Interesting photo Charles. I feel bad for you for using a bead blaster to remove paint on the whistle and bell. Although, you probably didn't know what damage would occur, I might have done the same thing. I have to correct you though, your locomotive details identify this loco as an 0-4-0... but it's clearly an 0-6-0. Again, it's easy to hit the wrong key on a keyboard while trying to document all the information in your head.
There is a former Porter 0-6-0 saddle-tank locomotive on display in a park in Georgia that once operated in Ohio on the Buckeye Central Scenic Railroad... unfortunately, both the scenic railroad and the operational days of the locomotive are no longer with us. That locomotive was owned by a gentleman from Parkersburg, West Virginia, who, after he bought it, he transformed the 0-6-0T into a 2-6-0 with a tender. He was the one responsible for also bringing it to Ohio for the Buckeye Central. It operated on the Buckeye Central for 2 years, and after a fallout with the Board of the Buckeye Central, he took his little Porter locomotive and went home. I had one day where the owner let me actually be an assistant Fireman, helping to shovel coal into the firebox, and on the second run of the day, he let me have the throttle for a mile or two, before he took back the seat. I later was allowed to operate it after the crowds had gone home and it was time to put the locomotive to bed, and I was able to run it to the ash pit, and then back to the station once the fire was dumped, and the boiler was blown down. I was kind of surprised to learn that a steam locomotive could still operate even after the fire was dumped since I had never considered the fact that once you dump the fire, the steam pressure is still high enough to allow limited operation in a yard to get a locomotive from the dump pit and back to the Roundhouse. Thank you for sharing this photo, and I hope that one day this "little tyke" would be restored to operation.
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