While we are not a railroad museum, per se, my hometown historical society is in the process of acquiring some railroad rolling stock for our interpretive center.
This past year, we did some exterior restoration of our 1902-era grain elevator and part of our ongoing plans to turn it into a museum and interpretive center is to replace a couple sectios of railroad track next to the elevator and place the rolling stock upon it.
As of right now, our rolling stock collection consists of a boxcar and a caboose, both of Milwaukee Road heritage, as that is the railroad that served Preston for about seventy six years. (Believe it or not, Preston was originally on a three-foot narrow gauge railroad (the Caledonia, Mississippi & Western) from 1879 until 1900 when the line was re-gauged.)
According to the information on the boxcar, it was built in December of 1939, which puts it among the first group of home-built, 40', ribbed-sided steel boxcars built at the Milwaukee Road's shops in Milwaukee.
Our caboose is also a home-built car, among the last group of ribbed-sided, steel cabooses built in 1951.
The caboose currently resides in a small salvage yard in Wisconsin and will remain there until we raise the funds to pay it off and ship it here to Minnesota. The boxcar is currently in Calmar, Iowa and has been graciously donated by the Iowa, Chicago & Eastern.
Apparently, there was a blurb about the caboose donation in the December 17th, 2007 Trains newswire ("Minnesota Town Acquires Milwaukee Road Caboose"). As I am not a current Trains subscriber, I cannot access the article to read what information it includes. I sent an e-mail to them last week to see if they'd send me a copy of the article, but I have yet to receive it.
I'm not sure when we will be moving the caboose, but plans are tennatively set to move the boxcar sometime in February.
I will keep you posted on things as they develop.
Speaking of developing... I am having computer issues right now, so it will be a while before I can post some images of the caboose and boxcar from my own collection. Although, there are images of the boxcar on RR Picture Archives.net...
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/rsPict ... ?id=280612
Enjoy!
- Erik "Komachi" Paulson, Vice President, Preston (MN) Historical Society
This past year, we did some exterior restoration of our 1902-era grain elevator and part of our ongoing plans to turn it into a museum and interpretive center is to replace a couple sectios of railroad track next to the elevator and place the rolling stock upon it.
As of right now, our rolling stock collection consists of a boxcar and a caboose, both of Milwaukee Road heritage, as that is the railroad that served Preston for about seventy six years. (Believe it or not, Preston was originally on a three-foot narrow gauge railroad (the Caledonia, Mississippi & Western) from 1879 until 1900 when the line was re-gauged.)
According to the information on the boxcar, it was built in December of 1939, which puts it among the first group of home-built, 40', ribbed-sided steel boxcars built at the Milwaukee Road's shops in Milwaukee.
Our caboose is also a home-built car, among the last group of ribbed-sided, steel cabooses built in 1951.
The caboose currently resides in a small salvage yard in Wisconsin and will remain there until we raise the funds to pay it off and ship it here to Minnesota. The boxcar is currently in Calmar, Iowa and has been graciously donated by the Iowa, Chicago & Eastern.
Apparently, there was a blurb about the caboose donation in the December 17th, 2007 Trains newswire ("Minnesota Town Acquires Milwaukee Road Caboose"). As I am not a current Trains subscriber, I cannot access the article to read what information it includes. I sent an e-mail to them last week to see if they'd send me a copy of the article, but I have yet to receive it.
I'm not sure when we will be moving the caboose, but plans are tennatively set to move the boxcar sometime in February.
I will keep you posted on things as they develop.
Speaking of developing... I am having computer issues right now, so it will be a while before I can post some images of the caboose and boxcar from my own collection. Although, there are images of the boxcar on RR Picture Archives.net...
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/rsPict ... ?id=280612
Enjoy!
- Erik "Komachi" Paulson, Vice President, Preston (MN) Historical Society
~Erik Paulson
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