Steam Gauge Museum
(Page 2 of 4)
July / August 2005
By Barry L. David
Working pressure for an engine using a 200-pound gauge would be around 100 pounds. An Ashcroft trademark (Photos #3 and #3A) saw use from 1898 until 1907. It also sports the 1884 Ashcroft auxiliary spring patent that was used extensively on traction engine gauges.
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Photos #4 and #4A are an unusual Ashcroft trademark used between 1902 and 1907. A 250-pound J.I. Case threshing machine gauge with an engine operating pressure around 125 pounds.
Photos #5 and #5A are the same gauge as the 1902 but with the 1907 Ashcroft trademark. I have seen many of the 1902 J.I. Case gauges, but only one of these. It must have been the transition where J.I. Case was still using the 250-pound gauge but Ashcroft started using the 1907 trademark.
Ashcroft used a trademark (Photos #6 and #6A) from 1907 until the merger in 1929 with the American Steam Gauge & Valve Mfg. Co. We don't see any more increases in the maximum pressure of 300 pounds for Case gauges. The Case histories state that the last Case steam engine rolled off the production line in 1924.
During my 16 years of pursuing gauges, I found it frustrating that there was so little information on steam gauges. I had to compile the histories of the each gauge maker company from old catalogs and obituaries of their founders while working closely with several historical societies.
It took me 12 years to complete a collectors guide for steam gauge enthusiasts. In 2003, I made the guide with its large chapters on railroad, traction engine and fire engine gauges, available to other collectors. It is called The Antique American Steam Gauge, a Collector's Guide, and is available from Astragal Press.
Steam Gauge Museum
After putting the finishing touches on the guide, I needed a new project. We don't often have the opportunity to view these original gauges because they are tied up in private collections. I wanted to at least make my collection more accessible to those who wished to view it by housing it in a kind of steam gauge museum, if you will. The perfect venue for such a collection would be the original setting for a steam gauge. A 19th century steam water works in the New England countryside sprang to mind. Unfortunately, this was difficult to find in northern Utah. The next best thing would be a railroad building or piece of rolling stock like an old palace car. Again, these choices proved difficult to locate, but what I did find was an old railroad caboose to restore. I had considered a caboose from the period of the collection, but wood cabooses have not held up well through the years. The wood cabooses I could locate would have had to be torn down and rebuilt board by board. My wife wasn't too excited about a railroad caboose in the backyard, but the thought of getting all those gauges out of the house appealed to her even more.