By Justin Franz  

Manitoba’s Prairie Dog Central is raising money to rebuild Canada’s oldest operating steam locomotive. 

Prairie Dog Central A2l 4-4-0 3 was built by Dübs & Company of Glasgow, Scotland, in 1882 for Canadian Pacific, and it has led excursions around Winnipeg, Man., since the 1970s. The locomotive is now due for its 15-year overhaul, an endeavor the museum expects to cost approximately $150,000. A GoFundMe page has raised just over $5,000. 

“We are currently at a critical point where No. 3 is having to undergo major repairs,” the museum wrote. “We are asking for your help to raise funds and get No. 3 back on track in 2025. While our volunteers carry out certain tasks we have to raise money to pay for (expert) work.”

Prairie Dog Central 4-4-0 3 as it appeared in the late 19th century running as Canadian Pacific 22. The locomotive would be extensively rebuilt in 1909. Photo Courtesy of Canadian Pacific Archive. 

As the CP expanded west in the 1880s, the railroad was desperate for motive power. As a result, during the railroad’s first 18 months, it acquired 122 new locomotives from nine different builders, mostly 4-4-0 Americans ideal for freight and passenger service. Thirty of the 122 locomotives were constructed by Dübs & Company; of that group, 17 survived into the 1930s. What would eventually become Prairie Dog Central 3, ran in passenger service in Ontario with the number 22 until the early 1900s, when it was moved west to British Columbia. In 1909, the locomotive was rebuilt by CP and ran for another decade until it was sold in 1918 to the City Of Winnipeg Hydro Railway, an industrial railroad built to support the city’s water supply system. The locomotive remained serviceable until the 1960s and in 1970 began running in excursion service on a former Canadian National route. 

While locomotive 3 dates back to 1882, historian and author Omer Lavallée noted in his book “Canadian Pacific Steam Locomotives” that after its 1909 rebuild by CP, the only thing original on it was its frame. Such was common with locomotives that survived so long in service. 

Prairie Dog Central 3 is one of five CP 4-4-0s to have survived into the preservation era, according to Lavallée. The others include A1e 29 on display outside CPKC Railway’s corporate offices in Calgary; A2m 136 at the South Simcoe Railway in Ontario; A2q 144 at the Canadian Railway Museum in Saint-Constant, Quebec; and A2q 374, the first locomotive to lead a passenger train into Vancouver, at the Roundhouse Community Centre in downtown Vancouver. 

For more information about the Prairie Dog Central visit the railroad’s website. 

City of Winnipeg Hydro 3 operating on the Prairie Dog Central in the 1970s. Today, the locomotive has been modified to look as it might have appeared in the 19th century. Photo Courtesy of Prairie Dog Central.