Other Jordan Products
Other Jordan Products
Not to many people are aware that the O. F. Jordan Company also built rail equipment other than the Spreader, These include Wedge Plows of both single end and double end type , a Track Oiler and a Ballast Cleaner.
Jordan Wedge Plows
In the early 1960's, Jordan tried to market a Wedge Plow. This plow looked very much like previous offerings by the Russell Car & Snowplow company. The main difference was the fact that the Jordan plow used an all welded car body, but the Russell was all riveted. Thus this is one of the main spotting differences.
Jordan Wedge Plows also had the brake gear mounted on the rear of the car, and not the roof. As per advertisements, Jordan offered their Wedge Plow in either single or double track models, and with a flanger mounted ahead of the rear truck or a drop nose flanger. It might be possible that Jordan received the patents from Russell when they went out of business, or if this was just a spin off of there plow.
We do know that very few (less then 12) were built. Included in this accounting are the Pere Marquette plows (later Chesapeake & Ohio), a Maine Central unit, a Boston & Maine unit and a Canadian National unit (CN #55614).
At least one of these that we know of, has been preserved, and that is C&O #914025, ex-PM SP-25 and is current owned by the Western New York Railway Historical Society and is on display.
C&O 914020, a Typical Jordan Wedge. Jonathon Leese Photo
A builders photo of MEC 90. This plow is now stationed in Rigby Yard in Portland Maine. From the collection of John C. LaRue Jr.
Jordan Push Plows
This is yet another area lacking information. Jordan built a set of Wedge/Push plows for the Illinois Central Railroad, built on gondolas.
These plows had a very high nature to them. It is very much possible Jordan just built the plows and attached them to the gondola's supplied by the
railroad. So far there are at least eleven Jordan plows list in the Illinois Central / Illinois Central Gulf / Chicago Central & Pacific (CC) roster.
These plows were of the X-80xx numbering series. Illinois Central also has a Wedge Plow, # 101225 which is a Jordan push plow mounted on a three bay
open hopper.
A builders photo of IC X-8046. from the collection of John C. LaRue Jr.
Jordan "Twin-Type" Snowplow
This is the one machine that almost NO history can be found on: the Twin Type. This plow appeared in a 1953 advertisement but that's about it.
We are not even certain if it was even built! The Twin Type was marketed as a plow for a road that didn't have the ability to turn equipment, thus
it had plows on each end with a long central operators cabin.
The Jordan "Twin-Type" Snow Plow. Railway Age advertisement
Jordan Track Oiler
The Jordan Track Oiler was a machine that came out in the early 1930's. The point of the oiler was to do just that, oil track joints in
the days before welded rail came about. This was also an anti-corrosion method. The oiler looks just like a track speeder but a shy longer.
It also had a cart it pulled behind to hold oil. It was powered by a small four cylinder engine. Supposely, this machine was
also able to pull a standard sized tank car to hold more oil. The oil was sprayed to each side of the rail web, and also had extra hoses
to spray oil where the sprayers could not reach. So far we have seen examples of Track Oilers in livery for Illinois Central and Missouri Kansas Texas.
A Jordan Track Oiler. from the collection of John C. LaRue Jr.
Jordan Ballast Cleaner
In 1945, Jordan made a Ballast Cleaner. This was truly an odd looking piece of equipment. Very little is know about this machine,
other than the fact that only one was built (to the best of our knowledge to date), This unit ended up going to Atchison Topeka & Sante Fe Railway
in 1945 and was numbered 199210.
ATSF 199210 in East Chicago Indiana. from the collection of John C. LaRue Jr.
Another view of the 199210, but in working position. from the collection of John C. LaRue Jr.
