Amesterdam, NL: 1852 Stoomgemaal Halfweg, World's Largest and Still-Operating Steam Powered Paddlewheel Pump

(Satellite)

Sjoerd Peerlkamp, Nov 2019

The flywheel in the above photo is the brass wheel on the other side of the men and gauges. The two black wheels are reduction gears.

Facebook Reel

The boiler must be in the building on the left. The steam engine would be in the center of the building on the right. The six "black openings" contain the paddle wheels.

Street View, Nov 2022

I amsterdam posted

🤩 In the Flower Region you’ll find a unique monument: the Halfweg Steam Pumping Station. From 1852 to 1977, it pumped seepage and rainwater from 170 (!) polders into the sea, and today, it proudly stands as part of the Netherlands’ industrial heritage. 💧

😮 Fun fact: It’s the oldest and largest paddle wheel steam pumping station in the world that’s still in operation!

It is a low-lift, high-flow pump.

expatshaarlemmermeer
The 500 hp steam engine dates from 1923. I wonder how the paddles were powered between 1852 and 1923.

It looks like they completely rebuilt the facility to add the newer steam engine.

TripAdvisor

TripAdvisor
[Since 1500/60 = 25, I think the last paragraph specifies that it could pump 25 cubic meters/sec or 883cfs.]

I found an English translation of the above plaque.

The Halfweg steam pumping station was built in 1852 and operated as a reservoir pumping station until April 20, 1977. The original pumping station consisted of the engine house, with the housing for the scoop wheels on either side.

The first 100-hp engine was replaced by a more powerful one in 1888. The paddle wheels were also enlarged. Because increased steam production became necessary, the current boiler house had to be built in 1888, in which four Lancashire boilers were installed. In 1923, the steam engine and its four boilers were replaced by the installation still in place today, consisting of two Babcock & Wilcox water-tube boilers and a 500-hp steam engine. Both the boilers and the engine were built by the engineering company Gebrs Stork & Co. in Hengelo.

Boiler 1 has been stripped of its brickwork, revealing the interior. Boiler 2 is operational and is still regularly fired with coal, allowing the steam engine to come into operation.

The paddle wheels have a diameter of 7.5 m and a width of 2 m. They can discharge 25 m³ of water per second, or 1,500 m³ per minute, 90,000 m³ per hour, and 2,160,000 m³ per day.

[hmdb]

fietsnetwerk

"Steam pumping station Halfweg is a scoop wheel steam pumping station dating from 1852 and is the oldest and largest scoop wheel steam pumping station in the world that is still active. After draining the Haarlemmermeer in 1852, the Rijnland Water Board had nowhere to store the excess water. To be able to drain off that water as quickly as possible, three secondary steam pumping stations were built of which Halfweg was one. The steam pumping station was in operation until 1977. In those 125 years, it moved a total of 14 billion cubic metres of water and used 40,000 tonnes of coal to do so.

"Since 1986, the Friends of Steam Pumping Station Halfweg Foundation has been responsible for its maintenance and use as a national monument. Prince Claus reopened the steam pumping station in 1987 after a thorough restoration and since that day, the pumping station has been running under steam for the public several days a year. Add this piece of Dutch history and hydraulic engineering to your cycling route and check the website for the current steam days."

This is what was in front of the Prince Claus in the above photo.

Facebook Reel

Evidently, if you rent the event space, you can start up the engine:

Are you looking for a unique location for meetings, presentations, business events or tourist visits, with a terrace on the waterfront? Then look no further than the steam-powered pumping station at Halfweg, the world’s oldest and biggest still operational scoop-wheel pumping station.

Experience how large parts of the Netherlands have been reclaimed from the water and kept dry to this day at this fine example of industrial heritage. Surprise your guests with a visit to the engine room with its monumental 500 hp steam engine and gigantic paddle-wheels capable of pumping 1.5 million litres of water per minute! On request, the mighty steam engine is set in motion and one of your guests can turn the big wheel to open the steam valve. An unforgettable experience! The museum offers various catering options, as well as audio and video equipment and free WiFi. The boiler house, the venue for receptions and presentations, hosts up to 100 people.

[stoomgemaalhalfweg]

A better view of the flywheel and reduction gears.

Harm Franzen, Jul 2019

This is the inlet side. The paddles go down here.

Sjoerd Peerlkamp, Nov 2019

And this is the outlet side with the paddles going up.

Tommas Roos, Jul 2023

And the water comes out here.

Madelon Kooiman, Nov 2019

A closeup of the shaft and one of the bearings.

