Yes, McCloud locomotives did engage in a tender swap. When the #16 arrived on the property in 1938 the McCloud River rebuilt it in the company shops. When they finished with the locomotive the #18 came into the backshop for some work, but the shop had yet to refinish the #16's tender. The shop simply took the tender off of the #18 and attached it to the #16 to get it out on the road. When the #18 emerged the #17 was next in line, and the shop mated the #17's tender to the #18, and then fixed up the #16's original tender for use with the #17 when it emerged. In 1953 the railroad swapped the tenders behind the #16 and #19 just prior to disposing of both locomotives (#16 to scrap, #19 to the Yreka Western). Thus, the #19 today has the #18's original tender; the #18 has the tender originally from the #17; the tender from the #16 went to scrap with the #17; and the original tender from the #19 went to scrap with the #16.

I don't know offhand what the the capacity of the #18's present tender is, but it should be somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,500-2,000 gallons of oil and 3,500-5,000 gallons of water. If anyone has a builder's card for Pacific Portland Cement #102 (Baldwin c/n 42912) lying around we should have an exact answer.

Jeff Moore
Elko, NV