Watercolor: Oiling Big Boy 4014 - 20" x 14"

On July 12-13, 2024, Union Pacific's western tour of their steam engine Big Boy 4014 came to Roseville. On a Saturday morning at 9 am, I estimate 10,000 people were crowded along the tracks to look at this phenomenon. It is huge, with 16 driving wheels, more than twice most steam engines! The engine has a 4-8-8-4 wheel arrangement. Each driving wheel is 68 inches in diameter. Because it is 133 feet long, the frame is articulated to allow it to negotiate curves.

The engine was built in 1941 and retired in 1961 after traveling more than a million miles. It was restored by Union Pacific in at the Union Pacific yards in Cheyenne, thoroughly reconditioned, switched from coal to oil, and returned to service in 2019. There were 25 Big Boys built, operating normally between Ogden, Utah, and Cheyenne, Wyoming.

The oilman is from an archived black and white picture from the mid-1930s, added partly to give scale and color. While the locomotive is black, I thought dark blues were more artistic. I particularly liked so many lines converging on my center of interest. 241122. Watercolor, 20" x 14".