Franklin Hoogreef, Oct 2020

And a view on the opposite side of the engine shows how the shaft goes through the entire pump house.

Jaap van Herk, Sep 2023

Facebook Reel

Union City, TN: c189 Chamber of Commerce/Union Station: M&O+NCaStL

(Satellite)

NC&StL = Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis Railway 

The building has an angle because the NCaStL came through this crossing on an angle.

Street View, Jun 2024

Andrew Waldo posted two photos with the comment:

Union City, Tennessee: Passenger & Freight Station, Mobile & Ohio Railroad/Nashville, Chattanooga & St Louis Railroad. The Notes give us two views of the joint NC&StL/M&O Passenger & Freight Station at Union City. The first is the of the rear of the Station and the second is a track side view looking west down the NC&StL, with the M&O crossing the horizontal center of the photograph. Northbound is to the right. The Notes estimate the Station was built in about 1891. The photograph was taken on 16 May 1916.

Credit: National Archives & Records Administration, ICC Engineering Field Notes, Mobile & Ohio Railroad, Tennessee. Digital Image Collection of Andrew Waldo.

1

1
[This photo shows the backend of the depot before an addition was added.]

2

1954/55 Union City Quad @ 24,000

Street View, Jun 2024

This view shows the UCT patch confirming that UCT bought the former-CSX unit.

It is a GP15. [Facebook]

Street View, Jun 2024

UCT is the Union City Terminal Railroad. [IndianaBusinessRailroad]
The owner of the grey industrial spurs is UCT. The owners of the red line going north from Rivers is UCT as the first owner and CN as the second owner.

National Rail Network Map

Evergreen, AL: L&N Depot and Caboose

Deopt: (Satellite)

Caboose: (Satellite)

I can't determine the current use for the building.

Street View, Jan 2024

Al Pelham posted
Credit Canebreak History private group by Jim Williams

Street View, Jan 2024

Point Pleasant, WV: B&O Depot

(Satellite)

I picked this older view because it had less vegetation in the way.

Street View, Sep 2013

This is the most recent view.

Street View, Aug 2025

I've come to think of "activist investor" as a euphemism for robber baron. And this depot is another demonstration that management doesn't like "wasting" money on maintenance. CSX has no pride.

Tucker McLaughlin, Aug 2025

Doug Bess posted three photos with the comment: "More photos of the B&O District Run 1 with B&O #9245. Comments on captions."

1
9245 shoving cut of cars up to the NYC interchange.

2
9245 running past the switch to the NYC interchange.
[The stairs and door in this photo is consistent with Tucker's photo above. So back in the B&O days, it had a nice paint job.]

3
9245 behind Point Pleasant depot after finishing up a day's work.

Doug's reference to NYC tracks made me wonder about what NYC was doing this far south. According to the 2005 SPV Map, it was two NYC subsidiaries. It was Toledo & Ohio Central (TOC) to the West, and the Kanawaha & Michigan (K&M) to the East. The bridge across the Ohio River was owned by both TOC and K&M. The C&O route that TOC joins was the Hocking Valley (HV). And according to the 2005 SPV Map, the NYC route is now owned by NS. (Of course, the C&O/HV and B&O routes are now owned by CSX.)

1958/60 Gallipolis Quad @ 24,000

I've noticed that this map doesn't do a good job of showing a route that is shared by NS and CSX. Today, it is NS that uses the HV route north of Point Pleasant.

National Rail Network Map

Rockwood, PA: B&O Depot and Lost Junction (RW) Tower

Depot: (Satellite)

Tower: (Satellite)

Jackson-Township historical preservation posted
B & O (Baltimore & Ohio) Railroad Depot in the town of Rockwood, Somerset County in 1908.
David Demsey shared
Darren Reynolds shared with the comment: "B&Os "RW" tower in Rockwood, Pennsylvania."

Jackson-Township historical preservation posted
B & O (Baltimore & Ohio) Railroad Depot, Roundhouse and Tower in Rockwood, Somerset County in 1908.
David Demsey shared

The depot was across the river from downtown.

1968/71 Rockwood Quad @ 24,000

The bridge across the wye and Casselman River was a connection between the B&O and Western Maryland.

Satellite

It must have been built after 1908 or I think it would show in the photo at the top. This is the oldest topo map I could find, it it already existed.

1921/21 Meyersdale Quad @ 62,500

The branch to the North goes to Johnstown.

