page_title: Baldwin Locomotive Works
section_title: End
hierarchical_section_title: Baldwin Locomotive Works / History: 20th century / End
caption_attribution_description: English: Locomotive at Texas Transportation museum in San Antonio, Texas
context_page_description: The Baldwin Locomotive Works was an American manufacturer of railroad locomotives from 1825 to 1956. Originally located in Philadelphia, it moved to nearby Eddystone, Pennsylvania, in the early 20th century. The company was for decades the world's largest producer of steam locomotives, but struggled to compete as demand switched to diesel locomotives. Baldwin produced the last of its 70,000-plus locomotives in 1956 and went out of business in 1972.
  The company has no relation to the E.M. Baldwin and Sons locomotive builder of New South Wales, Australia.
context_section_description: Between 1940 and 1948, domestic steam locomotive sales declined from 30 percent of the market to 2 percent. By 1949, there was no demand for steam locomotives. Baldwin's attempts to adapt to the changed market for road locomotives had been unsuccessful; the reliability of their offerings was unsatisfactory, epitomized by notorious failures such as their "Centipede" diesel locomotives and their steam turbine-electric locomotives, which proved to be money pits unsuited for their intended service.  In July 1948 Westinghouse Electric, which had teamed with Baldwin to build diesel and electric locomotives and wanted to keep their main customer in the rail industry afloat, purchased 500,000 shares, or 21 percent, of Baldwin stock, which made Westinghouse Baldwin's largest shareholder. Baldwin used the money to cover various debts. Westinghouse vice president Marvin W. Smith became Baldwin's president in May 1949. In a move to diversify into the construction equipment market, Baldwin merged with Lima-Hamilton on December 4, 1950, to become Baldwin-Lima-Hamilton. However, Lima-Hamilton's locomotive technology was unused after the merger and market share continued to dwindle. By January, 1952 Baldwin closed its factory in Rochelle, Illinois and consolidated Whitcomb production at Eddystone. In 1953 Westinghouse discontinued building electrical traction equipment, so Baldwin was forced to reconfigure their drive systems based on General Electric equipment.  In 1954, during which time they were being virtually shut out of the diesel market, Baldwin delivered one steam turbine-electric locomotive to the Norfolk and Western railroad, which proved unsatisfactory in service.  The last locomotives produced by Baldwin were three experimental RP-210 dual power passenger locomotives for the New York Central and New York, New Haven, and Hartford rail lines in 1956.
  In 1956, after 125 years of continuous locomotive production, Baldwin closed most of its Eddystone plant and ceased producing locomotives.  The company instead concentrated on production of heavy construction equipment. More than 70,500 locomotives had been built when production ended. In 1965 Baldwin became a wholly owned subsidiary of Armour and Company. Greyhound Corporation purchased Armour and Company in 1970, and in 1972 Greyhound closed Baldwin-Lima-Hamilton for good.
caption: 1954 Baldwin 0-4-4-0 Diesel-Electric Switcher at the Texas Transportation Museum
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