Neilson & Company was a locomotive manufacturer in Glasgow, Scotland founded in 1836. In 1843, they began building for the local railways, and by 1855, they were building four-coupled tank engines. In 1861, James Reid became a partner and the company became Neilson Reid locomotives.

With increasing train loads during the early 20th century, the North British Railway needed more locomotives; it was James Reid who would base the company’s new locomotives on the successful D32s, trains famous for transporting perishables, mostly fish from Mallaig and Aberdeen. For the benefit of trainspotters, the D32s were built with saturated 5ft 1.25in diameter boilers, 6ft diameter driving wheels, and 19in x 26in cylinders were operated with piston valves.

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It was also Reid who re-introduced the policy of renaming NBR locomotives. The D29 models carried names taken from Sir Walter Scott’s novels, and they quickly became known as the ‘Scott Class.’ The first batch of six built by the North British Locomotive Company in 1909 included NBR#896 also known as the Dandie Dinmont. The train was retired from service in 1949.

One of the Scott class locomotives

Fast forward to 2015 when the Borders Railway began a scenic train journey that traveled deep into the heart of the landscapes Sir Walter Scott wrote about in his famous novel. Queen Elizabeth I officially opened the Railway with a special steam train trip which also marked the day she becomes Britain’s longest-serving monarch. Other travelers included two Dandie Dinmont Terriers who travelled to Waverley station to honor the writer ahead of his birthday. The line began in Edinburgh (site of The Scott Monument) and ended near his former home Abbotsford House.

To our knowledge, the Dandie Dinmont Terrier may be the only breed for which a train has been named. Readers may wonder about “the Saluki,”  one half of a pair of passenger trains operated by Amtrak between Chicago and Carbondale in Illinois named for the breed, but it is part of Amtrak’s Illinois Service that debuted in 2006 and not the actual locomotive.

Locomotive image by Andy Dingley/Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10650056. Dandie Dinmont Terrier image appears courtesy of the AKC on the occasion of the breed’s 200th Anniversary.