Ex-Manitoba Sugar

Today it’s a railway theme (hooray!) and the subject but a single piece in the extensive collection belonging to Aspen Crossing, a tour train operator. All eyes on this “little” industrial locomotive that one half of your humble Team had a run in with decades ago. It’s sits on a siding in Mossleigh Alberta along with many other pieces of rolling stock, not far from firm’s base of operations, and is watched over by three historic grain elevators. We’ve looked at it briefly before in other articles but this visit, it garners all our attention. And mixing it up, we’ll be hanging around after dark.

Wearing BIGDoer.com yellow (the best colour ever), this beastie dates back to 1958 and was built for Manitoba Sugar out of Winnipeg. There it was kept busy shuttling cars about their Fort Garry Neighbourhood plant, which was built about 1940. Inbound loads of sugar beets, from which the sweet stuff was extracted, and outbound loads of pure crystallized delight were the main products coming and going. Later beets came in by truck, leaving only outbound loads, either bulk sugar in specialized railcars or bagged and in boxcars. The engine never carried a number from what we can see, which is odd – almost all rail equipment was assigned one for a myriad of reasons (bookkeeping being one).

Later Manitoba Sugar was taken over by BC Sugar out of British Columbia and operated under their Roger’s Sugar brand. The locomotive worked at the plant till its closure in 1997. The buildings there still exist but are used by a grain firm mostly. Before the arrival of this locomotive, the plant had a couple small steamers to do the work.

In the 1970s your author, as a troubled teen, lived almost within sight of the plant and would often stroll on down to watch the action there. And during that time, although the memories are foggy at best now, was witness to this very locomotive going about its work. The plant did seem quite busy anytime it was visited. Once in a while my band of unhinged friends and I would sneak in. One of those visits we climbed up high on a raw beet pile found on the back side of the property, where a beet-fight broke out, and promptly got escorted out by security.

You know if you throw a sugar beet at someone it’s going to hurt. Those things are solid and our (thankfully) interrupted melee resulted in many bruises that day. That was the only time they caught us.

In another instance, we swiped a beet, took it home and tried to eat it. Let me tell you, that was not the greatest idea in hindsight. Talk about inedible. It was as thought trying to bite into a football and at best tasted like sweetened dirt mixed with cow crap. Yuck!

Back to the locomotive…now many decades have passed, and it and I are reunited. Nice to see old friends.

The locomotive was transferred to the Taber Alberta Plant of Roger’s Sugar (earlier Alberta Sugar and Canadian Sugar Factories), a plant dating back to 1950, where it worked until recently. Interestingly this sugar factory is the last of its kind in all Canada. In addition to the one in Winnipeg, there used to be two others that extracted from sugar beets not all far from Taber, one in Raymond and the other Picture Butte. Many of the buildings connected to these two still exist and have become grain storage facilities.

General Electric made this locomotive at their Erie Pennsylvania factory. That firm is the leading locomotive builder in the western hemisphere today and perhaps the world. At one point they concentrated only on little industrial “critters”, used in factories, refineries and such and not mainline power, as they do today and have done mostly so since the 1960s. A relative lightweight it comes in at forty five tons. Power comes from two diesel engines, one on each side of the central cab, which drives two generators that supply power to a single traction motor in each truck (or bogie). Power to the second axle on each comes via a chain drive from the first.

General Electric build hundreds of this model from the 1940s-1970s – they made more than fridges! For their size, they pulled well, and we’re able to work in the tight spaces often found in industrial plants. Realistically the top speed was maybe thirty clicks per, but more often than not, even that was rarely reached. Most of the time they’d be moving at a walking pace. Spot a car at this loading dock, remove one from another, and so on. Back and forth all day long and zero chance to stretch one’s legs.

This is the first locomotive acquired by Aspen Crossing. They’ve since picked up many more, including a steamer – link below. Little Yellow was never intended to pull tour trains and has always been used for odd jobs like pulling around track maintenance equipment. But most of the time it sits, along with many other miscellaneous pieces of rolling stock in the collection on their storage track in Mossleigh. Keeping company is many box cars, a caboose or two, a snowplow, baggage car, a railway crane and so on. And they just keep adding stuff.

Additional rolling stock and locomotives, those used specifically for the tour trains, are kept at Aspen Crossing’s base of operations down the track a couple clicks or so. You’ll can’t miss the place off the highway, with that big flashing sign. Aspen also has a couple restaurants there, camping facilities, a gift shop and a seasonal greenhouse operation.

The railway came through Mossleigh in 1930, the line being part of the Canadian Pacific’s Lomond Subdivision, a sleepy grain branch. The last CPR trains to use it were around the turn of the century. Soon after most of the track was pulled up except for a section retained for car storage, later acquired by and now used by Aspen Crossing, heading east from a CPR connection near Farrow, to a town called Arrowwood. That’s the next community down the track from Mossleigh. Tour trains run mostly in the warmer months. In April, the time of our late night visit, the track was rusty with disuse. But in a month or so, it’d be train time.

We’ve done a couple ride-alongs with the guys, here: Train Day at Aspen Crossing and here: Twilight Train. Let me tell you the fun to be had!

This outing was used to practice advanced night photography techniques, shared with us by a good friend who’s expertise in this area knows no bounds, the amazing Coinoath Sarsfeld. Look him up – his work is beyond reproach. We’re happy with the results. He was only there in spirit but keeping company with us this evening is another good chum, Byron Robb, a well rounded photographer who we collaborate with often. It’s always better to shoot with friends who are fun and interesting.

They’re saying…

Umm, I know you are world-class photographers and all, but I like the back-story parts best of all. Kudos. Leo Byrd.

A few weeks prior…
Canadian National Railways #5080 – an old steamer recently delivered & since moved into the “compound”.

Know more about the grain elevators…
Prairie Sentinels – Mossleigh Alberta – from 1930.

Another little yellow locomotive…
Coleman Collieries #DL11 – a former coal mine locomotive.

If you wish more information on what you’ve seen here, by all means contact us!

Date of Adventure: April, 2019.
Location: Mossleigh, AB.
Article references and thanks: The fine folks @ Aspen Crossing, Canadian Trackside Guides, Byron Robb, Manitoba Historical Society, Roger’s Sugar.
BIGDoer.com was here with permission. If you visits the Aspen Crossing Collection, please take care and don’t climb on the equipment.

In Mossleigh Alberta, waiting for night to come.

A sweet little locomotive.

It once worked at sugar refineries in Manitoba & Alberta.

Now it’s part of the Aspen Crossing Collection.