Book excerpt: This book fuels the world-wide interest in American locomotives of the late-steam era, when strong performance, high horsepower, and functional beauty were givens. Among roads wealthy enough to afford such engines, Chesapeake & Ohio was in the forefront with its 'Super Power,' and this new book systematically sets forth the development, use, maintenance, and performance of these 'custom made' designs from the introduction in 1930 of the C&O T-1, then the world's most powerful two-cylinder locomotive, through the 'Kanawhas' and 'Greenbriers' of the 1940s, to the L-2 class of 1942 and 1948, the worlds heaviest Hudsons, to the last fifteen of the Allegheny type, which had established the highest drawbar horsepower record of any steam locomotive in the world. The fascinating story of C&O Super Power involves not only the road's own Mechanical Department in Richmond, Virginia, but its close association with Lima Locomotive Works, of Lima, Ohio, and its even closer kinship with the authoritative Advisory Mechanical Committee of Cleveland, Ohio. In giving the reader a fresh and penetrating examination of C&O Super Power, this book brings together over 175 photos, plus reproductions of C&O's own locomotive diagrams and an ICC inspection report for Allegheny no. 1604, preserved today in Baltimore. The photos were carefully selected for quality, relevance to the text, and originality. These action and still photos hopefully will offer images seldom if ever seen before that the viewer will greet with surprise and delight.