I'm well into writing an extensive article on New Haven heavyweight equipment. Fortunately, there are a lot of historical records and resources online, particularly periodicals and professional journals. Even better, most are searchable (although skimming through them manually often still yields further insight).
Railway Age is probably the most commonly known such journal.
Many of these periodicals changed names over the years, and/or were combined with other journals. They often maintained their volume numbering system, from predecessors, which can be confusing because you may be looking for editions of, say, Railway Age Gazette, Mechanical Edition and not find many
One such periodical is Railway Mechanical and Electrical Engineer, which was absorbed into Railway Age in 1953. But it only used that title for a short period. Here's a list of links to the issues of that periodical, along with its predecessors all linked to online sources. It retained its volume numbering system from American Railroad Journal starting in 1832.
Many of these are hosted in multiple places on the internet, but the ones I have linked have copies that are available to download without restrictions.
Happy reading and researching!
- Volumes 1 (1832) to 60 (1886)
- This merged with
- Volumes 1 (1869) to 35 (1886)
- to become
Railroad and Engineering Journal
- Volume 61 (1887) to 66 (1892)
- and then
American Engineer and Railroad Journal
- Volumes 67 (1893) to 85 (1911)
- Volumes 87 (1912) and 87 (1913) were retitled American Engineer
- Another journal:
- Volumes 1 (1870) to 16 (1885)
- Only 11-16 are currently available online.
- became
- Volumes 17 (1886) to 26 (1895)
- then was absorbed into American Engineer and Railroad Journal
- Partway through 1913 it was acquired by the Railway Age Gazette:
Railway Age Gazette, Mechanical Edition
- Volumes 87 (1913) to 89 (1915)
- It 1916 it was retitled to:
- Volumes 90 (1916) to 123 (1949)
- After 1949 it became
Railway Mechanical and Electrical Engineer
- Volumes 124 (1950) to 126 (1952)
- It was then absorbed into Railway Age
