"Broad Gauge Steam - The Final Decades"
By Kenn Pearce
Paperback cover 284 pages colour & black/white photos
INTRODUCTION
It is now more than 40 years since the last broad gauge steam locomotive worked in regular revenue service in South Australia. The use of Rx class engine, No.214, at Tailem Bend for the last time on 1st December 1967 passed without a whimper of a farewell to more than a century of broad gauge steam on South Australian Railways. It was surprising that a more fitting celebration of the end of an era was not arranged.
In Adelaide, the Mile End locomotive roundhouse was already a 'tomb' when I first visited this evocative building on 7th June 1969. However, the spirit of the place - the echoes of the men who once worked there and the smells of the machinery - still resonated from the decaying buildings on that grey day. Inside the roundhouse, four of South Australian Railways' large 520 class 4-8-4s lurked in the gloom. In readiness, so it seemed, to be summoned to haul another passenger train to Port Pirie, Terowie or Tailem Bend.