Engine House and Machine Shop

The machine shop, located alongside the engine house, was a prefabricated building constructed by Geiger Engineering & Manufacturing Co. of Union in 1939. Geiger was an RV customer with its plant and freight siding on the Newark Heights Branch. The company constructed its Union plant in 1937. The shop building was built of steel and concrete slabs and measured 25’ x 49’ x 13’ high. In 1944, shop machinery consisted of the following:

• 1 - 24" lathe

• 1 - 22" shaper

• 1 - #2 grinding wheel

• 1 - Tilt table saw

• 1 - Drill press, small

• 1 - Buffalo forge

All of the machinery was considered old with a total value of approximately $1,000.

A tax assessment from 1947 listed the following shop machinery:

• Cutting blow pipe & oxygen regulator for welding, built 1929, cost new $116

• 1 - Arch tube cleaner for locomotives, Lagonad Mfg. Co., built 1930, cost new $95

• 1 - Small Electric Drill, Black & Decker, built 1930, cost new $38

• 1 - Gear Hoist, built 1932, cost new $43

• 1 - Lathe, built 1933, cost new $456

• 1 - Frigidaire Water Cooler, built 1935, cost new $156

• 1 - Oliver Typewriter, built 1937, cost new $22

• 1 - Wales Adding Machine, built 1937, cost new $59

• 1 - Sutton #2 Sand Dryer, built 1938, cost new $53

• 1 - 4 Drawer Steel Filing Cabinet, built 1938, cost new $21

• 1 - Rebuilt Underwood Typewriter, built 1939, cost new $60

• 1 - Parker Combination Vise, Chas. Parker Co., Meridan Co. #289-1/2, 6", built 1938, cost new $44

• 1 - R. C. Allen Adding Machine, cost new $95

• 1 - 2nd Hand Underwood Typewriter, cost new $58

• 1 - Portable Frigidaire Air Conditioning Unit, cost new $332

In May 1953, the old, wooden engine house was demolished. That same month, work began on a new two-stall engine house in its place. These additional two stalls shared the side walls of the 1939-built machine shop on the northerly side and the 1951-built one-stall engine house on the southerly side, which thereafter acted as partition walls. Work was completed on the building in October 1953. The building was constructed by Geiger Engineering & Manufacturing Co. of Union in the same manner as their two previous buildings.

The building was a one story masonry and steel frame diesel engine house. It measured 72’ 8” x 36’ 8” x 21’ 2-⅜” average height. It had a single pitch flat roof. The building had a steel frame of five bents of two 6” H columns at 15.5# and one 18” I-beam roof girder at 50#.  The end walls, doors, and window frames were of various framing sections. All framing was bolted together. The weight of the steel superstructure was 22,000 lbs. The side walls and roof were comprised of 12’ x 4’ x 4” thick precast reinforced concrete slab sections bolted to each other and to the steel frame. The joints between the slab sections were caulked. The two overhead folding stall doors measured 15’ wide by 16’ high. They were wooden and manually operated. There were two 3’ x 7’ steel doors. There was 339 square feet of steel window sash consisting of eleven units of various sizes and two 4’ x 4’ x 4’ high steel framed and glass ventilator skylights on the roof. There was one 8’ x 8’ x 5’ high sheet metal and steel framed smoke jack on the roof over the westerly end of the track pit. The building was equipped with manually operated vents. All steel and wood work was painted. Geiger built the building under contract for $16,709.96. The building permit from the Borough of Kenilworth cost $39. The two skylight ventilators cost $360. The one smoke jack cost $350. 

The excavation of thirty cubic yards of earth for the foundation cost $240. The concrete foundation, requiring seventeen cubic yards of material, cost $900. Reinforcing steel bars in the foundation cost $96. Except for the westerly 12’ of the bay of the building and 12’ of the northerly wall, the superstructure was carried on the foundations of the two adjoining buildings.

The building’s 6” concrete floor, measuring 1,500 square feet, cost $1,150. A 6” thick bituminous macadam floor, measuring 868 square feet, cost $550. 

Geiger utilized the existing engine inspection pit extant in the wooden engine house and constructed a 12” high and 12” wide concrete extension at the top of it. The concrete cost $213.31. Reinforcing steel bars cost $64.

Heating was installed by R. F. Stengel & Son for a total of $1,453. Heating equipment consisted of a Lennox hot air space heater and an “Oilfyre” fuel oil burning furnace, consisting of Model CB4 Lennox furnace with type LD2C-1 Lennox oil burner, type 781 Lennox blower unit, furnace bonnet and distribution grilles, electric and thermostatic control equipment, a 1,000 gallon capacity fuel storage tank buried in the ground and all piping for filling tank and connecting to oil burner.

The water piping consisted of ¾” galvanized pipe and fittings, including four valves at a cost of $56.30. Materials were provided by Robinson Corp. Louis Travisano did the installation. 

Electric wiring was fed through galvanized iron conduit. There were eighteen lighting outlets (miniature spot type, no fixture) mounted inside, six plug receptacle outlets mounted on the walls inside, and three lighting outlets (miniature spot type, no fixture) mounted outside. The twenty-seven outlets and contract work by C. C. Zimmerman cost $637.41.

A walkway and drainage basins were installed across the front of the original diesel engine house, the new engine house, and the machine shop. 

The walkway consisted of two sections. The first was 4” thick and of bituminous concrete. It was 50’ long and 3’ wide. It cost $50. The section was 4” thick and of plain concrete. It was an irregular area. It cost $34.83.

There were three catch basins constructed of brick. They measured 2’ x 2’ x 18” deep inside with 1⁄2” thick perforated steel plate cover. They cost $234.80.

The total cost of the two additional engine house stalls, with appurtenances, cost a total of $23,291.80.

In February 1954, a two-ton capacity manually operated overhead crane and runway, with a 24’ span, were installed in the newer two stalls of the engine house. It was built and erected by Geiger at a cost of $1,234.50.

After the railroad was last operated in April 1992, Delaware Otsego Corp. began selling off pieces of property which included the engine house area in Kenilworth. The engine house was demolished about July 1992 to make room for a new strip mall.