Flip to 1883 poster commemorating Matthias W. Baldwin’s construction of “Old Ironsides, in 1832.
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Credit: Courtesy of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania Collection, Atwater Kent Museum of Philadelphia
Locomotive builders took tremendous pride in their "iron horses," as did the railroads that operated them. Early locomotives, each with its own name, were colorfully painted and decorated, and often assigned to specific engineers who further adorned them with special whistles, polished brass fittings, their own portraits, and other embellishments. "The Tiger" was one of four similar eight-wheelers that M. W. Baldwin & Co. built for the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1857.