (1951), as reproduced by the Great Northern Railway Historical Society. The count of 568 steam locomotives as 1951 began, and the first Cascade Tunnel completed in 1900.
Ben Ringnalda, “Preserved GN Steam,” Great Northern Empire. The displayed engines that fall inside this table, and the note that H-5 No. 1355 was rebuilt from E-14 No. 1020 in May 1924. The 1861 William Crooks is on that list and is outside this table.
Northwest Railway Museum, Snoqualmie, Washington, collection note on Great Northern 1246. Retirement in 1953, the Woodland Park Zoo years, the move to Snoqualmie, and the 1907 date that does not match the F-8 cell.
Great Northern Railway Historical Society, “GN Locomotive Rosters.” The society points readers to two out-of-print books for an all-time roster. Those books were not used for a figure on this page.

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