Re: Tanana Valley Railroad engine #151

I can't offer any information on the locomotive, but the photograph is well known and has long fascinated me. It shows the wintertime crossing of the Tanana River in Nenana, AK, with track laid directly on the ice. This was when the Tanana Valley RR was under the control of the Alaska Engineering Commission, during the construction of the Alaska RR (SG) between Seward and Fairbanks; the winter ice crossing was discontinued after the completion of the Mears Bridge in Nenana in 1923.

The original Tanana Valley RR was of very light construction overall, so No. 151 is supposed to have been used only in the winter months when the roadbed was frozen solid.

-Philip Marshall