1958

Milwaukee, WI: 1867 Illinois Steel/North Chicago Bay View Works

(Satellite, this is the location of the historical marker. The mill was north of here and the company town was south of here.)

wuwm, Courtesy of Ron Winkler
"In 1867, Eber Brock Ward chose an area south of Milwaukee to open his newest rolling mill. That area is now known as Milwaukee’s Bay View neighborhood."

I knew that Brock Ward had a mill on Goose Island. I did not know he had a mill in Wisconsin. This was his third mill.

"Many small manufacturers had sparked considerable industrial energy in Milwaukee by the end of the Civil War. But Eber Brock Ward, a wealthy Detroit industrialist and former Great Lakes shipping magnate, sparked new area growth when he opened the Milwaukee Iron Company in 1868 with 185 employees on twenty-seven acres in Bay View. Brock owned iron companies in Detroit and Chicago, was a pioneer manufacturer of steel rails, and was lured to Milwaukee by easy access to rich iron ore deposits in Michigan and nearby Iron Ridge in Dodge County. He built homes and boarding houses, donated lots for churches, and recruited skilled English puddlers and other artisans. The company produced re-rolled iron rails; metal bars called fish plates, which joined two rails together; merchant bar, which customers reshaped for other products; horse shoes; nails; and pig iron, a durable product made from smelting iron ore with coke and limestone in blast furnaces. By 1870, the company produced half of Wisconsin’s pig iron. By the early 1870s, Milwaukee Iron employed one thousand workers and was a national leader in iron production." [uwm]

wuwm and BayViewHistoricalSociety

Near this site in Bay View stood the Milwaukee Iron Company rolling mill, the first major heavy industry in the region and an important producer of iron and steel for the Midwest. The mill, which opened in 1868, transformed ore from Dodge County and Lake Superior area mines into iron products including thousands of tons of rail for the region’s growing railroads.

By 1885, more than 1500 people were employed at the plant, some recruited from the iron-producing districts of the British Isles, and the village of Bay View grew from a rural crossroads to an industrial community surrounding the rolling mill.

On May 5, 1886, the mill was the scene of a major labor disturbance. Nearly 1500 strikers from around Milwaukee marched on the Bay View mill to dramatize their demand for an eight-hour work day. The local militia, called to the scene by Governor Jeremiah Rusk, fired on the crowd, killing seven people.

The mill closed in 1929, and the buildings were demolished a decade later. But the community of Bay View remains: a neighborhood of mill workers houses, shops and churches.

[hmdb]

David Nelson posted six images with the comment:

A few more things about the Bay View rolling mill.   I am repeating some already posted photos, some lesser quality ones not previously posted, an October 1985 aerial view from my (former) condo at Bay View Terrace of the general area. and a Sanborn map.

For those that know the area, notice that it is the rolling mill's own trackage that explains the "dog leg" in S Superior Street!

1
[A Wisconsin Memories post provides a date of 1938.]

2
[This looks like just a cropped version of Photo 1.]

3

4

5

6
[The historical marker is out-of-frame in the lower-left corner.]

LinksToThePast
"Milwaukee Iron Company rolling mill (also known as the Bay View Rolling Mill, North Chicago Rolling Mill, and United States Steel) located in Bay View operated the first major heavy industry in the region, iron and steel production. The rolling mill which opened in 1868, was first built to re-roll railroad rails, but then started to manufacture new rails transforming ore from Dodge County and Lake Superior area mines. In 1883 the furnaces were operated by the North Chicago Rollowing Mills. By 1885, more than 1500 people were employed at the plant, some recruited from the iron-producing districts of the British Isles. The village of Bay View grew from a rural crossroads into an industrial community surrounding the rolling mill."
[The remainder of the article concerns the Bay View Massacre on May 5, 1886, during a strike for an 8-hour work day.]

Wisconsin’s most historic and bloody labor incident occurred on May 5, 1886 on the shores of Lake Michigan in the Bay View area of Milwaukee. That day dawned after four days of massive worker demonstrations throughout Milwaukee on behalf of the creation of eight-hour day laws..

As some 1,500 workers marched toward the Bay View Rolling Mills (then the area’s biggest manufacturer) urging the workers thereto join the marches, the State Militia lined up on a hill, guns poised.  The marchers were ordered to stop form some 200 yards away; when they didn’t, the militiamen fired into the crowd, killing seven persons.

The marchers dispersed and the eight-hour days marches ended. The incident, in spite of its immediate end to eight-hour day efforts, spurred workers and their families to look forward to build a more progressive society in Milwaukee and Wisconsin.

[WisconsinLaborHistory]

This is one of the homes that was built for the puddlers to help entice them to leave England and work here. [UrbanMilwaukee]

Street View, Mar 2025