RailNews

Canadian National 102 is the fifth streamlined diesel to join the Illinois museum’s collection. Photo Courtesy of Monticello Railway Museum.

Canadian National Donates E-unit to Monticello Railway Museum

By Jacob Rajlich

Canadian National has donated one of the E9AM locomotives that once led its business train to the Monticello Railway Museum in Illinois. The group announced the acquisition earlier this week after the locomotive arrived in Monticello, Ill., from Homewood, Ill., where it had been stored for a number of years.

Museum volunteers are currently preparing to do a mechanical evaluation of the locomotive.

The CN 102 is the fifth streamlined diesel in Monticello’s fleet, joining Wabash F7A 1189, CN FPA-4/FPB-4 6789/6862, and the “IC 4044”, being restored from a Pennsylvania Railroad E8.

Built for the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad in 1950 as E8A 9940A, the unit would later go the Burlington Northern, and spent decades in commuter service over the “Racetrack” between Chicago and Aurora after being rebuilt as an E9AM by Morrison-Knudsen. The unit subsequently went to the Illinois Central and then CN.